The dominant images of Australia's nature and culture tend to revolve around beaches, farmland, deserts and rainforest. However in the Snowy Mountains, an alpine region in the south-eastern corner of the mainland, snow and skiing have been an intricate part of the local communities since the middle of the 19th century.
Skiing in Australia began in the New South Wales town of Kiandra, established as a gold mining settlement high in the Snowy Mountains in 1859. In winter snowbound locals made simple snowshoes - lengths of wood - in order to negotiate the snow. Today we call these skis. The 'Sydney Morning Herald' reported on the novel amusement of 'sliding' on snowshoes at Kiandra as early as 1861. By the 1880s Kiandra residents, among whom there were many Chinese, formed the Kiandra Snowshoe Club. Sports days with races and snow jumping were organised and the town became an annual event. These sports were recorded on glass plate negative by the renowned Sydney-based photographer Charles Kerry in 1896. Shortly after Kiandra came to be promoted by the New South Wales Government Tourist Bureau as for city tourists keen to experience snow and skiing.
The story of skiing is also intrinsically linked to the history of cultural diversity in Australia. The community of Kiandra was already ethnically diverse by the end of the 19th century. Colonists of Anglo-celtic descent lived alongside others from Europe, the Middle East, Asia and their descendants. Most, if not all, participated in skiing. For example Maggie Wilson, the Australian-born daughter of Chinese miner and shopkeeper Tommy Ah Yan, became the first recognised Australian woman ski champion in the early 20th century.
By that time Maggie Wilson and others were using snowshoes or skis fashioned from local mountain ash timber with a turn-up at the front, as opposed to the flat 'butter pat' style snow shoe used in the 1860s. It is thought that the technique for achieving the turn-up was introduced to the area by Norwegian immigrant Martin Amundsen.
Amundsen was the cousin of Raold Amundsen, who would later become the first man to reach the South Pole. Martin allegedly jumped ship on the South Coast of New South Wales and made his way to Kiandra in the early 1880s. There he became involved in the local mining industry. From his home province of Telemark in Norway, he also brought the knowledge of air seasoning timber for skis. To Amundsen, therefore, can be attributed the single-handed transfer of a technology that facilitated the development of the local ski culture, tourism and manufacturing industry.
These snowshoes are an example of early Amundsen skis. Their significance is enhanced by the poker worked inscriptions 'Y Weselman' and 'Kiandra'. An associate of Amundsen, Weselman was a European who developed a copper mine at Lob's Hole near Kiandra in the early 1890s. They are made of mountain ash and have the characteristic Amundsen turn-up at the front. It is possible therefore that they were made by Amundsen or at least under his tutelage.
These snowshoes have an added significance in being among the oldest acquisitions in the Museum's collection. They were donated in 1895 by a woman who lived at Adaminaby - not far from Kiandra. The donor described them as having been used to carry the mail when snow made roads impassable to vehicular traffic.
Original museum records state that the shoes are made of mountain ash, an Australian hard wood.
This date range (1880-1895) reflects the possible earliest period of Weselman's activities in the area in association with Amundsen and the donation of the skis to the Museum.
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