T O W N F E A T U R E Tumbarumba
getting to know TUMBARUMBA Visitors to Tumbarumba usually make their first port of call the Visitor Information Centre, a historic building that doubles as the town’s museum.
Tumbarumba Historical Society volunteers Ron and Catherine Frew help out in the museum and the town archives in the library. The former teachers have lived in town for about 35 years and written numerous books and publications, including the wonderful pictorial of life in the old days, simply called Tumbarumba. It depicts the modern history of the town starting with its settlement in 1859 by miners, stockmen, timber getters and farmers after the discovery of gold. Post war, the construction of the Snowy Mountains Hydro scheme saw a huge influx of migrants to the mountains in a 25-year project from 1949 to 1974. With the gold long gone and the Snowy Mountain Hydro scheme completed, the township is now home to a tight-knit community of about 2500 people. Today the alpine landscape is dotted with pine plantations, vibrant cattle and sheep grazing enterprises and vineyards producing the now famous cool-climate wines.
110 CWL TUMBARUMBA
The Historical Society recently commemorated the 60th anniversary of the discovery of the Southern Cloud plane wreckage in 1958. Tom Sonter, a young carpenter, was inadvertently thrown into the spotlight after stumbling across it while photographing mountain scenery. It had been a long 27-year wait to find answers, the plane having disappeared in the rugged mountains in 1931. It was Australia’s first big civil airline disaster, costing the lives of its pilot, copilot and all six passengers. A dinner and trek to the crash site brought together descendants of those lost. They shared personal stories of the effect of the disaster on their families. “We have photographs and artefacts from the crash site here in the museum along with a scaled model of the plane. We even have poignant letters the pilot wrote to a young Victorian school boy months before the disaster,” Ron says. If not for the tragedy, changes made to aviation meteorology, communications and safety equipment would not have occurred when they did.
The Historical Society recently commemorated the 60th anniversary of the discovery of the Southern Cloud plane wreckage in 1958.