KAMERUKA ESTATE

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The Kameruka Estate was one man’s dream, one man’s vision.

That man was Robert Lucas Lucas-Tooth.

He was born in Sydney in 1844 to parents who ran a farm in Tasmania. He was initially schooled by his mother but was taken to England to attend Eton College when his mother felt that “Robert will begin to require something beyond my instruction and I feel he cannot mix with our Colonial youths without contamination”.

He returned to Australia in 1863, joining his two brothers in the management team of Tooth’s Kent Brewery in Sydney. In 1868 he became a partner in that business – so he had money to invest!

In 1864 he purchased the leasehold of the 75,000 acre Kameruka Estate from his uncle. By 1871 the Estate had reduced in size to 22,000 acres, but Robert Lucas-Tooth now owned that area freehold.

Robert’s objective was to develop the farm in a way that would implement his own humanitarian social ideals and become a “transplanted segment of the English countryside; a largely self-contained community based on the English agricultural estate system”, “providing his tenant farmers with six-roomed cottages, a school, a church, a meeting hall, store and post office. He planted English trees on a large-scale, built an ornamental lake, kept an aviary of golden pheasants and liberated all kinds of game: pheasants, quails, hares and foxes” … and, naturally, provided the Estate with a full-size cricket oval!!

Robert never lived at the Estate, although he visited it on a number of occasions. (In the late 1870s he also developed the 820-acre Eridge Park estate at Burradoo near Bowral into a ‘model park’, and ‘in 1882 he built a castellated Gothic mansion at Darling Point, with a ballroom larger than that at Government House, and named it Swifts after the family home in Kent’ – so he also had significant interests elsewhere in NSW as well as in England.) Instead, he employed outstanding managers at Kameruka who would send detailed reports to him on a monthly basis.

He died in England in February 1915, reputedly of a ‘broken heart’ following the deaths of two of his three sons who were killed on active service during World War I. His other son, Archibald Leonard Lucas-Tooth, took over responsibility for the Kameruka Estate, but died shortly afterwards, in September 1918, when he contracted influenza whilst serving in the British army in France.

The period in which the Estate was at its most successful was when Robert Lucas-Tooth was its owner. He established a core business on the Estate (dairying), but he was innovative and was not afraid to trial new things.

When necessary, he imported skilled labour to the area to ensure that every one of his ventures was given a maximum chance of succeeding.

Vicky Small’s book ‘Kameruka’ provides many details of life on the Estate and describes some of the innovations that occurred at the time it was owned by Robert Lucas-Tooth:

‘‘Hog raising’ was introduced and James Manning (one of Robert Lucas-Tooth’s partners in the Twofold Bay Pastoral Company which owned the Kameruka land before it was purchased by Robert) developed a successful formula for preserving hams and bacon … Mr Manning’s efforts were greatly acclaimed in Sydney and it was noted ‘the bacons and hams of Kameruka will be well known and as highly appreciated as the rich delicacies of York and Westphalia’.

Business activities were extended by operating a flour mill with the assistance of a Mr Kirkwood. Unfortunately it was found that wheat would not grow satisfactorily and eventually it was converted into a cornflour mill (in Merimbula) by Mathew Munn in 1865.

At the dairies on the Estate the milking families were provided with a well built cottage of six large sized rooms protected from the hot Australian summers by a verandah. At the back was a detached kitchen sixteen feet square, and outside a brick oven. These homes were described as a ‘comfortable and convenient homestead, that many a pioneer of civilisation on the far interior would envy or covet.’

Each family was responsible for the care and milking of one hundred cows and were paid at the rate of a penny a gallon. The milk received in the morning had to be delivered at one of the three cheese factories by 7am, and in the afternoon milking commenced at 3pm so it could be in the cheese vats before dusk.

A ‘Manipulator’, the head cheesemaker, was in charge of each cheese factory … The
‘Manipulators’ were recruited from America (where more scientific methods of cheese making were in
use] on a two year contract basis and were paid a monthly wage. While employed a four room cottage
with kitchen was provided in close proximity to the cheese factory they operated. The Estate covered the cost of their passage to Australia and when their two years had been completed a return fare was provided.

Early Religious Instruction was provided by Ministers calling at private homes, but in 1865 a Church of England Committee was formed and the now famous Architect, Edmund Blackett, was called upon to design the ‘Holy Trinity’ Church. As with schools, the land for the Church was provided by the Estate, and the construction was undertaken by Charles Galli at a cost of £565 … A stipend to pay the Minister was collected quarterly at ten shillings per family.

The first school built on the Estate, Kameruka Public School, was opened in August 1879 with an enrolment of 32 pupils. A second school was provided five years later and 27 students attended Toothdale Public School which was far more convenient for those children living further afield.

A store was built for the convenience of the tenants providing a large and varied amount of household items and a Post Office was opened where all postal requirements were available. Mail was delivered weekly when the ‘Postmans Track’ was established from Cooma down Brown Mountain but when creeks became swollen with flood waters much of the mail arrived in a saturated state.

Due to the distance from the townships of Bega, Merimbula and Pambula the residents of Kameruka were a close-knit family and much of the entertainment was provided by picnics beside the creeks, or parties which were held in homes, enticing many to walk or ride for miles bringing their musical instruments and talents. A very memorable highlight was when Alfred Shaw brought the Eighth English Cricket Team to Australia. Whilst on tour Kameruka played host to a match between an English Eleven and Candelo Twenty-Two on the ‘hay paddock’. Held over two days on 12th and 13th January 1885, the interest the occasion generated is best described by Alfred Shaw who was astounded by the attendance:

‘The most astonishing part of the matter was the attendance – where they came from is a mystery. At least 150 buggies and 600 horsemen and horsewomen, besides foot people, were on the ground – in all at least 2,000, and certainly almost everyone within an area of 15 miles must have been there, some coming much further, and a few so many as 100 miles, one of the players riding 100
miles through the bush, and another, with his wife, driving 90 miles.’ (The English won the match by an innings and 12 runs.)

In 1880, Robert laid down the foundations of the Jersey Herd in the Colonies by importing the bull ‘Lucius’, and the cows ‘Majestic’, ‘Princess Royal’ and ‘Pretty Queen’ from England. They made their home at Eridge Park … In 1888, the herd was transferred to Kameruka and they became the nucleus of the breeding program. The herd at one time included more imported animals than any other in Australia. £90 annually was allocated to enclose land for planting shade and shelter trees and an area was set aside for the use of employees wishing to form sporting clubs, and £22 was to be used for this purpose. The Deer Park was to be kept for game purposes only …
Mr James Moody, who had received his training under the Californian experts at Mildura, was engaged as an orchardist at a salary of £125 per annum, with a new cottage to be erected for his use. His first duty was to establish a new orchard of 50 acres … Mr Moody’s only request was that the new orchard not be situated near Candelo ‘owing to the ill fame of the township for pilfering’.

All the dairies were to be upgraded to satisfy the requirements of the officials under the Dairy Supervision Act and these premises, complete with milk cooling arrangements, were built at a cost of £120 each. The dairymen were also to receive new cottages as white ants had destroyed a great many of the buildings on the Estate. The new seven room homes were built of brick with a verandah out front and back, and the added luxury of a kitchen inside. There were further concessions of milk, firewood, and land for growing vegetables and housing farm animals.

To help assist in adverse weather conditions, Robert asked that irrigation be looked into and an experimental system set up. This job was handed to the Orchardist, who attacked the work eagerly. Five acres of land was ploughed, subsoiled, and sown with lucerne whilst still wet. In addition, a quarter of an acre of paspalum grass and two acres of paspalum planted on the hills amongst the natural grass were selected. These areas were to be irrigated with a pump day and night.

In addition to the irrigation experiment Mr Moody had requested another fifty acres of land for orchard, which was granted … After much discussion, it was decided to invest in prune trees as at the time no one in the State was growing them in any large numbers. Five thousand were planted, along with four hundred pear trees. Apples, peaches, and apricots were already being grown.
To handle the crops a Central Fruit Barn, eighty feet by fifty feet, was built of brick with a large loft and cement floor.

In 1903 1,400 cows were being milked. By 1904 Kameruka was making Derby, Stilton, Dutch and Leicester cheese. When the NSW Butter Company went into liquidation the Estate Manager attended the sale and was very pleased with the purchase of a complete plant for Gouda and Edam cheese. Imported by the Butter Company at a cost of £100, Mr Wren had been able to purchase it for £25.

The dairy farmers had their cultivation areas increased another five acres for the purpose of growing pumpkins, and a competition was held for the prize pumpkin which was grown at Copley, turning the scales at 136 lbs. The farms were also fitted with manure pits, for the purpose of fertilizer, and the dairymen were paid a bonus for every pit filled and emptied.

Accommodation for single men was beginning to become a problem so management decided to build a Bachelors’ Quarters, instead of erecting individual cottages. Two storey and constructed in brick, it could comfortably house sixteen men, making it more convenient for the labour to be living at their place of employment.

1911 brought some improvements for the employees. All factory hands were to have three weeks leave of absence and sick pay was to be made available at a half rate of pay for one month. A pension pay was also introduced for the older men who were eligible for the Government Old Age Pension. Sam Williams and John Doyle, two men who had spent close to a lifetime on Kameruka, were to receive ten shillings each week for light duties, which usually involved raking up leaves or keeping the premises around the offices tidy.

The foundations for The Hostel (providing tourist and visitor accommodation) had been laid down by Thatcher and Son at the end of 1914, with two bricklayers working for twelve shillings a day. Situated in front of The Lodge, near the entrance to the Estate, The Hostel contained eight bedrooms and six sleepouts, with added accommodation for three Chauffeurs. In addition, there were four bathrooms and a shower, a dining room and a library, and it also sported a billiard table for the entertainment of guests … a daily Tariff of fifteen shillings included bed and three meals, and morning tea was provided for sixpence while afternoon tea was one shilling. (The Hostel became a temporary hospital in 1919 when the Spanish Flu epidemic swept across the area; it was demolished in 1927, by then having become unprofitable, and its bricks were used to construct corn silos on the Estate.)

An added attraction was a nine hole golf course designed by Laurie Auchterlonie, who had been responsible for designing the distinguished St Andrews golf course in England … a charge for the use of the links was set at two shillings a day each player or ten shillings a week, with the rule that ‘no golf was to be played on Sunday during the hours of the Church service at Kameruka’ … Maintenance of the course was solved when 149 wethers and ewes were purchased at twenty-five shillings and nine pence a head to keep down the grass.

Further building was undertaken on Kameruka when a Social Hall was completed, ‘a splendid addition to the equipment of the Estate and should be greatly appreciated by all those who are privileged to use it.’

The real importance of the Kameruka Estate to the NSW South Coast was that it provided the district with a large-scale commercial enterprise at a time when there was no other large industry in the area. This provided employment opportunities, which in turn attracted a significant population to the area.

The solid foundations that had been laid whilst Robert Lucas Tooth owned the Kameruka Estate paid dividends for some years thereafter. Kameruka Alberta peaches and apples were much sought-after in Sydney and, during the 1920s for example, the Gold Medal for Cheesemaking at the Royal Sydney Show was won on six occasions by the Estate.

At its height the Estate milked 2,000 cows and was home to the largest Jersey herd in Australia. It operated 15 sharefarmed dairies named after villages in Kent, as well as a home dairy which for a time supplied a ‘Home Farm’ butter factory. Three schools were sited on the Estate to educate the children from the large families that were resident there.

When Leonard Lucas-Tooth died, ownership of Kameruka Estate passed to his two infant daughters, Rosmarie and Christine, and the Estate was run by Managers reporting to Trustees for these girls. These Trustees, however, proved unwilling to invest in the Estate at the levels that Robert had done, and were reluctant to innovate.

A series of unfavourable natural conditions, including floods, bushfires, fires in a number of Estate buildings, droughts, rabbit plagues, hail and strong winds which affected the orchards – and the Depression of 1929! – also significantly affected the Estate and its profitability over the years since World War I.

The enormous changes to transportation that occurred after World War II also had a significant impact on the Estate, virtually consigning the concept of, and any need for, ‘a largely self-contained community based on the English agricultural estate system’ in Australia to history.
From late 1958, when suppliers to the Candelo (Bimbaya) and Bemboka Co-operatives started redirecting their outputs to Kameruka, the Kameruka cheese factory started processing milk for the first time from producers outside of the Estate.

Three separate cheese factories once operated on the Kameruka Estate – Niagara, Wolumla (both of which were closed in the 1950s) and The Island. The Island factory ceased cheese production in June 1971 (although packaging of cheese on the Estate continued for a further six months) after legislation rationalising the NSW dairy industry meant that Kameruka could no longer be assured of receiving reliable milk supplies, and the Estate found that significant capital expenditure would be needed to modernise its factory to ensure it remained commercially competitive. Milk from the 14 Kameruka dairies then functioning was diverted to the Bega Co-operative and the Bega Co-Operative took over the processing of Kameruka brand cheese.

Over time, however, the focus of the Kameruka Estate gradually shifted from milk-production to the raising of beef cattle and sheep – although in 1983 eight of its share dairies were still supplying an impressive 3.67 million litres of milk, and until 2008 the Kameruka Jersey Stud had the distinction of being Australia’s oldest continuously-running dairy stud.

The Estate remained in the Tooth family for 150 years until, in 2007, it was sold to an English
shipping magnate, Giles Pritchard-Gordon. At the time of its sale it covered 3,337 acres.

After the death of Pritchard-Gordon in 2014, his widow put the property up for sale. It was purchased in recent years in two separate tranches by a neighbouring family of dairy farmers who also own the historic Oaklands farm in Pambula.

They have set to work restoring the numerous homes at Kameruka as well as the historic seven-bedroom homestead, and are running beef cattle and sheep on the property. Unfortunately, they have
no current plans to re-open the Estate to visitors, although the historic Church can still be accessed from the Candelo-Bega Road.