The old Tobacco tin

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The old Tobacco tin

Postby Tony » Sun 27 Feb, 2011 7:08 pm

What has an old Tobacco tin have with bushwalking, read on.

A couple of weekend ago while on a bushwalk/fishing trip my mate Dave and I where camped near an old cattleman’s hut somewhere in KNP, it was raining, we had just eaten dinner and where enjoying a drop of Port around the fire place when Dave noticed a mouse running across the floor, the mouse ran down a gap in the floor boards. Out of interest I grabbed my torch and had a look down the hole, the mouse was gone but I saw a dusty, rusty old tin, I grabbed a stick and lifted the tin so I could grab it with my hand. When I got the tin out, I could see that it was an old tobacco tin.

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Old Tobacco Tin
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On opening the old tobacco tin I found an old news paper cutting and an opened packet of cigarette papers. The cigarette papers where an Australian brand but made in France but the news paper cutting got my interest, the cutting had been torn out of a news paper, on one side there was an advertisement for baldness and dandruff cure, the other side had some general information about a toy fund, an announcement about a new restaurant that had just opened, and an announcement about up coming Australian Naval and Military Expeditionary Force Association Smoke concert.
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The contents
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Cigarette papers
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I took photos of the tin and contents and placed the tin back where I got it from, hoping that it is another very long time before it is found again and that the next finder puts it back for the then next person to find.

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baldness ad
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Articles
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When I arrived home I wanted to see if I could find when the tin found its way in the hole, the news paper cutting was a clue, there is mention of the “Sun toy fund”, I tried to do some research on the net. The National Library of Australia has a large collection old news papers some have been scanned and are available on the web. My search for the Sun News paper came up with many choices, but only a very few had old papers on line, I did find a paper called the Sun that was published from 1910 to 1988. Another clue was in the Toy fund article, the name of Rev. Jas. McLeod was on the list of donors, I did a search and there was a Reverend James McLeod that was working in Sydney in the early thirties, another clue could be the article on the Australian Naval and Military Expeditionary Force Association Smoke concert. The Australian Naval and Military Expeditionary Force (AN&MEF) was a small volunteer force of approximately 2,000 men, raised in Australia shortly after the outbreak of the First World War to seize and destroy German wireless stations in German New Guinea in the south-west Pacific. The final clue and a good one is the tobacco tin, a search came up with this site, 1930 Tobacco tins, note the middle tin at the top.


My current thinking is that this tobacco tin may have been under the hut floor undiscoverd since the early to mid 1930’s 80 years or so. How the tin made it under the floor is a mystery that has me guessing was it placed there or did it fall off a table etc. I do not have much experience in history, if any Bushwalk.com members can help with any advice it would be appreciated.

Tony
Last edited by Tony on Mon 28 Feb, 2011 8:56 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: The old Tobacco tin

Postby Liamy77 » Sun 27 Feb, 2011 7:17 pm

wow cool find! the mountain hut societies would love to hear about it i'm sure!
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Re: The old Tobacco tin

Postby ILUVSWTAS » Sun 27 Feb, 2011 7:23 pm

That is a very cool story Tony, thanks for sharing!
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Re: The old Tobacco tin

Postby Tony » Mon 28 Feb, 2011 7:30 am

Hi Liamy77,

Liamy77 wrote:wow cool find! the mountain hut societies would love to hear about it i'm sure!


Thanks, I had not thought of letting the Kosciuszko Huts Association know of my find, I will let them know, but in some ways I an reluctant to tell the location as the tin might disappear, if it was going to go into a museum then that would be fine.

Tony
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Re: The old Tobacco tin

Postby stepbystep » Mon 28 Feb, 2011 8:41 am

Very nice Tony, like finding treasure - I once found a newpaper while renovating(destroying) a house - it was published 70 years TO THE DAY previously, spent the rest of the day reading it!
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Re: The old Tobacco tin

Postby johnw » Mon 28 Feb, 2011 9:17 am

Tony, that's a great find and story. I really enjoy finding a bit of history while bushwalking and know a couple of spots in the Blue Mountains where some quite old artifacts have survived intact. Fortunately they're off the main tourist routes and walkers who do visit those places have generally respected their historical value and left them as found.

I think you may be correct about the period being early to mid 1930s. I did a quick bit of research on on the newspaper clipping with the ad for Thea Von Bryce (dandruff and baldness cures). This resulted in a number of links to old newspapers on an NLA sub-site, including this one dated Saturday 3rd November 1934:

http://trove.nla.gov.au/ndp/del/article/17111167

Coincidentally the name Consett Stephen appears on the same page. Unrelated to your find, but I couldn't help wondering if that has an association with Consett Stephen Pass up near Mount Tate.
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Re: The old Tobacco tin

Postby Tony » Mon 28 Feb, 2011 12:04 pm

Hi John,

Thanks very much for the NLA link about the Thea Von Bryce (dandruff and baldness cures). I had a quick look through the paper it was very interesting.

Most of the old huts in KNP still have some artifacts hanging or lying around, I love looking at them, the best is Grey Mare hut.

Tony
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