Ginninderra Blacksmith's Shop

It is located on the Barton Highway, next to Deasland homestead, which is slated for demolition due to the ‘Mr Fluffy’ loose-fill asbestos disaster.

It contains the remnants of a forge with a small cast-iron door and a petrol engine next to restored leather bellows.

[4] James Hatch built the original blacksmith's shop, possibly as early as 1859, but more likely in 1860 as he seems to have been away at the Kiandra goldfield in 1859.

Hatch's elder brother, William, also moved to the district, taking up a selection called Rosewood in 1862.

Fortunately, the blacksmith's shop was saved with the help of Aboriginal man, Bobby Hamilton, and other Ginninderra neighbours.

[11] The Queanbeyan Age said ‘You can hear the notes, loud and clear, with all their variations, from the anvil of Mr George Curran’s blacksmith’s forge’.

Helping him in the blacksmithing business was Augustus Helmund, the son of a German sign writer from Queanbeyan.

Harry Curran seized the opportunity, left his uncle George at Bungendore, and took over the workshop at Ginninderra a few months later in his own right.

[19] In 1893, Curran found himself indirectly involved in a criminal case brought against his brother-in-law, who was charged with stealing seed corn from John Southwell, and hiding it in the blacksmith's shop.

Her drawing is now part of the collection of the National Library of Australia and is on loan to the Canberra Museum and Gallery’s permanent display, which also features Curran’s smaller anvil and swage block.

[25] In February 1954, when Elizabeth II visited Canberra, Curran was one of seven elderly ‘pioneers’ invited to meet the royal party.

Lionel Wigmore recorded that, when he was introduced to the Philip, Duke of Edinburgh, who remarked, ‘you must have worked very hard’, Harry Curran's dry reply was, ‘Too right I did!’.