 
Issue 30, Autumn 2012
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 STEAMING WITH HISTORY
Hillside and the Cavalcade of Iron Horses
A century of steam - an overview of the contribution the Hillside Workshops have made to New Zealand Industry from the 1870s to 1970s. Words by Sarah Bond.
There is a lingering smell of diesel and brake dust in Dunedin’s Hillside Engineering offices. The weatherboard buildings and series of workshops spread over seven hectares seem to breathe the history of New Zealand railways. Listening to the stories of two men with 103 years of combined railway engineering experience - hearing how Hillside developed as an engineering site and what it was like to work there over the years - is an experience in itself. Especially since they are both willing to share their stories with a non-rail expert.
Jim Hannah became an apprentice fitter in 1954, two years before the last steam locomotive chuffed out of Hillside workshop. Lyn Harris started in 1965 at the age of 15 as a fitter electrician. Hannah supposedly retired in 1996, although he has kept boomeranging back as an ISO Documentation and Quality auditor, and Harris’s current position is Production Manager.
Much of Harris and Hannah’s understanding of Hillside’s early years was captured by Jim Dangerfield, an experienced signalman who trained signal staff all over Otago and Southland - and collected rail memorabilia and photographs.
Today, the general populace seems to have forgotten that the railways were once the best way to travel around New Zealand. Before the 1950s few people had cars, and if the milk factories, forestry mills and freezing works were the heartbeat of New Zealand, the railways were the arteries that fed them.
Read the full story on pages 20-23 in Issue 30 – on sale now from your favourite magazine retailer, or order your subscription HERE and we'll rush a copy direct to your letterbox. |
 RESTORING HERITAGE, PIECE BY PIECE
By Kim Newth
Rows of precious stained glass are stacked against benches at the North Canterbury workshop of Stewart Stained Glass. Rescued from a cross-section of quake-damaged heritage buildings, in some cases they are all that remain of once-familiar city landmarks.
Since the first Canterbury earthquake of 4 September 2010, stained glass conservator Graham Stewart and his team have removed literally hundreds of windows for safe storage. The beautifully crafted pieces in the workshop represent just a small selection. Much of it has already been boxed up and moved to storage elsewhere. Sadly, along with the workshop’s complete pieces, are buckets of glass shards. A great deal more has simply been lost in the rubble.
Graham knows exactly where each rescued window has come from: “Christ Church Cathedral, the Canterbury Provincial Council Buildings, St Mary’s in Merivale, Holy Trinity Avonside, Sumner, Redcliffs, Sydenham church, St Andrew’s College…” It is at moments like this, staring at these pieces, that the true extent of damage sustained by the region’s buildings becomes achingly real. The dream is that not all this glass will remain in indefinite storage.
Giving hope in that respect is the company’s first major restoration project of a 2.7 metre high stained glass window from South Canterbury’s 1869 Church of the Holy Innocents.
Full story on pages 28-31 in HERITAGE MATTERS magazine, Issue 30 Autumn 2012 – on sale now from your favourite magazine retailer, or order your subscription HERE and we'll rush a copy direct to your letterbox. |
