Hurstville Museum & Gallery exhibition
Makers & Manufacturers: The Industrial History of St George
9 November 2024 – 11 May 2025
Makers & Manufacturers highlights the untold stories of the industrial history of the St George region. As Sydney expanded during the 19th century, the St George area remained unsettled longer than any other, with a population of just over 450 people by 1841. The earliest industries in the area used the abundant natural resources and included timber gathering, charcoal production, lime burning and oyster farming. With a growing population in the region, however, agriculture, local manufacturing and construction industries began to expand. Farms of every kind, dairies, ship and boat builders and even non-food crops, including tobacco cultivation and an ostrich farm existed, contributing to the expansion and development of the region. By the end of the First World War, numerous businesses and industries existed, including ice works, bakeries, butchers and slaughter yards, brickworks and potteries, timber yards, boot and shoemakers and builders. As Australia became a more affluent society during the 1950s, people became ‘consumers’ who could purchase mass-produced goods, many of which were made in local factories. From the 1960s onwards, new technologies continued to influence the way manufactured goods were produced, and modern Australia took shape.
Selection of boot making tools including shoe talc and stitch marker, c. 1920s-40s. Metal, leather and cardboard, Hurstville Museum & Gallery collection, H1980.368.
Incorporating historical material from Hurstville Museum & Gallery’s collection, along with loan items from public and private collections, including the Powerhouse Museum, Australian National Maritime Museum and the National Film and Sound Archive, the exhibition sheds light on little-known aspects of the local, social, economic and business history of the region. It explores many diverse industries, those who worked in them, and how they have contributed significantly to the development of the St George region.
Boatbuilders, Neverfail Bay, Georges River, Oatley, NSW, c. 1912. Georges River Libraries Local Studies collection, SNR-871.
This project is supported by the Create NSW Cultural Grants Program, a devolved funding program administered by the RAHS on behalf of the NSW Government
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