CHAPTER 13 | 1900s – Federation
The vineyard comprised 80,000 vines that supplied wine for the local residents, including tailors, shoemakers, blacksmiths, carpenters, and ‘other artificers’. The town’s population was mainly Aboriginal, and many of them worked on the enormous farm, which included 20,000 sheep, 300 horses, and 200 head of cattle. The Benedictine community was responsible for ‘administering’ an area of over 30,000 square miles. Aside from New Norcia’s spiritual purpose, it was a model of late 19th- century agricultural ambitions and ‘the colonisation power of land theory’. By 1925, the monastic settlement had expanded to 25,000 acres, with 6,000 acres under cultivation, and was completely self-sufficient, with enough surplus to sell to the Perth markets. Some of its burgundy wine was sold to the United Kingdom. Eventually, the vineyard fell into decline and wine production ceased. But there was a dark side to the community’s history. The Aboriginal orphanages were places of brutal assimilation, and both black and white children were vulnerable to abuse. Although the settlement’s orphanages and colleges closed in the 1970s, New Norcia still thrives as a Benedictine township offering a place for retreat and attracting thousands of tourists a year. It also has a deep-space tracking station established by the European Space Agency.
FACING AND ABOVE:
Benedictine Abbey and a flock of sheep on the main road near the Monastery, New Norcia, Western Australia. [SLWA b2100342_1 and b2118333_1]
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