Former Lifeboat Station - Port Fairy - Historic Area
3 Griffith Street,, PORT FAIRY VIC 3284 - Property No B5005
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Statement of Significance
The Port Fairy lifeboat station has outstanding historic and demonstrative significance. It is a rare and remarkably intact reminder of the important role local oared lifeboats, with volunteer crews, played in the days of hazardous, sail-powered coastal shipping.
It has a strong historic association with the economic importance of coastal shipping to Port Fairy (and other regional ports) in the 19th century, before this trade was largely destroyed by the spread of railways.
The lifeboat (which is an integral part of the place) has outstanding rarity value. This boat and its twin at Portland are thought to be the oldest lifeboats surviving in the world. These boats also have considerable technological interest, as they had innovative design features produced for an 1851 lifeboat design competition, and were recognised as a great advance at the time.
While other sites have comparable histories and some significant elements (eg Portland, Warrnambool, Queenscliff and Newcastle, where vessels of various ages survive), only at Port Fairy does the original lifeboat survive with its associated buildings and significant demonstrative significance.
The lifeboat, buildings and artefacts are a microcosm of ninteeenth century maritime activity at a regional seaport and a memorial to the volunteer crews who risked death to help others.
Classified: 1/10/1981
Revised: 03/08/1998
Port Fairy Historic Area Staement of Significance: Port Fairy is a natural harbour where the Moyne River enters the sea, the fourth of Victoria's coastal settlments, and now the one with the greatest concentration of pre-Separation buildings. These include numbers of simple double-fronted cottages in the local limestone, imported timber, and some basalt from the nearby flows, and the earliest of them may contain material from the whaling and pastoral period which preceded the sale of the site by the Crown.
The bulk of development post-dates both the finalisation of Atkinson's acquisition by Special Survey in 1843 of eight square miles (20sq.km.) of land, and the establishment shortly afterwards of a rival government town on the foreshore.
The characteristic qualities of the town derive from the coastal atmosphere and especially the timber wharves and jetties on the Moyne River (despite some intrusion of concrete), and the simple cottages and early hotels and commercial buildings, principally in the local limestone, all of which invite comparison with the South Australian port of Robe.
A special flavour is given to Port Fairy by the Irish influence of its early inhabitants upon the architecture, by the importation of Tasmanian materials and complete prefabricated buildings, by the widespread planting at later dates of Norfolk Island Pines, by the fine tufa stone carvings of Walter McGill which adorn the church buildings, and by the major buildings of the distinguished local architect Nathaniel Billing. All of these features are to be seen not only inside but in a more dispersed manner outside the designated area: within the area by contrast it has been necessary to exclude a section of mediocre modern development, the future of which (and sspecially the scale of building) must be closely monitored to prevent it further impinging on the special character of the town.
Classified: 02/03/1981
2010 Note: Building conserved 1990-1996, slipway rebuilt 2004, good condition.
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EMOHVictorian Heritage Register H0252
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FORMER ST ANDREWS PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH AND MANSEVictorian Heritage Register H0850
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GUNS AND EMPLACEMENTSVictorian Heritage Register H1504
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