Olivia’s diligence in pursuing the story, the follow-up by Graeme Day of Radio 2ST, and the involvement of the local community, appears to have brought the fate of the archaeological artefacts from the former Fitz Roy Iron Works in Mittagong, to an unhappy conclusion. It is very disappointing to learn (SHN November 16) of the alleged demise of the sandstone blocks and bricks. 

The 1300 hand-made bricks were made from clay discovered on the site and, the sandstone blocks, quarried by hand; by men with no modern equipment but with hard labour, sweat, and grit. The bricks were used to construct three cupolas in the 1850s. Cupolas are a small furnace that smelted the abundant iron ore on the site. 

I am enclosing copy of a photograph taken on 18 October 2005 of the cupolas in situ. A second photograph indicates the destroyed cupolas on 19 December 2005. These remnants and bricks were taken to the RRC and carefully cleaned by staff and stored in a protected place.

There is a current investigation being conducted by WSC into the missing artefacts. I do know that some of the smaller sandstone blocks were used in garden beds around the offices at the RRC as a temporary measure until the proposed entrance wall in Mittagong was constructed.

The town of Mittagong was founded on the establishment of the first ironworks in Australia. 

Its involvement is visible in the underground car park in the Highlands Marketplace, and its contribution to the wider community is depicted on the interpretative signage within the town, known as the Fitz Roy Iron Works Heritage Trail. The commencement of Australia’s industrial age can be traced to the Fitz Roy Iron Works. 

Sadly, a part of Australia’s and Mittagong’s important industrial heritage appears lost.

Who amongst you are watching series 5 of Rake? The one where Richard Roxburgh’s sodden legal character Cleaver Greene finds himself disbarred but eminently suitable to stand as an independent senator in the Federal Parliament. 

The shenanigans that ensue are a brilliant portrayal of current politics, full of alternating prime ministers, lobbyists, back stabbing, and scenarios scripted so close to possible realities it’s frightening. Bravo, I say to film productions which elevate the ordinary and reduce the so called extraordinary to theatrical pulp. 

Good on all the brave satires which showcase our parlous state of politics, lifting the lid of a system which is self-serving rather than being in the service of people or an ideal or any notion of national rectitude.

These are troubling times. But you know what? As long as we can allow the power of laughter to torchlight heavyweight wrongdoing, here’s hope yet for sanity and probity.

That goes for a giggle against government at any level by the way, our own Wingecarribee Shire Council included. The present councillors have my respect in the main, even though some of their decisions do not. Would a massive community belly laugh turn the scales of their yays and nays I wonder?

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Subsidies on offer to take on apprentices