Whether you are a local or a visitor, put Meroogal on your list of places to experience in the Shoalhaven. It is an absolute gem of a history museum housing a surprising treasure trove.
Unlike many houses that are open to the public, Meroogal was never home to someone well-known or wealthy. Its significance lies not in the names of those who lived there, but in the way those lives were lived and in the possessions they left behind.
The museum collection comprises about 4000 household objects and family treasures that illustrate nearly 100 years of social and technological change.
Designed by Kenneth McKenzie for his sister Jessie, work on the house began in 1885, the year Nowra was declared a town. In February 1886, the recently widowed Jessie Thorburn moved in to the newly completed house with three of her four unmarried daughters, Belle, Kate and Georgie. The fourth daughter, her youngest, Tot, moved in later, in 1893.
Meroogal was loved and maintained by four generations of women from this one local family, and has barely changed since it was built in the 1880s. The house still overflows with their favourite belongings, and the garden with fruit and produce that hint at their self-sufficiency and hospitality. Books and ornaments, furniture, photographs, diaries and journals, clippings, recipes and receipts – all tell a multitude of stories about the pleasures and labours of daily life, the Meroogal women and the south-coast community in which they lived.
On her death in 1956, aged 91, Tot left the house to her nieces Helen, Margaret and Elgin Macgregor, who had lived there since the mid 1930s. In 1977 Margaret Macgregor’s daughter June Wallace inherited the house. She owned and maintained Meroogal until 1985 when it was purchased by Historic Houses NSW (now Museums of History NSW) and June donated the 4000 or so objects in the house that form the museum collection.
Apart from an early extension to create a larger dining room by relocating the kitchen, and the retrofitting of electricity and plumbing, Meroogal has changed little since it was built. Through careful housekeeping and maintenance, the Thorburns and Macgregors kept the house much as it was when they first moved in. They were in their own way, whether through thrift or design, its first conservators.
Life at Meroogal owed much to the financial independence of the Thorburn and Macgregor women, with the original purchase of the land and construction of Meroogal financed by Jessie Thorburn’s son Robert, a successful gold miner. The large home, with its extensive kitchen garden, chicken coops, horse paddock and orchard (the original allotment was over 10 times the present size), enabled a degree of self-sufficiency, and when times were tighter in later years, bedrooms to rent out and land to subdivide. Without this family support, the Thorburn sisters most likely would never have had a house of their own, and would perhaps have had no choice but to marry or seek work not generally considered suitable for women of their class.
Meroogal Women’s Art Prize 2024
There’s an additional reason to visit Meroogal between November 20024 – May 2025, the biennial Meroogal Women’s Art Prize.
The prize was established in 1998 by Sydney Living Museums (now Museums of History NSW), in acknowledgement of Meroogal’s strong feminine history, and to encourage female artists in the Shoalhaven to submit works influenced by the house and its history.
The exhibition of works selected for the 2024 Meroogal Women’s Art Prize opens 10.30am Saturday 9 November 2024.
My next article will show you some artworks you won’t see in the exhibition! I have gathered together some wonderful works by local artists not selected for this year’s prize and exhibition. I was interested to hear their views on art prizes and the role they play in their practices. You may be, too. Watch out for, Art Prizes: An Artist’s Friend or Foe?
LOCATION
Meroogal is located at corner West and Worrigee Streets Nowra NSW 2541.
Open Saturday 10am-4pm closed Christmas Day. Wheelchair accessible.
Find more information about visiting Meroogal by clicking here.
