Dodging metre-long flames, blacksmith Guido Gouverneur plies
30-centimetre-long tongs to pull a glowing piece of metal from the jaws of a
roaring furnace.
The metal is passed to a dreadlocked assistant, who conveys
it to a steam-powered hammer that bangs and clangs it into shape.
These rare machines are ancient, and so are the activists
who have emerged in a campaign against the State Government, which wants to
evict Mr Gouverneur’s company, Wrought Artworks, from the workshop.
“A lot of the ex-railway workers have come down for
meetings here. They have been very instrumental in the workshop remaining a
heritage site and the machinery maintained,” said the co-director of
Wrought Artworks, Wendie McCaffley.
“These guys are really, really pissed off.”
The Redfern-Waterloo Authority says that because it is a
commercial business, Wrought Artworks should pay to use the workshop it has had
free use of for the past 17 years.
“Should the current business be required to vacate, the
Australian Technology Park
will keep the heritage equipment in place and establish an alternative
blacksmithing operation sympathetic to the history of the site,” said the
authority’s chief executive, Robert Domm. “This commercial issue is being
misrepresented as a heritage issue.”
For Bob Rhymes, 85, it is every inch a heritage matter.
“I worked there for 30 years, starting in 1950,” he said.
A former machinist, he recalls that workers would go to
their Wilson Street
homes for lunch when the work-whistle could be heard in Newtown.
“The issue is the heritage, not only of the building
and the machinery but also the memory of the men who worked there. A good many
died of industry-related disease. When I see those machines still working, it’s
like you imagine their ghosts.”
Mr Rhymes is close to many of his workmates from 30 years
ago, some of who will speak at an open day at the workshop on August 17.
The Government denies any conspiracy and says it simply
wants a tenant that will pay rent.
But Mr Gouverneur says his presence on the site was a
condition of the development consent granted when the former industrial area
was turned into a technology park in 1996.
“What other blacksmith would move in here? The fact is,
our presence here has made it impossible for them to turn the workshop into
offices or something else. We could end up with a Meriton on the site.”
Photo: Peter Rae Photo: Forging ahead … blacksmith Guido
Gouverneur is prepared for a hot contest with the State Government over the
heritage of this workplace.
Source:
www.smh.com.au/news/national/anvil-chorus-sparks-an-overwrought-row/2008/08/07/1217702251128.html