With compliments to Charles Walsh Nature Tourism who has created an interesting graphic proposal.

With myself being very familiar with the Kelly/Police/StringyBark Creek episode,
After you have read this proposal, please don't hesitate to have your say at the bottom of this page in the message forum.

My question relates to the very first sentence of the very first sign that visitors will read on the ‘Entry panel’ : “Welcome to the Stringybark Creek Historic Reserve – home to one of Australia’s most researched and analysed crime scenes”
My question is why, having acknowledged that this ‘crime scene’ has been subjected to so much research and analysis, is the main focus of all that research and analysis not referred to (in this document), but actually dismissed this as a distraction from the ‘essential messages to be interpreted”?  Dee

I would urge all readers to visit Dee's report "The SBC 'Draft Interpretation Strategy' misses the point."
Here dozens more comments can be read on this subject.

Previously the SBC history tourist and police descendants visiting these parts have been led up the garden path, and every effort must be taken this does not happen again. If you have an opinion please read all the pages and contact DELWP or this page message forum way below.

 We can assume if DELWP think your comment has merit, your message will be forwarded to the chosen signage expert 'Ian Charles' who put this proposal together. Speaking to the man himself he did not know of the 'comment' feature embedded on his document page, so all comments are first directed to DELWP. For this reason, I'm proposing, every comment posted on this page will get to be read so long as it's constructive criticism. That's why I have created the message forum below so anything you write can be read by all and considered. I understand if you are not on the DELWP mailing list as SBC stakeholder or interested party, you would not have been aware of this SBC DELWP strategy that Ian Charles believes is the way to go, but I certainly do not agree with that. If you also do not, then put yourself on the SBC Upgrade DELWP stakeholder mailing listing, contact - Lucas Russell -        lucas.j.russell@delwp.vic.gov.au 

                                                 V.P.H.U.

 

                                    Heritage Victoria

This particular map above came from one of my early WebPages. I know its my scan from a Kelly history picture book because I drew the faint pencil lines according to scale, and for when I nominated the whole area for Heritage listing as nobody had bothered to do so. I wrote the submission and several years later it was accepted on the heritage register. I was the informant and nominee. The point I will make is that while everyone who has studied my documents past and present, will know that the hut on this particular 1884 map relating to the Police camp was not actually marked on the map where it should have been. In fact the true place is more than 200 metres to the south near the end of the red line page 3, as where the Burman photo was taken. There are the remains of two huts there. So why has this information not been acknowledged for use by Ian Charles ?  Fact, Constable Lonigan was shot dead between the seated man and the central stump according to McIntyre who made a drawing and led a party back to the scene.

It all seems strange to contract a design brief for SBC to a person who knew nothing about the sites or the Kelly story before he became engaged as from March 2017 (he told me), - and without him ever consulting anyone like me who may be able to assist, or having a committed stake in getting history right. It is obviously intentional, firstly that the Vic Police Historical Unit', in conjunction with Heritage Victoria, and DELWP, engaged  Charles Walsh Nature Tourism , which has provided a long-winded historical background which is misleading to some degree.

This notion is re enforcing an earlier Blog thread Ned Kelly - The death of the legend  -
Is there a Stringybark Creek Swindle underway right now?

Recent communication with Heritage Victoria - head archaeologist Jeremy Smith about this matter, he informed me -
" My general policy on Stringybark is that we should avoid presenting any parts of the site as definitive locations,  --  and --  I think signage at the site, and other site information, can suggest ideas and theories, but should not try to present ideas as facts." 

So here we can see the type of brief Ian Charles WAS presented with. Does Jeremy Smith think I am some sort of idiot trying to present ideas as facts, it seems like it. Are Ian Charles's hands tied by those who pay for his services? History it seems is a commodity that can be bought if you can get away with it. Where is there any honesty when Jeremy himself said to me by phone that I was, in his opinion ninety five percent correct with my findings, this was witnessed by my wife and daughter a few years back while driving and receiving a call from Jeremy on a hands free speaker phone.

I always thought it was Heritage Victoria's role to help protect historical locations, and, also help direct assessment of disputed historical locations, buildings, landmarks etc for Heritage listing, and have known about the SBC two huts location ever since my nominating the sites in 2004 and since then my SBC documentation circa 2010 which was sent to them and is supported by many eminent historians as to where the police had camped at SBC. So why has nothing been done about rejection or acceptance of this site by the authorities? What is their agenda? There is obviously a huge lack of interest because perhaps once burnt twice shy they say regarding the Ian Jones site in preference to the two huts site. So now for them it seems better not to point a signpost anywhere in case they get it wrong again. This is a cop-out if you pardon the pun. This I'm sure the history tourist will not accept.

There is no longer any doubt or mystery about where these sites are, and as in the above texts by Ian Charles, see item 3, "The immediate issue to note in this regard is that it is the place itself that underpins its heritage significance." 

If this is so, then this is not being addressed at all within this proposed interpretive strategy text. I knew the significance of this when in 2004 I nominated the whole of Stringybark Ck including Kelly camp sites to Heritage Victoria, and wrote the 'statement of Heritage Significance in my submission, and four years later was promised by Heritage Vic archaeology head, Mr Jeremy Smith that archaeology would be undertaken at SBC to prove the sites. To my knowledge this has never happened or been on any serious agenda.

                     Input from an interested reader -
                            

" StringyBark Creek is the place where events happened", yes but SBC gully is more than 2 km long.
Ian Charles's text reads- 'The visitor is required to be 'invited' to share a 'Sense of Place', Why is it where it is?  
I ask, why a sense of place as opposed to the 'Actual place' ?

Here is a fact, SBC is a Spring. Its waters flow out of from the ground some 50 metres up from the ACTUAL police camp site, and the reason two huts were built there by the original lease holders of Fern Hills Run, Messrs Heaps and Grice who kept sheep there. The huts were shepherds abodes that required a fresh water supply. Twenty years later, the huts were abandoned and re occupied by gold miners who who may have rebuilt them over time, with the fireplaces unlikely to have been moved, but at least one hut was still standing as 'shingle built' that Ned Kelly described in his 1879 letter to the authorities.

See: Forth para states, 'simple schema' where there is no "need to specify the location of where events are today presumed to have occurred or took place'. "This issue actually distracts from the essential messages to be interpreted".
I say, this is actually absurd.

If there is a desire by the authorities to kill off history tourism from the Wombat Ranges, then this is the way to do it. 

" What other historical place in the entire world tries to say the exact spot is not that important - we have marked the exact place where the first fleet landed, where Gough Whitlam made his famous speech, where Melbourne was founded, where JFK was shot ( there's an X painted and repainted on the road in Dallas ..) we know exactly where the Broad Arrow cafe was at Port Arthur Tasmania, where ANZAC cove is, where the Glenrowan Inn was, where Harry Lasseter's body was found, where Bourke and Wills 'dig tree camp was, where Bourke died etc..

                                Lake Mungo

Speaking with Ian Charles by phone, he said he was not briefed by anyone and his commission was a clear DREAM brief, yet in his text he says-

" Its not within its brief to articulate or define the types of structures of offsite collateral that could be developed by a broader Stringybark Creek stakeholder collective" 

Now what does all that mean? And DELWP states Ian Charles was commissioned in an open Tender process?
I for one never got to hear about a SBC tender while I am well known to be a graphic and industrial design person capable of any creative account for StringyBark Creek.

By this I can see there was a total lack of transparency in this 'Tender process', and had I  been notified I would have made a much better proposal.
I invite the invitation.

It seems this 'simple schema' setup has a bit of a smell about it, for what ever the reason firstly push historical truth aside, second, give the brief to someone who previously didn't know anything about the Kelly story!  Ian told me he was chosen because of his vast expertise in the field and quoted his famous Lake Mungo project in southern NSW. I know a bit about Lake Mungo and have been there several times. The last time I was shocked to see the Simple Schema of how it works there, as now in my opinion the whole place is con job and a waste of time to visit if you are interested in the real Lake Mungo-Man-Lady story. Its about where 40.000 year old skeletal remains were found. The lake is about 12 Km across with a coastline of sand dunes. But what they have done there is a disgrace. On arrival they require a signature and entice the visitors to spend $38 pp to take a tour which leads you away from WHERE the real Mungo items were actually found on the Southern side of the dry lake, yet all tours lead to the northern end of the lake. Ian's explanation was, it was all about a 'sense of place'. Our group were extremely disappointed having committed several days and thousands to get there. As I could see this was a con, we went our own way and even though we were not anywhere near any place of importance, were soon told to leave. At the tourist office there were videos running that I had already seen on TV, so it would appear that the simple schema Ian Charles cooked up for Mungo might make a bit of money for certain administration and official guides, but the real story and real sites is out of bounds there, just like it may end up at SBC if this plan gets the go ahead. This sense of place might work if you are a 'ding dong', but it simply won't wash at StringyBark creek.

"Kelly experts can be flat out agreeing it is Tuesday, let alone having a consensus on where precisely the Stringybark Creek is- but, in my search for accuracy, I have been every bit as exhausted as I have been exhausted by it. And, for the record, having visited Stringybark Creek with Bill Denheld and seen the evidence with my own eyes, I am confident that he has it right." 
Peter FitzSimons, historian, author, Ned Kelly, published by Random House 2013

Third Para,
"Section 6 states that the interpretation will focus on letting the visitor connect with and re-imagine the setting in its c.1878 garb" .

Years ago someone asked me, 'why does it matter exactly where Const Lonigan was shot' ?
I say, try telling someone to go over there to that Kelly tree and  imagine the scene where Lonigan was shot when it did not happen there at all !

Another researcher after I had shown her the sites, "since I now know where it happened, at least I can stand there and dream knowing I'm standing in the right place".  We were able to re imagine the scenario, as from where the Kelly gang emerged into the police camp, we can pin point where the constable Lonigan fell, we can see roughly where Const Scanlan was shot and the direction McIntyre took off. Only when you have seen the right place with your own eyes, can we re-imagine.

I am extremely surprised that the Key photo of the police camp taken at the time is not even part of this proposal, all very strange!

Stringybark Creek already has been ruined by walkways and signage that led nowhere. Now it is going to be wrecked further by a forest of new signs, and possibly entry charges. 

The proposed signage is mostly irrelevant waffle that includes strange concepts like 'the patina of Ned Kelly' who was a "Scarlett Pimpernel" style figure - the "Where's Wally" of the north east! There are many words, phrases  and concepts that are utterly incomprehensible.  

Some of the arguments are so muddled they make no sense at all. Future visitors to the SBC site will need to bring a dictionary, a thesaurus and internet access to understand this signage. They will be enraged by the excessive signs, further despoiling the place. The whole experience will leave them disgusted rather than enlightened.  

What is needed at Stringybark Creek is the very barest of intrusive signs. A solid stone monument honouring the police murdered there would be a good start. There has been vandalism at this site before... 

Part of SBC's great ambience was its wilderness, now destroyed by DELWP's toilet, parking and picnic areas - and now this proposed signage wonderland. 

A sign pointing to Bill Denheld's Two Huts site of the police camp/murders should be erected once archaeology has been done. This is a very obvious, urgent necessity! 

Ian McFarlane, author, The Kelly Gang Unmasked. Oxford University Press, 2012

The visitor to SBC does not need to be re educated about where stolen stock were distributed to and from. He / she is there because they have read the many commentaries and now wants to see the sites at SBC where it all happened, and not be forced to stand around reading reams of text. This place can be bitterly cold, wet and miserable, I know. The history visitor has already read the whole story. All he, his wife and kids want to see is where it happened, not some extraneous explanation of where SBC is located, they already know that. If they make it there they have either come from Mansfield or Benalla, the road is twisty and in the wet 'dangerous'. They want in the shortest time to see with their own eyes what and where it happened, they don't need to read the 1881 Royal Commission, or where stolen stock were traded.

 We could expand on stolen stock if we were at Bullock Creek where there is a small valley that it is said stolen stock was held.

Its important this place is given over to the police side of the story. It has little to do telling otherwise. AND unless the 'actual sites' are recognised and dealt with, this WHOLE exercise is a failure.

Its no use pretending it happened here or there when it did not, requiring the visitor to read all this stuff when all along they came to experience the actual place, not a pretence place. SBC is all about truth not about anything else. AND unless the actual sites are recognised, SBC will remain a travesty to all visitors as it has been since those early 1884/5 maps which have deceived all visitors. Its only in our times with access to vast volumes of material and digital means that we can now say with certainty that we know where things actually happened.  Instead of spending tens of thousands on signage - graphics, writings and upgrades, shouldn't we first settle where these sites are actually located?

Why not invite a large number of interested persons, photo forensic experts, archaeology students, the police history museum people, forest managers, historians and anyone interested meet at SBC. A show and tell by all parties, and then on another date attend a SBC symposium set up to unravel and evaluate all that can be presented, and filmed as we go by University Film making students. This would make a very interesting documentary and let primary sources, science and logic decide where all this signage is to go. Not just leave it up to some one organisation to cook up a pretty plan that won't wash.

Its interesting that Ian Charles quotes a snippet from an account from the 1884 Bendigo Advertiser 1884, some six years after the event at SBC. The pertinent point is this, in 1884, the writer states that the police Mansfield monument should be at SBC, yet even now there is no attempt to get it right 133 years later. (ref 1884)  The Mansfield monument to the police is one thing, if there was to be a monument at SBC, then lets make sure its in the right place, otherwise why spend thousands on the wrong place as noted.  Ian Charles writes (Para 6) " What then is the best place to locate the memorial / foundation platform that must UNDERPIN the site experience?  Clearly its location needs to be within the precinct that embraces the police camp."  
Well that's a surprise, but the present day picnic area as proposed is NOT the site 'where anything happened'.

There might be a convenient picnic ground area there which might be an easy opportunity to tell the story but its certainly not good enough, not to guide and allow the visitor to see the three actual sites where the police camped and where two were killed. If this is not addressed by this process, DELWP, Heritage Vic and Police Historical Unit, have each failed the public interests and public monies being spent. As a result it will be creating an unintended unsatisfied groups that may put in place the directions to the right place out of control if the authorities don't address this better.

The above diagram page 'Memorial Precincts' is a joke. Firstly the Police camp and Kennedy sites are totally in the wrong place. They are both east side of the road, not west at all. No one coming to SBC will want to walk around a trail that won't go to the actual sites. This will be made clear on webpages like this, and few visitors will be fooled.
Images below will highlight the differences. On the left is the actual layout for SBC, whereas, on right is what is proposed by Ian Charles Vic Police and for DELWP with apparent approval from Heritage Victoria. We should ask for what reason should a visitor not be able to go to the actual sites? This is not a sense of place, its a cop out fallacy. No one will endorse this 'simple schema' layout. As the text says, it's not to scale, but the trail must lead to the true places as on these Google Earth images would show.

The contrast between Bill's SBC map on the left hand side and the accompanying right-hand map of the proposed trail, together with his explanations on that and the other slides, show clearly why Bill's points are vital to telling the story of SBC, and after reading his comments I urge that they be implemented. Knowing the actual locations where things happened is the whole point of going there, not to wander around aimlessly in the general area, or you might just as well be in some bit of stringybark forest in Gippsland.
Stuart Dawson, Monash History and author, "Redeeming Fitzpatrick: Ned Kelly and the Fitzpatrick Incident", downloadable article via Google.