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33-473: The Speewah is a mythical Australian station. Speewa or Speewah may also refer to: The Speewah Typically men talk of the Speewah when they are faced with hard labour as a means of making their jobs mentally easier, though it can also be seen as a way of legitimising their bragging. Speech of this sort is used to make light of the situation or to re-affirm the speakers' masculinity or bush skills to

66-644: A jackeroo who was sent to bring the cows in from the horse paddock was said to be gone for six months, not due to incompetence (for there are no incompetent workers on the Speewah) but simply due to the sheer size of the Speewah. When the cook was frying up bacon and eggs for the men, he needed a motorbike to get around the frying pan. The dust storms were so thick that the rabbits dug warrens in them. The boundary riders had to make sure that their watches were changed for each separate time zone. A portion of land owned by Jim Dillon south-west of Wyndham , Western Australia that

99-412: A collection of short stories titled Bush Studies . The final story, " The Chosen Vessel " (1896), gives an account of a woman alone in a bush dwelling, where she is preyed upon and eventually raped and murdered by a passing swagman. This was in stark contrast to traditional bush lore, where swagmen are depicted in distinctly romantic terms. Swagmen were also prominent in the works of those associated with

132-609: A different answer. 'The men from the Darling Ranges said it was back o' Bourke and the men of Bourke said it was out West and the men of the West pointed to Queensland and in Queensland they told you the Speewah was in the Kimberleys .' At any rate the territory itself is supposedly very large. When one wanted to close the gate to the station he had to take a week's rations with him, and

165-430: A handout. Most eyewitness descriptions of swagmen were written during the period when the country was 'riding on the sheep's back'. At this time, rovers were offered rations at police stations as an early form of the dole payment . They roamed the countryside finding work as sheep shearers or as farm hands. Not all were hard workers. Some swagmen known as sundowners would arrive at homesteads or stations at sundown when it

198-425: A number of impossible or difficult feats (for example, lifting huge weights, shearing a large number of sheep in a short period of time, baking pies so light that a gust of wind would carry them, kicking crocodiles up to the moon, and moving mountains) . The reason behind the " Crooked " in his name, while always a physical feature, varied from story to story, with explanations including having one eye higher than

231-517: A romantic icon of Australian history and folklore. Swags are still heavily used, particularly in Australia, by overlanders and campers. There are still a large number of manufacturers actively making both standard and custom-design swags. Swagmen were often victims of circumstance who had found themselves homeless. Others were rovers by choice, or else they were on the run from police ( bushrangers ). Many were European or Asian migrants seeking fortune on

264-457: A sheep from the local squatter . The economic depressions of the 1860s and 1890s saw an increase in these itinerant workers. During these periods it was seen as 'mobilising the workforce'. At one point it was rumoured that a "Matilda Waltzers' Union" had been formed to give representation to swagmen at the Federation of Australia in 1901. During the early years of the 1900s, the introduction of

297-586: A stew. In Henry Lawson 's short story 'The Romance of the Swag', he describes in detail how to make a dinky-die Aussie swag. Lawson states, 'Travelling with the swag in Australia is variously and picturesquely described as "humping bluey", "walking Matilda", "humping Matilda", "humping your drum", "being on the wallaby", "jabbing trotters", and "tea and sugar burglaring".' Swagmen travelled with fellow 'swaggies' for periods, walking where they had to go, hitch hiking or stowing aboard cargo trains to get around. They slept on

330-647: A swagman at age 14. Several of his novels follow the lives of swagmen and aborigines in the Kimberley and Pilbara regions of Western Australia. Many swagmen interacted with aborigines along their travels; bushwear designer RM Williams spent his latter teen years as a swagman travelling across the Nullarbor Plain , picking up bushcraft and survival skills from local Aboriginal tribes such as cutting mulga , tracking kangaroos and finding water. At times they would have been seen in and around urban areas looking for work or

363-464: Is a "Speewa" straddling the border of Victoria and New South Wales near 35°13′S 143°30′E  /  35.217°S 143.500°E  / -35.217; 143.500 . The Speewa Ferry across the Murray River links Speewa, Victoria with Speewa, New South Wales . There is a hidden, private "Speewah" in the south west of Western Australia that has its roots in the original "Speewah" in

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396-416: Is always associated with the Speewah; only appearing in stories set in the Speewah . Crooked Mick, like his American Wild West counterparts , is a giant of a man and skilled in many trades. Equally hard-working and playful, he is quick-witted and has an appetite to match his unusual size. Crooked Mick is regarded as the quintessential bushman . Nothing was beyond him; he was said to have been capable of

429-604: Is for the teller to describe several conflicting explanations for Crooked Mick's death and then provide the "real" story . Swagman A swagman (also called a swaggie , sundowner or tussocker ) was a transient labourer who traveled by foot from farm to farm carrying his belongings in a swag . The term originated in Australia in the 19th century and was later used in New Zealand . Swagmen were particularly common in Australia during times of economic uncertainty, such as

462-494: The 1981 film adaptation of Ethel Pedley 's 1899 children's book Dot and the Kangaroo , a magical swagman helps Dot find Mother Kangaroo's lost joey . The Scottish singer-songwriter Alistair Hulett wrote a song about the 'swaggies' called "The Swaggies Have All Waltzed Matilda Away". In the 1946 Sherlock Holmes film Dressed to Kill , a tune called "The Swagman", heard on an old music box, plays an important role in solving

495-515: The Jindyworobak Movement , including poet Roland Robinson , who was a swagman for much of his life before World War II . Coinciding with trends in 19th-century Australian literature, swagmen were popular subjects of contemporary painters and illustrators. Drawings of swagmen, itinerant bush workers, rural nomads and other men "on the wallaby" were prevalent in newspapers and picturesque atlases. ST Gill and James Alfred Turner popularised

528-549: The Kennedy Highway and is considered to be named after the legend. The Speewah is an imaginary land and its boundaries have never been defined: the Speewah can be anywhere that the storyteller wants it to be, and tales have it situated anywhere from Cape York to the Otways, from Brisbane to Broome  – anywhere in Australia. Its location is kept ambiguous and when questioned people from different regions of Australia will give

561-451: The goldfields . One such swagman was Welshman Joseph Jenkins , who travelled throughout Victoria between 1869 and 1894, documenting his experiences in daily diary entries and through poetry. Swagmen ranged in age from teenagers to the elderly. Socialist leader John A. Lee 's time as a swagman while a teenager informed his political writing, and also featured directly in some of his other books. Novelist Donald Stuart also began his life as

594-536: The 1830s, the term in Australia had transferred from meaning goods acquired by a thief to the possessions and daily necessaries carried by a bushman. The compound swagman and colloquial variation swaggie first appeared in the 1850s during the Australian gold rushes , alongside less common terms such as bundleman . New Zealanders adopted the term in the 1880s, where swagmen were also known as swaggers . Swagger also originated in Australia, but became obsolete there by

627-479: The 1890s and the Great Depression of the 1930s. Many unemployed men travelled the rural areas of Australia on foot, their few meagre possessions rolled up and carried in their swag. Their swag was frequently referred to as "Matilda", hence Waltzing Matilda refers to walking with their swag. Typically, they would seek work in farms and towns they travelled through, and in many cases the farmers, if no permanent work

660-579: The 1890s. Before motor transport became common, the Australian wool industry was heavily dependent on itinerant shearers who carried their swags from farm to farm (called properties or " stations " in Australia), but would not in general have taken kindly to being called "swagmen". Outside of the shearing season their existence was frugal, and this possibly explains the tradition (of past years) of sheep stations in particular providing enough food to last until

693-539: The Kimberleys. Speewah is also a real place in Far North Queensland . It is about 10 kilometres west of Cairns – a few kilometres south of the tourist town of Kuranda . It could be described as a bushland residential area. Crooked Mick is a larger-than-life character from Australian Oral Tradition, emerging during the era of the swagmen , and sheep shearing . A sort of Australian analogue to Paul Bunyan , he

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726-480: The bush were popular subjects of the silent film era of Australian cinema . Raymond Longford 's 1914 The Swagman's Story starred Lottie Lyell . 1936's The Flying Doctor was directed by Miles Mander and starred Charles Farrell as a swagman travelling through the Blue Mountains towards Sydney. Swagmen have been the subject of numerous books including the 1955 novel The Shiralee by D'Arcy Niland , which

759-546: The detriment of others. The Speewah station in The Kimberleys , Western Australia, is considered by some to be the original Speewah of legend, but may merely have been named after the legend in homage. The property is listed by the Australian Government as being located at 16°16′S 127°34′E  /  16.26°S 127.57°E  / -16.26; 127.57 . The town of Speewah is located west of Cairns on

792-462: The ground next to a campfire, in hollowed out trees or under bridges. In the 19th century, Australian bush poetry grew in popularity alongside an emerging sense of Australian nationalism . The swagman was venerated in poetry and literature as symbolic of Australian nationalistic and egalitarian ideals. Popular poems about swagmen include Henry Lawson 's Out Back (1893) and Shaw Neilson 's The Sundowner (1908). In 1902, Barbara Baynton published

825-467: The next station even when no work was available. Some were especially noted for their hospitality, such as Canowie Station in South Australia which around 1903 provided over 2,000 sundowners each year with their customary two meals and a bed. A romanticised figure, the swagman is famously referred to in the song " Waltzing Matilda ", by Banjo Paterson , which tells of a swagman who turns to stealing

858-544: The open-air life of the swagman. By the 1880s, swagmen featured in the works of Tom Roberts , Walter Withers , Arthur Streeton , Frederick McCubbin , and other artists associated with the Melbourne-based Heidelberg School , which is customarily held to be the first distinctly Australian movement in Western art and the "golden age of national idealism" in Australian painting. Swagmen and other characters of

891-429: The other, a twisted nose due to a crocodile attack, or misshapen teeth (due to a habit of biting the skin of the sheep he ate). Most commonly, however, it was due to possessing a "crooked" walk: a limp from being ringbarked when he was a teenager or a bent leg from an incident with a water trough . Crooked Mick's vital status varies based on storyteller; a common format followed when telling stories about Crooked Mick

924-418: The pension and the dole reduced the numbers of swagmen to those who preferred the free lifestyle. During World War I many were called up for duty and fought at Gallipoli as ANZACs . The song " And The Band Played Waltzing Matilda " tells the story of a swagman who fought at Gallipoli. The numbers of swagmen have declined over the 20th century, but still rising in times of economic depression. Swagmen remain

957-540: The term swag was used by British thieves to describe any amount of stolen goods. One definition given in Francis Grose 's 1811 Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue is "any booty you have lately obtained,.... To carry the swag is to be the bearer of the stolen goods to a place of safety." James Hardy Vaux , a convict in Australia, used the term for similar purposes in his memoirs written in 1812 and published in 1819. By

990-458: Was available, would provide food and shelter in return for some menial task. The figure of the "jolly swagman", represented most famously in Banjo Paterson 's bush poem " Waltzing Matilda ", became a folk hero in 19th-century Australia, and is still seen today as a symbol of anti-authoritarian values that Australians considered to be part of the national character . In the early 1800s,

1023-417: Was made into a 1957 film , starring Peter Finch (who himself lived as a swagman during early adulthood ), and a 1987 TV mini-series , starring Bryan Brown . Norman Kaye played the role of a swagman in the 1976 bushranger film Mad Dog Morgan . Arthur Upfield wrote a number of novels about swagmen including Death of a Swagman (1942), The Bushman Who Came Back (1957) and Madman's Bend (1963). In

Speewah - Misplaced Pages Continue

1056-541: Was settled at the beginning of the 20th century was named after the mythical land of the Speewah. This property (or station) still appears on maps as 'The Speewah' and has caused much debate from the storytelling community as to whether or not this is the original Speewah of legend or whether (which is more likely) it is merely named after the legend in homage . This property is listed by the Australian Government as being 16°26′S 127°57′E  /  16.433°S 127.950°E  / -16.433; 127.950 . There

1089-489: Was too late to work, taking in a meal and disappearing before work started the next morning. The New Zealand equivalent of a sundowner was known as a tussocker . Most existed with few possessions as they were limited by what they could carry. Generally they had a swag (canvas bedroll), a tucker bag (bag for carrying food) and some cooking implements which may have included a billy can (tea pot or stewing pot). They carried flour for making damper and sometimes some meat for

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