PALMATEER George

One of the most notable pioneers of the Piesse Gully area was George Henry Palmateer.

He was born on the Bendigo goldfields in 1866, his parents, Francis and Alice Palmateer, having arrived from Melbourne by sailing ship from America in 1840. He received his education at Spring Creek, a mining centre near Alexandria in Victoria, and on leaving school obtained a position in the Survey Department of the Victorian Government Railways, where he remained for four years. In 1891 he approached the Government of Western Australia for a position in the Public Service of that State, and being successful, took a ship for Albany.

On the boat he met another young man, Charles Ashcroft, who, like himself, was interested in settling on the land. On arrival in Albany they each bought a horse and cart and set out on the long cross-country ride to Perth, breaking their journey at most of the small towns on the way in order to get some idea of the country they proposed to make their home.

GEORGE PALMATEER   1928               #1
 

On arrival at Perth both men joined the Survey Department of the Western Australian Government Railway, and were immediately sent to Geraldton, where the railway line from that town to Mullewa was being surveyed. After nine months of camping hardships in the primitive conditions of the inland bush, they returned to Perth and from there spent three months in the surveying of the railway to Southern Cross.

With the discovery of gold in Coolgardie they decided to join the rush to the fields and returning to Perth, resigned from the Public Service. Purchasing horses they rode the 150 miles to Coolgardie on horseback, but after three months of scarcity of water (at 2/6 (25 cents) a gallon), illness and no gold, they again returned to Perth.

Shortly afterwards, in 1893, the Lands Department offered them two allotments of land in the “Heidelberg Valley”, now known as Bickley. One block, Canning Location 672, of about 100 acres, extended from the Upper Darling Range Railway (at the time privately owned), close to Bickley Siding, down almost to Piesse Gully and the other, Canning Location 673, also of about 100 acres, straddled the gully and joined 672 on the latters north-east corner. Both blocks were entirely virgin forest, except perhaps for some isolated timber cutting. Dense stands of Blackbutt and Redgum (Marri) covered the rich soil of the low-lying land, with Jarrah predominant on the higher gravelly, steep slopes of the hillsides. The soil was good and the situation appeared excellent for orchard and market gardening. There was water in abundance from Piesse Gully on 673 and 672 there were natural springs running down to the Gully, Altogether a delightful position, and it must have seemed a beautiful paradise to the two young men after their experiences in the harsh environment of the inland.

Ashcroft chose the lower block with the brook running through it and Palmateer took the upper block with the natural springs.

      A PAINTING OF THE FIRST HOME   1897        #2
 

In was characteristic of the friendship of these two young men that they chose to build and share the one hut while they set about the task of clearing their blocks, and they chose a site close to a fine spring of excellent water towards the top end of Palmateer’s 672. The hut was a single room framework of jarrah saplings stood upright in the ground, with jarrah slats from a nearby mill nailed on for walls. A single scullion roof of overlapping sheets of thick jarrah bark proved quite weather proof, and the floor also was of bark. The structure would no doubt have been quite sufficient in the summer, but it must have been bitterly cold in winter, not to mention a haven for spiders, scorpions and centipedes.

The men had no money for machinery or labour, if there was any to be had, - and their only tools were an axe, shovel, cross-cut saw, kangaroo jack and a grindstone, but with plenty of hard work and enthusiasm they soon had sufficient land cleared to plant a small orchard on each of their blocks.

Palmateer planted a few acres of orange trees to begin with. Varieties including Washington Navel, St, Michael, and Valencia, also Beauty of Glen Retreat Mandarins.

Meanwhile both men were getting to know their neighbours and at weekends they joined in social functions such as dances etc. Soon they were each selecting a site for a home and beginning to build. Palmateer chose a position on his north boundary towards the lower end of the property. Just below the site he had built a large dam for irrigation purposes and he used the white pipe-clay excavated from the dam to make sun dried bricks for the four rooms of the house. Jarrah shingles were used for the roof.

In 1897 Palmateer took up lease 15/950 of about 150 acres, adjoining his property on the north side. It was surveyed by Robertson in the following year and freeholded by Palmateer as Canning Location 390 in 1910, Later he also acquired Canning Location 506 of about another 100 acres, which straddled Piesse Gully immediately above and adjoining Ashcroft’s block.

While clearing the land and planting his orchard Palmateer supplemented his income from the young trees by growing strawberries. There as a keen demand for this fruit on the Perth market and the valley soil and climate seemed admirably suited to the production of the delicacies. Transport was a problem and Palmateer used a wheelbarrow, stacked high with 8 to 10 cases of fruit, a broad strap over his shoulders to help take the weight, and a horse to pull the heavy load up the rough track to the railway siding about a mile away. In those days the line was privately owned by The Jarrah Timber Trading Co. And goods and passengers were transported in open trucks to Midland Junction. One can only imagine what effect sun and rain had on the unprotected fruit by the time it reached the Perth market.

One of the chief pests to contended within the strawberry business were the bob-tailed lizards, or skinks, which had a passionate liking for strawberries and invaded the beds in large numbers. Slugs and small birds were also a problem.

On 28th April 1897 Palmateer married Lucy, daughter of John and Emma Wallis of “Orangedale”, Kalamunda, and the couple moved into the little white, brick-walled cottage and commenced to raise a family.

By the first decade of this century Palmateer had cleared about 40 acres of land and planted about 23 acres of orchard on it. The chief asset was 12 acres of fruit trees, by then approaching full bearing, the remainder of the orchard consisting of apples and stone fruit, the former including Cleos, Jonathans, Stone Pippens, Spitzenbergs  and Alexandrias, and the latter, Royal George and Early Silver peaches, and Blood and Burbank Japanese plums. The whole orchard was irrigated from the same natural spring on the high ground beside which Ashcroft and Palmateer had built their tiny hut years before, and which was capable of supplying 40,000 gallons of water per day.

At one stage a few sheep were yarded in movable hurdles in the orchard,but dingoes frustrated this undertaking, their eerie howling echoing through the valley at night.

In 1908 Palmateer gave a piece of land in the north-west corner of 506 for a Seventh Day Adventist school and in the same year he gave another piece of land for a Seventh Day Adventist church on 672, close to the existing new church. The tiny school was later moved to Bickley.

   LUCY PALMATEER (nee Wallis)  1928           #3
 

GEORGE & LUCY PALMATEER FAMILY   1907               #4
Left - Right :   ROY, CLARICE, LUCY (Mother), George (Father), GORDON, MYRTLE

In 1912 Palmateer had a fine new home built just above the old one and the white clay bricks of the old home were incorporated in the new. While the house was being built, the family, which by then had grown to two sons and three daughters, were housed in a large shed nearby. This shed had a loft, a workshop, a blacksmiths shop, and a packing section where all the fruit was graded and packed by hand. The external walls of the house were concrete and a high-pitched roof added to coolness in summer. There were 10 rooms in all and a high curve of concrete steps to the front porch over-looked the beautiful valley below. The architect was Ross Long and the builder was Pastor Harry Martin, and the house became one of the “show pieces” of the district.

      THE PALMATEER'S NEW HOUSE       1913        #5
 

It was known for its hospitality and delightful surroundings, particularly the very fine specimens of magnolia and camellia trees. Water from the spring, which was at the highest level of the orchard, was gravitated around the hillside by a pipeline to a concrete dam, or tank, of 8000 gallons at a point 30 feet above the house level. This supplied water for the home and irrigation and also power for a 10 inch Peltham Water Wheel which operated a 1 h.p. electric generator, thereby providing electric lighting throughout the house and replacing the acetelyne gas jets previously used. This was the first electric lighting in the district.

Palmateer had installed his own sawmill to cut casewood for fruit boxes. Decides casual labour there were two permanent employees and a cottage to house a workman’s family. If he needed it, was built up on the rise above the house near a succession of stone terraces. Incidentally, strange as it may seem, Palmateer had visions of building a hospital on the summit of these terraces and the second son, Roy, was trained as a doctor to co-operate in the plan.
 

SEVENTH DAY ADVENTIST SCHOOL 1915               #6
Back Row L - R:     GORDON PALMATEER, ROY PALMATEER, ALBERT PIPER,
Middle Row L - R:  MURIAL BROOKS, MYRTLE PALMATEER, CLARENCE PALMATEER, Mrs. DOWLING (Teacher), THELMA PALMATEER, RUBY LAIRD
Front Row L - R:         KEN LAIRD, RUBY CLARK, BASIL BALMIRE
 

In 1917 the first walnut trees were planted on 672 and in 1923 Palmateer planted a 4 acre grove of Franquette and Wilson’s Wonder walnut trees in the rich flat of the north-east section of 506 and these magnificent trees have become one of the Features of Bickley Valley.

By the early 1920’s about 30 acres of orchard, mostly citrus, were fully established on the property. In 1932 a devastating hailstorm severely damaged a wide stretch of the orchards in the valley and it took two years to recover from the effects. Palmateer spread loads of jarrah sawdust around many of his trees to replace the soil washed away by the storm and this helped to stimulate new growth.
 

    PALMATEER PROPERTY AT BICKLEY          #7
 

     PALMATEER PROPERTY AT BICKLEY         #8
 

     PALMATEER PROPERTY AT BICKLEY         #9
 

     PALMATEER PROPERTY AT BICKLEY         #10
 

When the name of the district was changed from “Heidelberg” to “Bickley”, Palmateer decided to retain the name “Heidelberg” for his property and it is still known by that name today. Part of the track he used from “Heidelberg” siding (Bickley) to his property was named “Palmateer Road” in honour of the pioneer. There were eight children in the family: Gordon, Roy, Myrtle, Clarice, Phyllis, Thelma, Dulcie and Audrey. Dulcie is now Mrs. Watson of Lawnbrook Road, Bickley, and it is she and her brother Gordon who have so kindly provided the bulk of the information for this little history of their father and the “Heidelberg” home.
 

GEORGE & LUCY PALMATEER FAMILY               #11
Back L - R;       MYRTLE, GORDON, ROY
Front L - R:      CLARICE, GEORGE (Father) , DULCIE, AUDREY, LUCY (Mother),  THELMA, PHYLLIS
 

The eldest son, Pastor Gordon Palmateer, in his “Family Reminiscences”, refers to the happy childhood days at “Heidelberg”, when they walked the miles to the first Government school at the top of the valley, passing the old saw pits here and there in the forest on the way, being fascinated with the post-and-rail fence which skirted one side of the property and which was eventually consumed by bushfires, the split jarrah pickets which survived for a few years around the original home, driving the horse around the “turn-table” to cut chaff and riding on the beam, the four-wheeled buggy, sheltering under the shed verandah, that took them visiting their neighbours and was later given to the Kalamunda & districts Historical Society. Picking the 10,000 daffodils on the hillside, (apparently cut flowers contributed to the family income), swimming in the dam, and pleasant friendships made at the tennis court, singing old favourites and hymns around the piano, the beautiful flower garden with colourful begonias blossoming by a spreading fern over the fish pond and a garden seat under the shade of the magnolia tree by the back verandah entrance, the arched gate with white roses climbing over it and the sweet-smelling Daphne besides the garden path, the medley of croaking frogs at night-fall and the frightening howl of the dingoes in the stillness of a frosty night.

From the earliest establishment of the orchard, Palmateer was an exhibitor and prize-winner of the various classes of fruit at the shows. Always interested in local public affairs, he took an active part in the work and progress of the district, and was a member of the local Roads Board for many years. He was also treasurer of the Kalamunda Brach of the Fruitgrowers Association and a delegate of the Central Council of that body. At an interstate conference of fruitgrowers held in Victoria in 1910, he was one of the delegates representing Western Australia.
 

Every endeavour has been made to accurately record the details however if you would like to provide additional images and/or newer information we are pleased to update the details on this site. Please use CONTACT at the top of this page to email us. We appreciate your involvement in recording the history of our area.

References:                 Article:        “The Helena Story” Edward Quicke

                                  Images:     1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11     Kalamunda & Districts Historical Society

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