You wouldn't think a photo of an innocuous flight of stone stairs to nowhere would trigger such a passionate response.
However, the stairs which once led from the Eucumbene Dam Wall to one of the region's much-loved tea houses and which featured in this column's photo quiz earlier this month, prompted a flood of memories for readers.
Celebrated Australian travel writer Frank Clune was one of the first to wax lyrical about the far-flung tea house while touring the partially completed Snowy Mountains Scheme in April 1959.
"I had coffee and scones in the octagon-shaped tearoom on the summit of the dam wall: a tearoom with a view, a magnificent panoramic view of the huge man-made lake in the mountains surround," gushed Frank in Across the Snowy Mountains (Angus and Roberston, 1961), one of the most ear-marked books on the Yowie den bookshelf.
No doubt spurred on by the Snowy Mountains Authority (SMA) propaganda machine, Frank was unashamedly a fan of the scheme.
"Lake Eucumbene cannot fail to become the greatest inland aquatic tourist attraction in Australia," he prophesised. While its quiet backwaters today are more the domain of hermits and fanatical trout fishers (or both), for at least several decades following its completion, Lake Eucumbene lived up to Frank's lofty prediction. Royalty even plied its waters on at least one occasion. But that's a story for another day.
Back to those stairs. "I was so thrilled to see a photo of them," says Shirley Jordan (nee Beck), now of Latham but who lived in Eucumbene Village for two years as a teenager in 1961-62. The village was the largest and longest-lived of the dedicated construction camps established during the construction of the scheme.
"My dad worked for the SMA, building the tunnel from Eucumbene to Jindabyne," she proudly reveals.
Sylvia especially has "wonderful memories of the tea house" where she "often worked on the weekends and during school holidays".
Destroyed by an electrical fire in the early 1990s, today the former landmark building's faded footprint is almost impossible to find amongst bushes, but for Sylvia the tea house will always remain in her mind "as an amazing structure with wonderful views of the dam and the lake".
"It was pretty basic, we only served tea, coffee home-made scones with jam and cream," recalls Sylvia, quick to add "but it was real tea, for back then there was no such thing as tea bags."
It appears as if the tea house's offerings didn't diversify much over the years. "It was still very much Devonshire Teas when I got my first paid job as a 13-year-old there in the 1980s," explains Jennifer Cullen.
"Oh, those were the days, I just loved the fast pace and the atmosphere," recalls Jennifer, who says: "In summer you could sit on the outside veranda and enjoy the view, and in winter it was warm and toasty inside because of fantastic floor-to-ceiling windows that trapped the sun."
According to Jennifer, her boss Lindy Johansen was legendary for dishing up exemplary customer service.
"She was always up early making scones," recalls Jennifer. "The road does a loop under the tea house so we could see when the tourist buses were about to arrive and could set the tables with baskets lined with red and white serviettes and ramekins of jam and cream ready to go.
"As they walked in, we'd place the hot scones into the baskets - nobody ever had to wait."
According to Jennifer, adjacent to the tea house were quarters for the owners which "came in handy when mountain weather set in".
"One year we were stranded by a snow dump for almost a week - what an adventure, at least we had lots of food to eat," she laughs.
Not quite so enjoyable were the long waits on the old bumpy road into Cooma for school or supplies, especially when storms closed low-level creek crossings.
"Some days we'd have to wait in dad's ute all day for the water to drop," she recalls.
During the late 1970s, Lindy established a small animal sanctuary adjacent to the tea house, initially with hand-raised kangaroos and peacocks.
Meanwhile, Bill Euston of Jindabyne flocked there for the birds.
"I took many overseas visitors who had never seen so many parrots and rosellas in one place," recalls Bill.
"I still take visitors there to show them the spillway that gives you a real idea of the height of the dam straight down ... there aren't as many birds now, in fact, it's now more a place of peaceful recollection."
Regular contributor to this column's musings on the high country, Barry Snelson of Calwell, also has fond memories of the unusually shaped tea house. A self-confessed fossicker, Barry admits he had ulterior motives when taking his mum and aunt on regular morning tea outings.
"I'd leave them to feast on scones and tea while I'd scurry off and have a poke around construction camps for discarded SMA memorabilia," he confesses.
Although Eucumbene Village was closed in 1966 and subsequently dismantled, over the years Barry did find a few vintage signs which now form part of his prized collection on the Snowy Scheme.
While some faded photos and a flight of out-of-place stairs may be the only tangible evidence of one of our region's much-loved tea houses, the flood of memories they have prompted will hopefully live on just as long. If not longer.
+ Where's your favourite tea house? I'd love to know about it, especially if it's still operating.
Pooh Corner controversy
"I read with interest your piece about the Pooh Bear's Corner sign being vandalised," writes Dom Stinziani.
"Whilst I have no idea of the perpetrator, I do have a certain sympathy for them," confesses Dom, who since first arriving in Canberra in 1970, has always known it as 'Pooh Corner'."
When Dom noticed the newly installed 'Pooh Bear's Corner' sign designed by the Narooma Men's Shed at the end of last year, his immediate reaction was, "who renamed it?"
Dom isn't the first to raise this issue. Gillian Jones of Kaleen lamented the apparent "bastardisation of such a significant name in children's literature". For the uninitiated, in Winnie-the-Pooh's world, it is simply known as 'Pooh Corner' - yes without the 'Bear'. (Oh, and for now at least, let's not let a possessive apostrophe on Pooh's complicate things further).
"I'm sure the good folk at Narooma Men's Shed had good intentions, but I hope that if and when the sign is replaced it returns to its original and proper name," urges Dom. "And something just a little less ostentatious too." Ouch.
In response to Dom's pleas, your akubra-clad columnist has unearthed a 2012 photo with 'Pooh's Corner' spraypainted on the 'cave' wall. However, I can also confirm the several previous iterations of painted signs, dating back over 20 years at the infamous Clyde Mountain hairpin also clearly read 'Pooh Bear's Corner'.
This means the name change from 'Pooh Corner' to 'Pooh Bear's Corner' wasn't the work of the Narooma Men's Shed. In fact, I suspect it was never a conscious decision.
Without wanting to prise open Pandoras Box too wide, someone must have a dated photo of a sign at the corner that simply states, 'Pooh Corner'.
WHERE IN CANBERRA?
Rating: Medium - Hard
Cryptic Clue: Doc
How to enter: Email your guess along with your name and address to tym@iinet.net.au. The first correct email sent after 10am, Saturday February 17 wins a double pass to Dendy, the Home of Quality Cinema.
Last week: Many readers thought it may have been at Bunyan or even Tharwa Forge but congratulations to C.S. Carroll of Ainslie who was the first reader to correctly identify last week's photo as Blacksmiths Lane in Queanbeyan.
That's no chicken bone!
Rose Higgins of Kambah was astonished to read that the unusual object fossilised in the floor of the National Portrait Gallery may be a chicken bone.
"It is clearly a cocktail fork, inspired by the well-known fondue forks of the 1970s," she asserts.
"You only have to look at the handle (paddle) section, the double prongs and the size, to see it's an identical shape to a cocktail fork," claims Rose, "who suspects a worker discarded the fork after chomping a few leftover footy franks from their lunch box."
I'm not convinced.
Going, going...
The last meals were served at the Eucumbene Tea House more than three decades ago, but it seems that this tree in the former car park hasn't missed out on a feed for some time. How long until that fence is totally devoured?
- CONTACT TIM: Email: tym@iinet.net.au or Twitter: @TimYowie or write c/- The Canberra Times, GPO Box 606, Civic, ACT, 2601
