WEST AUSTRALIANA Boats –
The 24 photographs in the Trotman-Norman collection have an impeccable provenance, and are a photographic record of the days in August 1910 when WH Trotman, a Fremantle engineer, was the guest of Hugh Davis Norman for the three days in Broome whilst SS Charon was loading cargo at the Mangrove Point jetty. The photographic essay begins as Charon is mooring and continues across the town “from the jetty to the jetty”. Streeters jetty was at the axle for the pearling industry, the town centre at the junction of Short Street and Dampier Terrace where there was a branch line for the train. Shell sheds stretched along the Broome Creek side of the Terrace, a terrace in name only, watered twice daily to keep down the dust. There was no time to sail to Beagle Bay to inspect Robison & Norman’s lay-up camp and shipyard which was the base for their 28 boats and 199 crew. This snapshot of the town in 1910 has been supplemented by other photographs of the period.
“What follows in this book is the story of a very remote town in the Kimberley, an outpost of Empire, a century ago and more, and fortuitously through the les of Mr Eki Nishoka, Yasukichi Murakami, the Maywood Studio, EL Mitchell, Dr Eric Mjoberg, Syd Pryor, E deB Norman and anonymous members of the crew of schooners Ena and Mina who happened to have a camera, or wrote interesting log books, and accounts of voyages. And the profusion of the Broome postcards bearing handwritten notes to family, friends and business associates added to the available detail.”-
This publication serves as a historical companion piece, prominently featuring the Trotman-Norman collection. It contains a photographic record consisting of 24 distinct, authenticated photographs captured in August 1910. The book offers an intimate visual and narrative window into the early 20th-century history of the pearling industry and community life in Broome, Western Australia
First Edition.