Centennial Park
Statues And Sculptures.
The Original Design For Centennial Park Had A Total of 31 Statues Through The Park. Over The Years Due To Vandalism And Weathering Only 19 Remained In 1946 And Today There Are Only 9 (By My Count; Centennial Parklands Says Only Three Of The Original Statues Remain).
Charles Dickens Was A Renowned English born Novelist & Social Commentator. He Achieved Popular Acclaim In The Late 1830s, And His Fame Grew Until His Death In 1870.
Centennial Park Was Officially Opened By Sir Henry Parkes, On January 26th 1888 To Commemorate 100 Years Of European Settlement In Australia
The Marble Statue Of Charles Dickens Appears To Have Been 1 Of 11 Statues Acquired In 1889 As Decoration For The New Park. It Was Originally At The Junction Of Parkes And Hamilton Drive But Was Relocated To The Junction Of Dickens And Loch Avenue In 1897, To Make Way For The Statue Of Sir Henry Parkes.
The Statue Is 1 Of Only 2 Known Life Size Representations Of Charles Dickens In The World (According To Monument Australia; Centennial Parklands Says It Is One Of Three); The Other Is A Bronze Statue In Clark Park, Philadelphia, USA.
In 1972 Most Of The Remaining Statues In The Park Were Removed & Put In Storage. Then The Statue Was Lost, And Its Location Was Unknown For Over 40 Years.
When Gaenor Vallack, A Volunteer At The NSW Library And A Member Of The Dickens Society, Was Flicking Through Edwin Wilson's Book The Wishing Tree A Picture Of Charles Dickens Statue Caught Her Eye.
In November 2006, Sandra Faulkner, Then President Of The NSW Dickens Society, Wrote To The Sydney Morning Herald's Column 8 Asking If Anyone Had Any Idea If The Statue Still Existed And If So, Where Was It?
In 2007, Column 8 published Saying That The Statue Was Placed In Protective Custody By The Royal Botanic Gardens, And That The Charles Dickens Statue Had Lost Its Head. The Statue Was Later Restored With A New Head And Unveiled Back In Centennial Park On 7 February 2011.
The Rest of the Story – Centennial Park's Statues, Then and Now
My story above runs from 1888 to Dickens's return in 2011. Here's the fuller version of how he got his head back, along with what we know of the other statues that once lined the drives of the People's Park, which ones survive, and where you can find them on your next walk or ride around Grand Drive.
Timeline
- 1827–1837 – Busby's Bore is dug to carry water from the Lachlan Swamps, now Centennial Park, to Hyde Park.
- 26 January 1888 – Sir Henry Parkes opens Centennial Park, "the People's Park".
- 1888 – Villeroy & Boch make the terracotta statues "Sunrise" and "Sunset".
- 1889 – There are eleven statues and two vases in the park. Four terracotta vases by Rhode and Andrea are placed along Grand Drive.
- c.1891 – The marble Charles Dickens, probably by Job Hanson, is set up at Parkes and Hamilton Drives.
- 1890s – The Villeroy & Boch griffins are installed on Parkes Drive near the Paddington Gates.
- 1893 – Premier Sir George Dibbs is asked in Parliament about Dickens's will forbidding memorials, and declines to remove the statue.
- 1897 – A statue of Sir Henry Parkes goes up, and Dickens moves to Dickens Drive and Loch Avenue.
- 1 January 1901 – The Commonwealth of Australia is inaugurated at a pavilion in the park.
- By 1917 – The Grand Drive vases are removed as damaged.
- Before 1946 – Disraeli is "destroyed by accident". "Charity" comes down in 1946.
- 1959 – Lincoln, Garfield and "One More Shot" are removed as too decayed to keep.
- 1970–1972 – After vandalism, Parkes and most of the remaining statues, including Dickens, Diana and the griffins, go into storage.
- 1986 – Cedric Dickens writes to the Herald asking where his great-grandfather's statue went.
- 1988 – The new Federation Pavilion by Alexander Tzannes is built over the Commonwealth Stone.
- 27 April 1996 – Premier Bob Carr unveils Alan Somerville's bronze Parkes on the old pedestal.
- 7 April 2005 – The restored griffins return.
- 2006–2007 – Sandra Faulkner's Column 8 appeals, and the statue is found.
- 7 February 2011 – Dickens, with a new head, is unveiled by Governor Marie Bashir on his 199th birthday.
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A Park Made for Statues
Before it was a park, this was the Lachlan Swamps, Sydney's water supply. From 1827 to 1837 convict gangs dug Busby's Bore, a tunnel about 3.6 kilometres long that ran from what is now Busby's Pond, near the Lang Road entrance, all the way to Hyde Park. When the Nepean scheme took over in the 1880s, the old water reserve was turned into a grand park for the colony's centenary. Charles Moore of the Botanic Gardens and his head gardener James Jones laid it out, with the unemployed doing much of the digging, apparently following ideas of engineer Frederick Franklin, a student of Sir Joseph Paxton. Sir Henry Parkes opened it on 26 January 1888.
Parkes took a keen interest in the statuary. In the European picturesque style, statues were placed at intersections and along the drives to catch the eye, and Centennial Parklands says the original scheme had 31 of them. Subjects ran from classical allegories and mythology to statesmen and writers. In the end, as you'll see, most have been lost.
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Charles Dickens – The Statue That Came Home
The Dickens statue is the star of my original post, so here is the rest of its story. Centennial Parklands thinks it was carved by Job Hanson and set up about 1891 at the corner of Parkes and Hamilton Drives. In 1897 it was moved to make way for Sir Henry Parkes. The Botanic Gardens report of 1898 said Dickens went to "a scarcely inferior site in the park, near the centre", a spot "much frequented by the public". A 1935 plan shows that Loch Avenue was then called Dickens Road.
Not everyone was happy. Dickens wrote in his will, "I conjure my friends on no account to make me the subject of any monument, memorial, or testimonial whatever." In March 1893 the Premier, Sir George Dibbs, was asked about it in Parliament. He said the statue had been put up by the previous government, and taking it down would cost too much on top of putting it up. So Dickens stayed.
He stood there for about 74 years. In the early 1970s, after vandalism, he went into storage. The Melbourne branch of the Dickens Fellowship traced him to the basement of T. A. Taylor and Sons in Rozelle. Cedric Dickens, the novelist's great-grandson, had written to the Herald about him in March 1986. Then came the question that set it all off again. Gaenor Vallack saw a picture of the statue in Edwin Wilson's book The Wishing Tree and asked "Where is that beautiful statue?" Sandra Faulkner, then president of the NSW Dickens Society, wrote to Column 8 in November 2006. There was no answer until the appeal ran again in February 2007. Then Geoff Hearn wrote in to say the statue had been "placed into protective custody by the Royal Botanic Gardens", adding: "he lost his head".
The Herald's 2011 report adds that the body was finally recovered from the backyard of a house at Wentworth Falls in the Blue Mountains, and nobody has said exactly how it got there. Faulkner didn't think the head was stolen by university pranksters. She thought it had been cut off "with a clean cut" to be restored one day. Either way, the head has never turned up. The scroll, the quill and the little finger of the right hand were missing too.
In 2008 the Botanic Gardens Trust offered the statue back. The NSW Public Works stoneyard at Alexandria, led by Paul Thurloe and Ruben Varfi, worked from old photographs. It took three tries over twelve months to find a block of Bianco P Carrara marble that matched. They gave him a new head, flowing beard and all, plus a new finger, scroll and quill. Some experts compared it to giving the Venus de Milo new arms. On 7 February 2011, his 199th birthday, Governor Marie Bashir unveiled him back at Dickens Drive and Loch Avenue. She remembered visiting him as a girl. As Faulkner put it, "the Boz is back in Oz".
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Sunrise and Sunset – The Two That Never Left
In the Rose and Column Gardens, near Busby's Pond, two terracotta women stand on top of nine-metre Corinthian sandstone columns. "Sunrise" is a woman with a baby boy on a half orb, and "Sunset" is a life-size woman cloaked from head to foot. Villeroy & Boch, the Luxembourg pottery firm, made them in 1888. Centennial Parklands says they are the only statues that have stayed on site the whole time. When the rest came down in 1971, these two were judged safe because they were so high up.
The fluted columns used to flank the front entrance of the William Street wing of the Australian Museum. James Barnet designed that building, and he also designed the park's Superintendent's Residence.
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The Griffins of Paddington Gates
Two ceramic winged lions by Villeroy & Boch were put on Parkes Drive in the 1890s. They sat at the Hamilton Drive junction near the Parkes statue, guarding the road down from the Paddington Gates. By 1946 they had lost heads, wings and feet. They went to the depot in 1971, and after restoration they came back on their original sandstone plinths on 7 April 2005. Strictly speaking they aren't true griffins, which have an eagle's head and wings. These are winged lions, which Centennial Parklands calls "gryphonic".
Sir Henry Parkes
It's only right that the father of the park stands in it. A memorial statue of Parkes went up in 1897, which is why Dickens had to move. Vandals damaged it, and in 1970 it was taken away. That attack led to a review of all the park's statues and the removal of any that were at risk. On 27 April 1996, the centenary of Parkes's death, Premier Bob Carr unveiled a new bronze by Alan Somerville on the original sandstone pedestal.
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"We Won" – The Footballer
In Cannon Triangle near Oxford Street stands "We Won", also called "The Footballer". It is by the Florentine sculptor Tommaso Sani, who lived in Leichhardt and caused a stir with his working-class figures on the Pitt Street front of the GPO. The life-size player wears a woollen cap, a sweater and tight knee-length trousers, but he has the calm classical face of Apollo. Around the bronze pedestal, a match is played by hordes of tiny putti, with four cherubs between the scenes. One of them wears the lion skin of Hercules. Graeme Sturgeon called it one of Sani's most important works. Centennial Parklands counts it with "Sunrise" and "Sunset" as one of three original statues that survive.
The Lost Statues
These are the ones we know about, according to Centennial Parklands and Randwick City Council's Our Story:
- Four terracotta vases by Rhode and Andrea stood along Grand Drive near Parkes Drive from 1889. They were removed as damaged by 1917.
- Benjamin Disraeli, the British Prime Minister, was "destroyed by accident" before 1946.
- "Charity", on Grand Drive near today's kiosk, showed a woman holding one child with another at her skirt. It was taken down in 1946.
- Abraham Lincoln, Garfield and "One More Shot" were removed and dumped in 1959 as too decayed.
- "Diana the Huntress", in marble with sword and hound and thought to be by Hanson, stood in Cannon Triangle until 1971. She is now lost.
Centennial Parklands admits that many have "disappeared without a trace". It mentions rumours of night-time thefts and even of statues buried under the levee banks of the ponds during the First World War. As they say, if Dickens is anything to go by, time will tell some remarkable tales.
The Federation Pavilion
It isn't a statue, but it's the park's most important monument. On 1 January 1901, at a special pavilion in Centennial Park, Lord Hopetoun was sworn in and the Commonwealth of Australia was inaugurated before about 60,000 people. The temporary pavilion is gone, but the Commonwealth Stone marks the spot. In 1988 a permanent Federation Pavilion by Alexander Tzannes, shaped like a classical rotunda, was built over it. Around it runs a line from Bernard O'Dowd's 1901 sonnet "Australia": "Mammon or millennial Eden".
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Where to Find Them Today
- Charles Dickens – at Dickens Drive and Loch Avenue.
- Sunrise and Sunset – on the columns in the Rose and Column Gardens near Busby's Pond.
- Griffins – on Parkes Drive at the Hamilton Drive junction, below the Paddington Gates.
- Sir Henry Parkes – the 1996 bronze on the original pedestal near the same junction.
- "We Won" – in Cannon Triangle near Oxford Street, with two cannon.
- Federation Pavilion – in Federation Valley, over the Commonwealth Stone.
- Busby's Bore memorial – near Busby's Pond and the Lang Road entrance.
- Newer works include Gillian Smart's Hand Upon Hand on Banksia Way and Jane Cavanough's Duck Sculpture in the Wetlands Maze.
Where the Sources Disagree
- How many statues? Centennial Parklands and Randwick's Our Story say 31 statues were planned or commissioned when the park opened. The Wikipedia/NSW heritage text says that by 1889 there were eleven statues and two vases.
- How many survive? By my own count about nine statues and sculptures are in the park today. Centennial Parklands says only three of the original statues remain ("Sunrise", "Sunset" and "We Won"). Its list of surviving pieces also includes Dickens, the griffins and the Parkes pedestal, so the count depends on what you include.
- One of two, or one of three? Monument Australia calls it one of only two life-size Dickens statues in the world. Centennial Parklands says one of three.
- When was Dickens removed? 1972 according to the Herald, Randwick and one Parklands page. 1971 according to the same Parklands page ("stood for 74 years from 1897 until 1971"). Parkes went in 1970, and most of the rest followed in 1971.
- Where was he found? Centennial Parklands says the Rozelle basement and then "protective custody" with the Botanic Gardens. Its overview page even says he was "discovered beheaded in … Rozelle". The Herald says the body was recovered from a backyard at Wentworth Falls.
- When did he come back? The unveiling was on 7 February 2011 according to the Herald, Monument Australia and the Parklands Dickens page. The Parklands overview page says 2012.
- Who designed the park? Wikipedia credits the park's design variously to Franklin, to J. W. Deering's plan, and to Moore with Lord Carrington and Parkes. It says "whose plan was finally used remains uncertain".
My Earlier Posts
- Centennial Park - Sydney - New South Wales
- Centennial Park And Queens Park - Sydney
- Sydney Centennial - 1888 - A Coming Of Age
- Federation – 1 January 1901 – From Parkes at Tenterfield to the Centennial Park Ceremony
- Busby's Bore - A Tunnel From The Lachlan Swamps To Hyde Park
- The Centennial Park Eel
- The Sydney Common - Moore Parklands
- The Old Moore Park Zoo – Sydney's First Zoo at Billy Goat Swamp
- Captain Cook Statue - Hyde Park South
- Albert The Good Statue - Queens Square
Sources
- Centennial Parklands – Statues and sculptures
- Centennial Parklands – Charles Dickens statue
- Centennial Parklands – Lost statues
- Centennial Parklands – Griffins
- Centennial Parklands – Sir Henry Parkes
- Centennial Parklands – Sandstone Columns
- Centennial Parklands – We Won (The Footballer)
- "After losing his marbles, Dickens finally has his head screwed on", Sydney Morning Herald, 8 Feb 2011
- Monument Australia – Charles Dickens (quoting the Newcastle Morning Herald, 22 March 1893)
- Randwick City Council Our Story – Lost Statues of Centennial Park
- Randwick City Council Our Story – Charles Dickins Statue
- "Centennial Parklands" – Wikipedia
- "Centennial Park (Sydney)" – Wikipedia
- "Busby's Bore" – Wikipedia