The NSW Migration Heritage Centre is collaborating with the Orange City Council to employ a local historian to undertake place research to produce a migration and settlement trail for the Orange local government area in the form of a brochure, a series of interpretative signs with images and a public launch for the Orange Migration Trail.
Its research will be drawn from the thematic study, book and exhibition Half A World Away: Postwar Migration Stories To Orange And District researched by local historian Elisabeth Edwards for the NSW Migration Heritage Centre and Orange City Council.
Places associated with the history of migration and settlement identified in the book include:
* Chinaman’s Bend, Mitchell Highway, where Chinese people once had market gardens;
* Orange railway station, often the first place in Orange migrants saw when they were taken to the city from holding camps, such as the one in Bathurst, to live and work. Many migrants found employment on the railways also;
* Electrolux factory (formerly Emmco, then Email Ltd), the main source of employment for migrants in Orange for many years. There was also a migrant hostel adjacent to the factory;
* Bloomfield Hospital, where many migrants worked;
* Bloomfield Hall: a number of migrants who worked at Bloomfield were involved in theatrical productions held there;
* Byng Church and cemetery, once the centre of a vibrant mining community comprising mainly Cornish people;
* Tynan Street, where many migrant families built their homes in the 1950s;
* Slavic Pentecostal Church, Kearney’s Drive, place of worship for White Russians from the early 1960s;
* Former Ukrainian Hall (now Aboriginal Lands Council), corner Clinton and Dalton streets, which was a social and cultural centre for Ukrainians;
* Lutheran Church, Heatherbrae Parade, where people from northern Europe worship;
* Hall in McNamara Street where Greek Orthodox services are held; and
* Strand Theatre/Old Town Hall/CWA Hall, where naturalisation ceremonies were held.
The trail will be developed by 2012.
