The Great Synagogue Sydney, 1878

For an excellent history of Sydney’s first Jewish congregation, read Rabbi Raymond Apple's history of the Great Synagogue, Sydney. The formal establishment of Sydney’s first Jewish congregation came in Nov 1831 when “The Jews of the colony assembled at the Jews’ Synagogue held over Mr Rowell’s shop in George St”. Later interior alterations were made by Barnett Aaron Phil­l­ips, a carpenter who had worked at Drury Lane and built Aust­ralia’s first stage scenery in the Theatre Royal. The synagogue ark 1830s was one of the earliest pieces of religious furniture in the country.

Eventually numbers of congregants grew to over 300 adults, so larger premises were leased in Bridge St Sydney. When even bigger facilities were required, a building went up in York St Sydney. This new synagogue had comfortable space for 500 seats and was elab­or­ately furnished. Its ark, larger and even more impressive than that in Bridge St, also survives. The final move came in the 1870s when a site in Elizabeth St was purchased.

Pest Synagogue, 1854-9 [above] ..

Brussels Synagogue 1875 [below]

The Great Synagogue in Sydney was to reflect the important Great Synagogue in the City of London 1788-90 in its practices and possibly its appearance. However the Sydney arch­itecture may have derived its inspiration from a number of different sources, including the Great Synagogue Pest 1854-9 or the Great Synagogue Brussels 1875 built in the Romanesque-Byzantine style.

A comp­et­ition for the design for the new building was won by Sydney architect Thomas Rowe, who planned a building in the French Gothic taste. For financial reasons his plans had to be modified, so Rowe did not get to create his elaborate, dream building. But it didn’t matter; the foundation stone was laid in 1875.

Great Synagogue,  1878
Elizabeth St entrance, Sydney.

Great Synagogue, rose window

The Great Synagogue was consecrated in 1878. This cathedral synagogue was built in sandstone in the neo-gothic style of course, but with some clear Byzantine elements. The most cathedral-like element was the giant rose window in the front wall, facing Elizabeth St and the gorgeous Hyde Park outside. Two square towers flanked the central compart­ment, terminating in beautiful domes, and the entire front was enclosed by ornate cast-iron gates as seen in the Sydney Daily Photo blog.

The interior of the synagogue was designed to maximise the sense of space, due to the height of the cast iron columns. The main décor­at­ive elements were the moulded plaster decorations, the panelled and groined ceiling, carved timber work, stained glass windows and gas-light pendants. As fas as I can see, the deep blue ceiling and silvery stars represented the night sky.

Interior space, men on the ground floor, women in the upper gallery.

Sydney City and Suburbs blog showed a delightful photo as the front appears now, still beautiful but hemmed in between the two adjoining buildings. The building is heritage listed.

St David's Church Haberfield, 1869. 
Another Sydney building designed by Rowe

Keith's Site of Sydney Life showed St David’s Uniting Church 1869 that was designed by the same architect, Thomas Rowe. In particular, note the square Norman style tower, not totally dissimilar to the square towers in front of the Great Synagogue, created just a few years later.

New West End Synagogue London, 1879

Another comparison will prove useful. The New West End Synagogue 1879 in St Petersburgh Place Bayswater, is one of the oldest and most impressive synagogues in London. Compare the date and the architecture with the Great Synagogue in Sydney.

Rural photography; seductive advertising

I don't approve of the advertising industry at all. It knowingly encourages conspicuous consumption, poor dietary habits in primary school children, sexual stereotyping, waste of the world's limited resources (plastic, packaging) and pollution. I rarely watch television that has paid ads, and I never listen to radio that accepts paid advertisements - only the ABC, BBC etc.

Now I have to admit that somewhere, sometime, somehow the advertising industry will hit pay dirt i.e they will find an image/sound/smell/taste that appeals to even the least receptive person. For me, it is this magazine advertisement for Montana wine from New Zealand.

Montana wine advertisement in an Australian women's magazine, 2009 (cropped)

The image presents a simple table in the open country side, with the sun slipping behind the distant hills at dusk. No humans, no animals, no cars, no buildings and no food. But the promise is of glorious scenery, fresh air, twenty of your closest friends, great food and wine, pure colours and no worries about your boss, your mortgage or apologising to the children's high school teachers.

Of course I understand that food doesn't simply appear on a table in a country field - a team of people would have to buy it, cook it in a tent, serve it to the guests and then clean up after. Nonetheless as a piece of visual art, the photographic image is well crafted. As a piece of clever advertising, it is very seductive.

Russian Colonisation of California

I have a vested interest in this story. My family, on leaving Russia, went either to Melbourne in Australia or Winnipeg in Canada. But who knew we may have had a connection to the USA as well?

The Russian American Co. was chartered by Czar Paul I in 1799 as a private trading company in Alaska. A flag was authorised by Czar Alexander I in 1806 and granted to this company, giving the company special recognition in the international trade world.

Russian Orthodox Church in Alaska

From early 1800s, fur trappers of Russian Alaska started to explore the West Coast of the North America, hunting for sea otter pelts as far south as the otters swam. For 40 years thereafter, devel­op­ment of the province continued gradually, at first only as far as San Francisco Bay.

The pre­sence of Russian fur hunters in the North Pacific had already panicked Spain into occupying Alta California. Taking advantage of the chaos created by the war between Spain and Mexico in March 1812, the Russians had freedom to move. In 1812 The Russian-American Co. set up a fortified trading post at Fort Ross, on the Sonoma Coast 100ks north of San Francisco. This, their most south­erly colony in North America, was intended to provide Russian colonies from the frozen north with agricultural goods. 25 Russian and 80 Alaskan men waded ashore, set up a temporary camp, and began building houses and a sturdy wooden stockade for the Ross Colony.

The Russians had come to hunt sea otter and, hope­fully, to trade with Spanish California. It was several months before the civil and military leaders of Alta California were made aware of the devel­op­ment at Ross, and by then it was too late. The fort was complete.

1828 drawing of the Ross Colony

History Hoydens blog noted how the stockade was impressively fortified, in order to give the enemy in Mexico pause to think about invading the Russian outpost. The colony was well armed and well manned. A redwood palisade surround­ed the site, with two block houses, one on the north corner and one to the south, complete with cannons that could command the entire area.

Outside the walls were the homes of company labourers, a native Alaskan village, and the dwellings of the local native Americans. Because the colony had to be largely self-sustaining, there were storehouses and outbuildings for processing the precious pelts, spinning and weaving cloth, a kitchen and a room for pharmaceuticals.

The stockade contained the command­ant’s house, the of­f­icials' quarters, barracks for the Russian employ­ees and various store-houses. A small building, used as the Fort Ross Chapel, was built from 1823-6. This was the first Russian Orthodox church built in mainland USA.

No unmarried Russian women lived at Ross. But inter-marriage between Russians and the natives of Alaska and Calif­ornia was not unknown. Natives and people of mixed ancestry as well as lower-ranking company men lived in a village that gradually grew up outside the stockade walls. Hunting of sea otter, whose pelts were very valuable in the trading world, was done by Kodiak islanders in their Alaskan hunt­ing kayaks. The hunters and their families had their own village out­side the stockade.

But by 1820, extensive hunting had depleted the sea otter pop­ulation so badly that agriculture and stock raising became the main occupation of the colony. Agriculture didn’t interest the Russian sea men, but luckily ship building did. The Russians were first to build ships on the west coast of North America. Four ships were constructed at the Ross colony in Fort Ross Cove.

ComingAnarchy blog noted that as agricultural production in the Fort Ross region declined, a formal trade agreement was signed between the Russian-American Co. and the Hudson Bay Co. in Fort Vancouver. This agreement specified that British Columbia would provide food to Alaska - the kiss of death for the Ross Colony in California.

Rotchev House for the colony's manager

Literrata & Cybernalia blog described what happened when the otter population was decimated and the fur trading business was over. In 1841, the company faced a massive financial loss, so they sold off their colony to settler Captain John Sutter for the sum of $30,000. The Russians packed up everything they could carry and sailed for home. Some left-over animals were rounded up, and the buildings were dismantled. Every­thing salvageable was transported back to Sutter's Fort in the Sacramento Valley.

Today the Fort Ross Compound has one original structure and five restored buildings. The structure of most historical interest at Fort Ross is the Rotchev house, an existing building renovated about 1836 for Alexander Rotchev, the last manager of Ross. Completely destroyed by a fire in 1970, the Fort Ross chapel has since been recreated, bas­ed on whatever historical evidence could be located. Other import­ant Russians buildings have been built from the ground up, still according to the original drawings: the first Russian Orth­odox chapel south of Alaska, the stockade, and four other buildings called the Kuskov House, the Officials Barracks and the two corner blockhouses.

Russian Orthodox Chapel, Ross Colony

The Russian River takes its name from these Russian trappers who explored the river from their Fort Ross trade colony, only 16 km from its mouth. Apparently they called it the Slavyanka River.

Carlo Catani: planning Melbourne's foreshores

Carlo Catani (1852-1918) was born in Florence where he learned engineering at the Technical Institute, and was soon employed in railway con­struction. Early in 1876 Catani and two of his colleagues decided to move to New Zealand. They sailed out of Europe but on arriving in New Zealand, they found no professional work for the new arrivals. Catani and his friends decided instead to push on to Melbourne.

Within a few weeks all three had joined the Department of Lands and Survey as draftsmen. In 1880 Catani was registered as a surveyor under the Land Act. Two years later he and his friends were transferred to the Public Works Dept, where they were employed as engin­eer­ing draughts people preparing plans for harbours, jetties and coast works, and by early 1886 they were assistant engineers. Melbourne was booming and needed keen, young, skilled men.

Catani Gardens, 
main path looking towards the rotunda/bandstand 
built for the 1988 bi-centenary.

This Italian civil engineer supervised many significant projects in and around Melbourne. Casey Cardinia blog wrote that Carlo Catani was one of the Engineers in charge of the Koo-Wee-Rup Swamp Drainage scheme just outside Melbourne and was Catani also responsible for the first mechanical equipment used on the Swamp. This transformed the area into prime farmland.

Catani’s other work with the Public Works Dept included flood mitigation works on the Yarra River. He was responsible for planting the now-magnificent elm trees along Alexandra Avenue. And he designed the Morrell bridge.

St Kilda Council created a foreshore committee in 1906. By that year Catani, who was Chief Engineer of the Public Works Dept, was con­tract­ed to reclaim and beautify the foreshore from St Kilda south-wards down the bay. His successful plan resulted in our famous strolling district, leaving space for beach facilities that became core parts of Melbourne’s foreshore incl Luna Park 1912, the Palais Theatre and Palais de Danse 1926 and just before World War 2, St Moritz Ice Rink 1939. As a result, several landmarks along the fore­shore were his creations. The gardens he designed at the end of Fitzroy Street were named after him, as was the Catani arch bridge on the St Kilda foreshore.

Catani clock tower, with Catani's bust

The clock tower is a very fine copper domed, classical construction that stands with pride on the StKilda esplanade/foreshore. Carlo Catani’s bust, as you can see in the photo, still appears on the Clock tower and it is this monument to a young Italian adventurer that I knew best. Alas, as Melbourne Heritage Watch wrote, the Catani Clock was stopped by rats.

The hot sea baths and hotel on St Kilda main beach in 1910, which replaced the 1862 Gymnasium Baths. In time, the hot sea baths themselves burned down.

I was surprised and delighted to read that the Afrilog Construction, Kenya blog, in CON­STRUCTION NEWS AROUND AUST­RAL­IA, urged that the design of any new development in St Kilda (still being debated in 2009) should remain true to Federation-era legacy of Carlo Catani. Of course our Kenyan blogger colleague is quite correct.