Paddle steamer 'Marion' saved by National Trust of South Australia in 1963: restored to cruise by Mannum volunteers
Paddle steamer Marion taking passengers on a cruise up the River Murray, from its home at the Mannum Dock Museum. Inset: P.S. Marion and barge in 1909, at that stage owned by Ben Chaffey, loaded with wool bales from Moorna Station, at Wentworth, New South Wales.
Images courtesy Mannum Dock Museum and the State Library of South Australia
The paddle steamer Marion, built in 1897 to work on the River Murray, was preserved in the 1960s due to the National Trust of South Australia and especially its history fanatics Harry Godson and John Norris.
In 1962, Godson wrote to The Advertiser newspaper, South Australian premier Tom Playford and the tourist bureau director suggesting the Marion, moored at Berri, should be moved to the dry dock at Mannum, once the river shipping hub, and made into a museum. South Australia’s last steam-powered passenger vessel, the Marion had served as a trading store boat, towing barges and carrying cargo and passengers on the River Murray.
The National Trust of South Australia’s third president Hurtle Morphett took up the proposal and, in 1963, the trust bought the vessel. Mannum Council approved moving the Marion under its own steam and making it a museum, sparking a Mannum branch of the National Trust branch being formed.
An initial protest reversed the plan to display the vessel out of water, because wooden boats deteriorated if dried out, and the trust agreed to berth it in a wet dock. The trust’s Jeffery Clarke arranged the Marion’s trip to Mannum in 1963, the trust’s most ambitious public event, finding a crew, organising insurance, buying equipment, stores and food. With Captain W.H. Drage in charge, John Norris as chief engineer, and enthusiastic crew members, including Godson and journalist Max Fatchen, the steamer’s progress attracted crowds at every stop.
A special train brought passengers from Adelaide to Morgan and 1,000 lined the wharf. VIPs, who boarded at Purnong and Bowhill, included Hurtle Morphett and premier Tom Playford who announced £1,000 for the Marion fund. Governor Edric Bastyan opened the Marion as a museum for river navigation in 1964.
The resources needed to care and restore the steamer proved beyond the trust’s resources and it was handed over to the Mannum Dock Museum board, supported by tens of thousands of hours of labour by volunteers. Their efforts restored the Marion, beyond being a Mannum Dock Museum exhibit, to its 1940s operational standard in 1994.
P.S. Marion was returned to carrying passengers on the River Murray as one of the last steam-driven, wood-fired, side paddle steamers in the world. Crewed by volunteers, it was able accommodate 30 people overnight and carry 100 passengers.
The National Trust of South Australia continued to monitor that the integrity of restoring the Marion to an original piece of Australian history. This meant modern amenities such as ensuite bathrooms and air conditioning were excluded, as part of the nostalgia of the Marion experience. (Health regulation requirements in the galley were excluded from this.)
The owners of two River Murray front properties near Renmark gave part of their land to National Trust of South Australia in 1957. The Dowling family donated 17 hectares of river flat at Paringa and named it Margaret Dowling Park. The other land was Wilabalangaloo, 24 hectares on the opposite side of the River Murray, between Renmark and Berri. This was donated by Janet Reiners, who also gave her homestead to the trust in 1971.
In 1959 Carl Engel and his wife presented the 26-hectare bushland property Engelbrook, near Bridgewater in the Adelaide Hills, to the Trust. Like Watiparinga Reserve, Engelbrook supported native vegetation but had a cooler and wetter climate.
