Published on Tuesday, 7 January 2025 at 3:15:17 PM

A Happy New Year to all and welcome to our first #TimeWarpTuesday for 2025! 

Heritage Places - Part One 

We are starting off this year with a mini-series on heritage places around the Town, celebrating the recognition of our heritage through the Municipal Heritage Inventory (MHI) and the current iteration known as the Local History Survey. In 1990 the Western Australian Government passed the Heritage of Western Australia Act, which under section 45, required “local government to compile etc. inventory of buildings with cultural heritage significance” (1) and so it was in 1996 that the newly reformed Town of Victoria Park began the process of community consultation and the hiring of a heritage consultant to prepare the Town’s first list of historical places. The MHI is now called the Local Heritage Survey, under the new legislation that came into effect on the 1 July 2019, and the original list has been reviewed, and updates made.  Naturally with the creation of the MHI, many photographs were taken to document the state of the heritage places as they were then, and with the generosity of the community, some historical images of the places were also included. There are 181 original photographs in the MHI from 2000, and these have been digitised and are currently being processed for access online. Over the coming weeks we will be bringing you some of these images and highlighting some points of note along the way. 

The McNess Home Group 

Place number VP18 in the original MHI (and currently place number 67) is a group of houses, numbers 11 through 19 Sunbury Road, Victoria Park. These five houses are war service homes, built not through government enterprise but through the philanthropic work of a man named Sir Charles McNess. 

“Charles McNess was born at Huntingdon England in 1852. He came to WA in the 1880s and set up a business as an ironmonger and tinsmith in a building at the corner of Barrack and Hay Streets. This is where the Royal Arcade and McNess Building now stand. He was a very successful businessman and built up a large fortune which he shared with many charities. His philanthropic career began in 1915 during WWI when he set up a patriotic fund to support hospitals, churches and even government bodies in their charity work. It was through this patriotic fund that a housing trust was set up to provide homes for returned serviceman or widows of soldiers killed in the war. Houses such as those built in Sunbury Road are examples of McNess’ generosity. McNess went on to be supportive of many charitable causes during the Depression in the 1930s and set up a relief fund for those distressed by unemployment. He was made a Knight Batchelor in 1931 in recognition of his philanthropic services. 

“Sir Charles McNess died in 1938. The Premier of the day, Mr J. C. Wilcock said of McNess:

‘Sir Charles’ benefactions were widely known. I believe they amounted to over £150,000. There were certainly widespread throughout the State and covered many worthy causes. He was particularly interested in the housing of the poor. The Housing Trust Act will always remind us of that. The State is indeed poorer as a result of Sir Charles’ death. He was associated with the State from its earliest struggling days and proved himself a good citizen in every sense of the word.’ 

“Correspondence from the 2000 owners of 19 Sunbury Rd raised some doubts over the McNess connection with their house. Though the house has a similar scale and age as [numbers] 11, 13 and 17 Sunbury Rd, this house was thought to be built after the others. Mr Homewood’s parents bought 19 Sunbury Rd from the War Service Homes Commission in 1933. According to Mrs Homewood the design and construction standards at 19 Sunbury Rd are distinctly different from their neighbours’ homes. Anecdotal evidence from Mrs E Lynch who lives at 17 Sunbury Rd shows that there were no houses between 17 Sunbury Rd and Duncan St in 1928 when all the other houses already existed. 

“Though this house may not have the same historical background as the others in the group, the age, scale and streetscape value are similar. This gives the house an heritage significance similar to the other homes. 

“Description 

“There are four separate cottages dating from the Inter-War period that form this group. They originally would have looked very similar but have now been significantly altered in appearance from an external point of view. 

“The original design, which is most in evidence in the cottage at No. 13, has red brick walls, a front timber skillion verandah and corrugated iron roof. The front wall under the verandah is tuck-pointed with a white rendered band at sill height. The house has a central door off the verandah with double casement windows either side. The roof is a simple hipped roof with small ventilating gables at either end of the ridge. 

“No. 11 has been painted and the front verandah infilled with fibro and aluminium windows, and reroofed with ‘decramastic’ tiles. No. 13 has had the front verandah infilled on the right hand side with louvres and fibro. Another house has been painted, verandah posts replaced with steel columns on brick plinths, and the verandah floor concreted. No. 17 has the front verandah infilled on the right hand side with louvres and fibro. Another house has been painted, verandah posts replaced with steel columns on brick plinths, and the verandah floor concreted. No. 17 has the front verandah infilled with louvres and fibro. 

“Statement of Significance 

“The McNess homes are important examples of a single man’s charitable nature. They have aesthetic, historic and social heritage significance. Having a similar scale and setting, the McNess homes represent an era of a simple building style. The homes have strong links with an important person , in Sir Charles McNess, who was extremely influential in charitable relief during WWI and the Depression years.” (2) 

Present Day Status of the McNess Home Group 

It is with great delight that this Local History Coordinator can report to you dear reader, that all five of these houses remain standing, and three (that can be clearly seen from street front observance) have been lovingly restored from their ‘well-lived’ look of the photos from 2000. These three houses again reflect the visual architectural features that they would have exhibited in the time in which they were built. They have been lovingly restored. 

This restoration work undertaken by the owners of the McNess Home Group houses, especially, house numbers 13, 15 and 17, should be highly commended for their diligence in caring for and restoring the history of our Town. 

The original MHI and current Local Heritage Survey, do not go into any detail about the war veterans who lived in these houses originally, and how these houses nurtured families and saw children grow over many decades as they thus contributed to life in our community. The original MHI and current Local Heritage Survey, sadly in the eyes of this Local History Coordinator, mark these houses as having ‘Little Significance’ in that they are more of community interest only, as they do not add as much to the understanding of the history of our community as other places like Edward Millen House do. And on the surface this would be true, because the proverbial line has to be drawn somewhere, but the McNess Home Group, should arguably be more well known and thought of in our community. This group is both an outstanding example of the philanthropic care for others, through McNess’ generosity, especially done so notably outside of government auspices etc, but these homes are also important for the stories they can tell of the World War I soldiers who returned home and tried to carry on their lives as best they could. The walls and roof provided physical safety for them and their families, but also were examples to our veterans of the respect they were held in due to their service. 

More research needs to be done in recording the individual history of each of these houses, but initial efforts have uncovered that number 11 Sunbury Road was built circa 1920 and was home to Frederick Charles TILL and his wife Florence. They lived there and raised four children from 1920 until 1958. Frederick Charles TILL achieved the rank of Corporal during his service in World War I. 

The house at number 13 Sunbury Road was first home to Walter CALDER and his wife Jessie Emily (nee MORRISON) CALDER. They lived at this residence from the time of its being built in 1920 until at least 1954. The couple had two children. Walter had served in the AIF in World War I from 5 March 1916 until he was medically discharged suffering from Trachoma (a disease affecting eyesight) on 8 August 1918. 

The house at number 15 Sunbury Road was first home to William Robert SEXTON and his wife Sylvia Maude (nee KEESING) SEXTON. They lived at the property from 1920 until William’s death in 1930. The couple had married in Victoria Park following William’s return from World War I, and they had three sons. Sadly, William died at just 38 years of age, leaving Sylvia a widow with three young children. 

Call to Action 

Has this story inspired you? Do you wish you knew more about these individual houses, other houses in the Town or indeed your own house? Would you like to help us capture the history of our Town? If you answered ‘yes’ to any of these questions, then we ask you to consider making a submission to the 2025 Local History Awards (https://www.victoriaparklibrary.wa.gov.au/local-history/local-history-awards). Even if you just have one old photograph of a place, event or thing in the Town’s long history, we’d love to see it. Please put your thinking cap on, get out your camera, talk to your relatives and neighbours and get documenting and researching. Your entry could win you a prize too, but you will be arguably winning the greater prize of knowing you have helped both present and future generations understand their community better. 

Here's to a wonderful new year and more stories to come dear readers. 

#LoveVicPark 

References:

(1) Heritage Act 1990 (WA)

(2) Heritage Today 2000, ‘Town of Victoria Park Municipal Heritage Inventory’, Town of Victoria Park, pp. [219-223].

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