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Period: White Australia »
Commentary on: The Snowy Mountains Scheme »
Prof Andrew Jakubowicz.
Text Commentary
Providing energy for industry...
1949 - The Snowy Mountains Scheme begins, employing an army of workers from many countries
Here we see the huge dams and underground workings which form part of the Snowy Mountains Hydro-Electric Scheme. The Snowy Mountains (on
the border of New South Wales and Victoria) are part of Australia's Great Dividing Range and contain its highest mountain, Kosciuszko -
discovered for European science by the Polish explorer Count Strzelecki, and named for a Polish patriot of the nineteenth century.
Post-war reconstruction demanded energy - and the post-war reconstruction strategy focussed on hydro-electricity. The Snowy Mountains
Hydro-Electric Authority was established in 1949 to realise a dream of harnessing the waters of rivers in Australia's high country to
irrigate the Murray and Murrumbidgee areas and in so doing, to generate vast quantities of cheap electricity. The great undertaking became
the most complex, multipurpose, multi-reservoir hydro scheme in the world. It operates over 3200 square kilometres; its largest storage
facility, Lake Eucumbene, has a capacity nine times that of Sydney Harbour. The scheme was built by more than 100,000 men and women over
25 years, two thirds of them migrants to Australia.
They came from more than thirty countries to fill Australia's serious post-war shortage of skilled and unskilled personnel, many recruited
directly, many sent to the Snowy scheme as part of the indenture system called the Displaced Persons Scheme. This brought survivors from
war-torn Europe to Australia but forced them to live and work for two years wherever they were sent by the government. Of the 170,000
Central and Eastern Europeans who came to Australia under this scheme, many ended up at the Snowy tunnelling, building huge dams, power
stations, high voltage transmission lines, townships and camps and 1600 kilometres of roads through previously inaccessible
country.
The tough, dangerous and unremitting work of taming the rugged geography of the Snowy Mountains was conducted by Basques, Bulgarians and
Byelorussians, Croats, Serbs, Poles, Ukrainians and Anglo-Indians, and dozens of other cultural and national groups. The engineering
genius behind the scheme, Olaf Trygve Olsen, was Norwegian; the first Snowy Mountains Authority Commissioner, Sir William Hudson, was a
New Zealander; and the chief engineer, Ed Patterson, was an Anglo-Indian. But it was the tens of thousands of skilled and unskilled
migrant workers who created the mighty scheme and the towns and roads within it. In the process, this polyglot army learned English and
new skills where necessary. They gave to the project their determination to succeed in their new land.
Because they built a reputation for resolute hard work they began to be seen as valuable additions to Australian society. A high
proportion of these migrants were single men who married Australian born women, furthering their integration into post-war Australian
society. The Snowy River of Banjo Paterson's imagination, "where the Snowy River Riders on the mountains make their home, Where the river
runs those giant hills between..." was tamed by a work force literally a world away from his quintessential Aussie bushmen, but like the
stripling of Paterson's poem they were "hard and tough and wiry - just the sort that won't say die" and the work they achieved now lights
up Sydney and Melbourne's rush hours and supplies half the electricity needs of Canberra.
In the harsh environment many workers were killed - and it was known for its dangerous working conditions. There were also some conflicts
between workers of different national backgrounds, while for some of the former supporters of the Nazis in central and eastern Europe, the
scheme provided a way to disappear into Australian society and bypass the security services.
Further reference:
Kunz, E Displaced Persons: Calwell's New Australians, Canberra, Australian National University Press, 1988.
McHugh, S The Snowy: The People Behind the Power, Melbourne, Heinemann, 1989.