by Dr Noris Ioannou

Finishing the subject of 19th century brickmaking and shard dumps on your Park Lands (refer to my previous article), I’m jumping to the early 1980s to tell some curious stories I came across in my research into the unfolding history of ceramics in South Australia. 

During my interviews, I came across a group of individuals who were very passionate about collecting early jars and bottles.

Many places within your Park Lands were formerly used as rubbish dumps. In the 1800s, dump sites included (among others):

• the area immediately south of the West Terrace Cemetery, in Park 23 (what was later called “Edwards Park”); and

• Rundle Park / Kadlitpina (Park 13).

Of the scatter of household rubbish dumps in your Park Lands, a handful that had commenced in the early years of settlement and had been sustained through to the 1890s (and up to the 1930s in a few cases) had become sites of night-raids.

Why? Because, by chance, these old dumps had preserved ceramic items, manufactured in the early potteries of Adelaide, now rare and of considerable value to collectors. 

From 1845, with the prohibition of brickmaking on your Park Lands, sites beyond the boundaries, especially west – notably Bowden, Hindmarsh, and Thebarton – became favoured, given their proximity and bountiful clay deposits.

In particular, Hindmarsh Pottery had extended its brickworks to successfully producing pottery. Aside from household wares, its production included stoneware bottles for inks; blacking substances; brews such as ginger beers, ales and beers; and even containers for preserved oysters.

These (often salt-glazed) stonewares were stamped with the name of the contents, the manufacturer, and sometimes, the maker: Hindmarsh Pottery. These stoneware bottles became disposable and a part of the household rubbish, eventually to be thrown out and ultimately dumped on your Park Lands. 

In the 1980s, as word got out, overly enthusiastic collectors frequented the Park Lands, in the depth of the night, digging holes to access the superficially buried dumps, seeking these now rare and desirable items. Indeed, the extent to which collectors embarked on these illicit digs on the Park Lands approached that of a frenzy.

So much so, that eventually police helicopters patrolled the most popular areas, hovering above and spotlighting, and in some cases, arresting individuals.

Finally, the council decided on a drastic solution. This was to bulldoze and excavate as deep as necessary to remove the masses of broken shards bottles, oyster shells, and bones from the ‘favoured’ dumps.

Adjacent excavation of soil to an even greater depth followed before the mounds of historic Adelaide shards and bottles were reburied at a considerable depth, to be finally covered with a thick layer of soil to deter even the most zealous collector.

Incidentally, these shard dumps assisted my research into ceramic history. Prior to their ‘reburial’, I was able to wander around the mounds of exposed shards to make some interesting and valuable observations. It was possible to identify those fragments derived from wares made in local Adelaide potteries, and also compare them in quality and quantity to those of imported English ceramics.

This estimated proportion of local to imported shards, gave me a rough indication of the extent of the output of local potteries compared to imported. Sadly, additional analysis became unattainable once the mounds were reburied.

So that’s the story of the fate of shards in your Park Lands, which are now less likely to be encountered – an archaeological trove that awaits future exploration. 

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Dr Noris Ioannou is a cultural historian whose writing has focused on material folk culture and the arts and crafts, particularly the way tradition, place, and innovation have shaped Australia’s identity and heritage.

His eight books include Ceramics in South Australia 1836-1986: from folk to studio pottery (Wakefield Press 1986) and The Barossa Folk: Germanic Furniture and Craft Traditions in Australia, as well as the cultural travel book, Barossa Journeys: Into A Valley of Tradition (Wakefield Press 1986), now in its third edition. His latest cultural history, Vernacular Visions - a Folklife History of Australia: art, diversity, story-telling, was published by Wakefield Press in 2021.

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Main photo: Shutterstock.