10. Wakefield Cottage
This building started as a simple four roomed cottage with rear skillion roofed lean-to. The projecting southern gable front was added some years later. The northern wing, attached by a breezeway was added in 2016. The original owner was John Smith, who also owned The Magpie and Stump Hotel and the adjacent Flour Mill. The properties were advertised for auction in February 1900 and described as ‘Allots. 76, 77, Township of Mintaro, containing 2 Acres, with 6-roomed Stone House thereon, known as the Mill House.’[1] Following Smith’s death in 1876, the house had a number of owners, including James Torr, the owner/publican of The Devonshire Arms, who donated the land on which the playground and bowling green sits today to the community. Another owner was William Skuse, an early Mintaro settler. Both Torr and Skuse are buried in the local cemetery. Their headstones reflect their differing wealth and station in life. Initial conservation work was carried out in the 1980s, and this included restoration of the shingled roof, some internal modifications and external consolidation work. The cottage was modified for its role as a restaurant in the 2000s and operated as such for a number of years. It has been a private residence undergoing ongoing extension and conservation since 2011.
02. Mintaro Post Office
The Mintaro Post Office was built in 1883, although the township has had a postal service from 1866. The simple sandstone and brick building was built to a standard design repeated in many country towns. The sandstone is tuck pointed with black lining and red brick curved plinths are used. The Post Office Building is listed as a State Heritage Place on the State Heritage Register. It passed from The Commonwealth into private ownership in 1930 when it was sold to Frank McNamara for £4100. The McNamara’s continued to operate the postal agency until 1979 when it was sold to Stephen and Marilyn Geier. Since then, the building and postal agency has changed hands on four occasions. Various additions to the building were added over these years but recent conservation work has seen these removed. The postal agency continues to operate as the town’s distribution centre for letters and parcels, now for one hour a day, Monday to Friday. Banking agencies and other services are no longer provided.
04. Central Business Complex
The row of shops across the main street from the Post Office and Devonshire House was built in the 1850’s to service Mintaro’s commercial needs. The traditional ground floor commercial layout was complemented by upper floor living accommodation. In 1853 Joseph Gilbert sold Allotment No. 37 to shoemaker John Huxtable and then sold the northern section to James McWaters, a farmer, in March 1857. Lot 36, to its north, was originally owned by Frederick Leighton, a blacksmith who operated a forge and had stables behind the main building, the sections of the buildings over time were used for a variety of services and retail enterprises including fodder stores, a fruit and vegetable shop, a delicatessen that provided lunches to the Slate Quarry workers, a butcher and a branch of the ES&A Bank. Various families occupied the living areas until the 1980’s when both buildings were purchased by ‘entrepreneurs’ and renovated and converted to a small general store, tearooms, a restaurant and small conference centre and Bed and Breakfast accommodation, incorporating the attic bedrooms. Slate, a feature of many Mintaro buildings, has been used extensively to construct walls and paving on the ground floors and verandas. Stone horse mounting steps, originally located in front of the Post Office, are now a feature at the front of the shops, between an incredibly old Pepper tree and equally ancient Moreton Bay fig tree.
06. Magpie & Stump Hotel
The first allotments of Mintaro were sold in late 1949, and by December 1950, the Magpie and Stump Hotel was completed at the entrance to the village. It mainly operated to service the needs of the itinerant bullock and mule drivers who rested whilst making their way from Burra to Port Wakefield. A little south of the hotel are the bullock stables and huge rings are still visible where the bullocks were tied up at night. Internally, the property consists of a front bar, two dining areas, a kitchen and bed and breakfast accommodation. Externally, at the rear of the property, the original stables, stockyard and coach house have been converted to form private storage areas. At the front of the hotel, the triangular design encloses the once celebrated 1936 Centenary Garden project. Between the garden and the hotel was a roadway, now a part of the delightful lawned beer garden. The building is constructed with stone, slate and brick and has a corrugated iron roof. Today the Magpie and Stump remains the physical and social focal point of the village.[1] There were not that many hotels in South Australia when the Magpie and Stump opened its doors in 1850. The decision to do so when the town was so small was principally to provide a service to the bullock and mule drivers. ‘Sometimes as many as 70 muleteers and their teams stayed overnight, with their showy dresses and lassos and knives often used in disputes. They did not endear themselves to the adults of Mintaro, though small boys watched with intense interest.’[2] It is not surprising then to learn that by the 1860s, due to increased concern for their welfare, a village petition raised awareness for the building of a police station and the procurement of a police trooper! The adjacent shop with its baker’s oven dating from the late 1850s is now incorporated into the hotel. The old shop, in the pub, had a room devoted to the Mintaro Coursing Club which started in 1884. The last live hare was used as a lure as recently as 1986. Coursing then continued in the area until 1997 using a drag lure. Notes State Heritage Branch Register Report prepared by Kate McDougall, 7 Sep 1982. Government of South Australia, Department of Environment and Water, Mintaro State Heritage Area (Fact sheet) [PDF], https://cdn.environment.sa.gov.au/environment/docs/her-fact-mintarosha-factsheet.pdf, accessed 13/10/2024.
22. Jolly House
This allotment of land was purchased by Yeoman Joseph Rogers for 10 Pounds, then sold to Thomas Miller for 20 Pounds in 1855. Miller already owned the adjoining properties and the stone structure at the rear of the property on Lot 20 which could be the remainders of Miller’s carting operation. Henry Jolly, a carpenter and undertaker purchased Lot 40 (sic) in 1856 and probably built this house soon afterwards. Jolly’s original home was built from stone and galvanised iron.[1] Henry Jolly and his wife Elizabeth Dickson Jolly came to Mintaro, SA, from St Peter’s Port, Guernsey in 1851 with their one-year-old son. Henry was a carpenter and a Wesleyan lay preacher, and the last example of his work is in St Mark’s Anglican Church, Penworthan.[2] Their son Henry Dickson Jolly married Anne Lathlean, daughter of Richard Lathlean, on 29 Jun 1876 in Campbelltown, South Australia. Henry and Annie had eight children Ernest Harry Jolly, Bertram Dickson Jolly, Elsie Elizabeth (Jolly) Bath, Norman William Jolly, Alice Lydia Jolly, Annie Jolly, Hazel Mary Jolly and Rupert Eric Jolly. All Henry Dickson Jolly’s children excelled in professional life; his son Norman being South Australia’s first Rhodes Scholar. Norman attended Prince Alfred College and the University of Adelaide, graduating with a Bachelor of Science (BSc). In 1904, Norman Jolly was the first South Australian to be chosen for a Rhodes Scholarship, attending Balliol College, Oxford. After graduating B.A. from Oxford with a first in natural science in 1907, Norman Jolly studied under (Sir) William Schlich, and briefly in Europe, to obtain the Oxford diploma of forestry.[3] Another son, Bertram, played Australian rules football for Norwood and is recognised by the Redlegs Museum even though his time with the club was brief.[4] After Henry Jolly senior’s death in 1888 the property remained in his family until it was sold to Sidney Torr in 1899 for 220 Pounds. This cottage is an important element within Burra Street and complements Mintaro’s built environment. It has a simple rectangular plan and the projecting wing is probably a later (c.1890s) addition. There is a distinctive timber valence work to the front verandah and gable end, the central section probably being the work of Henry Jolly.[5]
23. House, Store & Carpenter’s Shop
Allotment 38 was sold to Burnett Nathan in August 1851. Four years later an ‘equal half part’ of the land – the southern portion of it – was sold to Richard Lathlean who probably began building his residence and shop soon afterwards. By 1867 Lathlean was assessed for his house and garden, a shop, warehouse, stone cellar, and shed. In the 1870s the complex was known as Lathlean’s Post Office and Store, the Mintaro Telegraph operating from 1873 with ‘ …. the instrument installed in the store besides the Post Office.’ Two early photographs survive of the shop and workshop – PH4 c.1890? and PH5 a 1951 view which shows the carpenter’s shop beginning to deteriorate at parapet level. PH4 shows handsome shop fittings, elegant arch headed windows with delicate nine-paned windows with arch heads and a parapet sign which says ‘J. Denton General Store.’ Lessees of the property or portion of the property included William Butler from 1874, George Montgomery from 1896, and Harry Cliff Denuren (sic) from 1908. H.G. Jolly and family ran a carpentry, painting, building and undertaking business from these premises.[1] Richard Lathlean Snr., the original owner of this building, was born 1824 in Cornwall and arrived in South Australia on the 27th January 1847 on the David Malcolm with his wife and child. He is first reported in Mintaro, speaking at a meeting, in December 1855 and then named as a storekeeper in an inquest into the death of Anne Matthews, a servant in his employ, who died at his house in 1857 (‘…by the visitation of God‘[2]). Having previously purchased the northeasterly part of Lot 38 from Burnett Nathan (a land speculator) the Certificate of Title vol. 31 folio 193 of 1862 records the transfer of the property to bring it under the Real Property Act 1858. The southeasterly half of Lot 38 was finally brought under the new Act in 1874 (CT vol. 192 folio 167). In 1864 he sold his ‘business’ to W. A. Rabbich and opened a store in Kapunda but returned to Mintaro a year later and repossessed his business from Mr. Rabbich who was ‘intending to follow some other.’[3] Two years later in 1867 he purchased part Lots 50 & 51, on the opposite side of Burra street and south of Young street, on which he built another store. This property was subjected to the January 1874 flood of Kadlunga creek, the newspaper report of the day stating ‘…and on the level ground in front of Mr. Lathlean’s store it was up over the middle of a tall man’s body.’[4] A devout member of the Mintaro Wesleyan congregation Richard Lathlean was instrumental in hiring James Fry as a teacher for Mintaro in 1867 while Secretary to the School Committee of the Church. He was also involved in the acquisition of the land that would eventually be the home of the public school. Lathlean retired from business in 1874 and moved with his wife to the city. He advertised his Farrell store for let or sale but retained the Mintaro properties and leased the ‘business’ at Lot 38 to William Butler on a 5-year term. The business continued from 1878 to 1896 under the management of Henry Dickson Jolly, son of Henry Jolly, carpenter, who had married Richard Lathlean’s second daughter Annie in 1876. The store on part Lots 50 & 51 was sold in 1882 to Mary Hogben, widow of Edward Hogben from Manoora, while in 1896 Mr. H. D. Jolly ‘disposed of his business and left Mintaro’[5] at Lot 38. This property was then leased to George Montgomery whose store on the corner of Burra & Hill streets was ‘…burnt to the ground last night.’[6] Richard Lathlean died in 1902 and the title transferred to his wife Elizabeth. She continued to lease the property and in 1905 George Montgomery sold the ‘business’ to Denton Bros. of Farrell Flat. By 1908 the property was leased to Harry Clifton Uren and two years after Elizabeth Lathlean died (1909) the property was sold to W. T. Mortlock. When Mr. Mortlock died in 1913 the property transferred to his trustees and eventually was sold to Leonard Albert Fisher in 1953. After the death of his wife, Iris Collette Fisher, in 2015 the property was sold to Mr. Simon Stretton. The building has been undergoing careful restoration and development since then.
08. Former Police Station & Lock Up
The Mintaro Police Station was built during the important developmental phase of the town (1860s and 1870s). Increased traffic through the village necessitated greater protection for its residents and in 1868 the building was completed. The property comprises of a main building, exercise yard, cell block and accompanying horse stables. It is sited upon an elevated block and a grand slate staircase leads to the front door. The main building has a central charge room (now a residential lounge room), two bedrooms and a kitchen. At the rear of the trooper’s residence are three cells and two bathrooms. A large exercise yard lies in between, completely surrounded by tall stone walls. The building is constructed with slate and sandstone walls, slate flooring under the verandah, quoining and corrugated iron. The central projecting pavilion emphasises the front door and a recessed sandstone sign announces the Police Station. This Police Station design was also used in Truro and Callington.[1] Mintaro was a village without a police station for the first 18 years of its existence. It seems that the growing town was in need of police presence and townsfolk were annoyed with the government for being neglected. Due to increased concern for their welfare, a village petition raised awareness for the building of a police station and the procurement of a police trooper. By August of 1867, an acre of land had been purchased for 50 pounds, the building designed by the Colonial Architect’s Office and the foundation stone laid. By February of 1868 the building was completed at a cost of 1100 pounds. The builder was W. Paterson.
24. Catholic Church & Cemetery
In 1851 Peter and Bridget Brady purchased an 80-acre section and offered Fr Kranewitter SJ, an Austrian Jesuit priest, the use of their small cottage for Sunday Mass. Over time with the village growing, a need became apparent for the district’s Catholic population to have its own church. On April 24th, 1855, Peter Brady transferred two acres of his land to Bishop Murphy on which to construct a new Catholic Church. On June 7th, 1855, the foundation stone was laid by Bishop Murphy for the Church of the Immaculate Conception, the first church in Australia to be given this title. With the hard work of the parishioners, assisted by Fr Kranewitter and the help of Mr Thompson Priest, a local stonemason, the new church was completed and officially blessed and opened by Bishop Murphy on the 23rd of November 1856. It remains the oldest, extant Jesuit Church in Australia.[1][2] The church is built of local stone and was built by local men who quarried, sorted and carted the stone. Father Kranewitter and his companions and also Thompson Priest, a local stone mason and stone cutter, helped in building the church. The stain glass windows bear the names of the early parishioners—Peter and Bridget Brady, Michael Tobin, Mary Smith, W.E. & H. Giles, T. Dempsey and G. Faulkner. Changes to the church over the years have included a polished wooden ceiling, in 1906, and in the 1920s the flagged slate floor was replaced by wooden flooring. In 1938 the church was fully renovated at great expense. Well attended masses and a reunion of past and present parishioners raised sufficient money to cover the costs of these renovations. Further changes to the interior of the church were made in the 1960s. When Father Ragalski was serving Mintaro in 1881 a Mission Cross was erected to commemorate a mission held in that year. A replica of the Mission Cross, built and erected by local, Shawn Deal, was blessed by Father Chris Jenkins in 2021. The centenary of the Church of the Immaculate Conception was celebrated on Sunday 25 November 1956 with a mass at the church, followed by lunch at the Mintaro Institute. Mass and celebrations to commemorate 150 years since the building of St. Mary’s Church Mintaro were held also, in 2006. From 1872 the Sisters of St. Joseph provided education to the catholic children of Mintaro, initially using the church building. Many of the pews used today have holes for inkwells. The school closed in 1890, only to reopen in 1925, along with a new convent for the Sisters. The school closed permanently in 1957. A plaque marks the site of the convent and commemorates the work of the Sisters of St. Joseph in Mintaro. Mintaro Catholic Cemetery is located on the eastern side of the church and is the burial place of many pioneering catholic families. The cemetery is still in use. St. Mary’s Mintaro continues to be served by the Jesuit priests from the Sevenhill Parish. Mass is celebrated on the second Sunday of each month at 12.00.
25. Mintaro Public Cemetery
The Mintaro Cemetery is one of two burial areas in Mintaro, the other being in the grounds of the Roman Catholic Church. The cemetery is located about one kilometre west of the town. It contains the earliest formal graves of settlers in the district, commencing in 1858-9. Some of the early headstones are in marble, but then in the 1860’s, slate headstones were supplied by Thompson Priest carved from slate taken from the nearby Mintaro Slate Quarries. These headstones are simple and elegant in design, but unfortunately are weathering quite badly due to lack of maintenance and the inherent nature of the stone. There are also excellent examples of iron fenced plots and above-ground slate graves. The burial plots extend along a narrow band, a North-South strip across the land allotted for the purpose (part of section 344). The cemetery area was one thousand links square. There was some early segregation of denominations and possibly even social classes in the early stages but these distinctions have become blurred over time. The graves of the Bowmans of Martindale and the Chewings of Kadlunga are in the northern section of the cemetery, and other early settlers graves are also easily located. The Mintaro Cemetery in a way reflects the atmosphere of the town. It has an aura of neglect and decay contrasting in spots with the bright newness of a freshly established grave.[1] A Mintaro Progress Association cemetery group works with local volunteers and the Clare and Gilbert Valleys Council to improve and maintain the public cemetery. Recent efforts include restoration of the main entrance gate, initial restoration of the ‘olive hedge’, a cemetery walking trail, construction of a shelter and of a columbarium for housing cremated remains.
26. Mintaro Slate Quarries
The Mintaro slate quarries are located two kilometres west of the town. The mining of slate played a vital part in maintaining the life of Mintaro after the cessation of copper transportation through the town. The quarry has continued to be a major employer of local labor. Slate was first discovered in the early 1850s on part of Section 178, land which belonged to Peter Brady. The flagstones were outcropping in-the bed of the creek which traverses the section. In 1856 Brady leased the slate bearing area to Thompson Priest, a Mintaro settler who began excavating the No. 1 quarry adjacent to the site of the original discovery. During the 1860s the land changes owners – from Brady to John Smith – but Priest continued to work the quarry. He built a house and office in Mintaro and a small office and foreman’s house at the quarry. Ruins of Priest’s quarry buildings remain on the site, and the house in the town is still in use. Mintaro slate was exhibited at the London International Exhibition of 1862 and “received the very highest awards, being classed as superior to any slate previously met with, the natural cleavage being equal to planed stone.” The 1860s and 70s saw Mintaro slate being used extensively in the local area, including Gawler. Wineries in the Barossa Valley and the Clare Valley used Mintaro slate for their fermenting tanks, and the Kapunda Copper Co. used slate tanks for the acid process in refining their ore. Thompson Priest employed 12 men in 1868, and in 1869 the Almanack entries for Mintaro list quarryman as an occupation for several Mintaro residents. An interesting comparison was made between Willunga and Mintaro slate in the Register, Sept. 30, 1871. “PAVING SLATES In the pavement in front of the new Post Office there has just been laid down before the principal entrance a fine slab of Mintaro slate measuring 12 x 9 feet. The bulk of the material used is from the Willunga quarries, the produce of which, though not equal to the Mintaro, is considerably less in price, and therefore generally used for the purpose. Mintaro stone has been used for the steps leading to the doorway, and also in other parts ‘of the building”. Thompson Priest’s method of disposing of his slate at this time was to hold an annual auction on the western boundary of Section 178. The price for the stone was£ 5.0.0 for a cart which could be pulled by one horse, and £10.0.0 if it needed two horses to pull the cart. The Mintaro cemetery contains a number of slate headstones which are delicately carved and bear Thompson Priest’s trademark. No. 1 quarry reached a depth of between 80 and 100 feet before the stone became too hard to be marketable. Thompson Priest’s son Edmund had become involved in the business also by this time. The land on which the quarry was located passed into the ownership of Sir Samuel Way in 1879 and was part of his Kadlunga estate. Some competition arose in 1884 when some local identities including Way’s manager, F.H. Weston, raised a syndicate and leased some land from Way in section 307 immediately north of Priest’s quarry. An attempt was made to establish another slate quarry but this foundered for lack of finance at this stage. Thompson Priest died in 1888 and the company was taken over by a Melbourne firm but it languished during the depression of the 1890s. The local syndicate tried again in 1893 again with Weston as its chairman. It leased what had been Priest’s area in section 178 and the area in section 307 which it had previously leased, and worked it with the main markets in Melbourne, until the syndicate was reformed in 1911 as the Mintaro Slate and Flagstone Company. The new company bought the land from Sir Samuel Way in 1912, and also purchased the Melbourne agency which had been its distributor for Victoria. In 1914, when the quarry was visited by the Government Geologist, Mr. L.K. Ward, a third quarry had been opened adjacent to the original No. 1, or Priest’s as it was known. The company employed 25 men at this stage. ·Steam and oil power had replaced hand powered methods for both quarrying and dressing the stone. The company continued producing quality slate with some fluctuation in market demand during the pre-war period. Post-war the sales slowly increased and in 1958 quarry no. 4 was opened for deeper work. The company suffered a take-over in 1978 and the quarry itself has since been sold to S.D. Tillett (memorial stone masons) and is continuing to function as Mintaro Slate Quarries. Mintaro slate has continued to have an extremely high reputation for quality and durability. The uses to which it has been put over time have been varied, ranging from the obvious building and paving applications, billiard tables, wine tanks and troughs, to the less known electrical switchboard uses. Mintaro is a perfect show place for the range of uses to which slate can be put. The Mintaro quarry is the oldest continuously functioning quarry in South Australia, and in the opinion of Mr. David Young of the Mines and Energy Department, possibly in Australia.[1]