The significance of these images are very important to show recognition for the ongoing work of our passionate AMMPT volunteers like Barry Goldman.
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In this instance, a recent donation of artefacts from Richard Rennie was received a few weeks ago and one of the items caught Barry’s eye . At first he thought it was a South Australian made ‘ Benbo’ (Spelling not known) projector but later he discovered it to be an ‘Austral’ projector made in Sydney.
Barry immediately went to work on the machine which was in a very poor state. Barry stripped the machine down to bedrock. He de-corroded, cleaned, oiled, reassembled and paint treated the machine. Barry advises that the film magazine is still being worked on and it wasn’t available for photos at that time. The provenance for this particular machine was not known by the donor but Barry has been able to discover that it was probably made around 1922 and found that at least one of the bronze gears was cast and machined by a Perth company no longer with us. The serial number found under layers of corrosion and grime, is 2259 suggesting that the Austral projectors were a popular choice. Barry also discovered that at some point in this machine’s life it had been adapted for the addition of sound to the projection. To that end Barry has donated some important historical books on Projection history to our print library and Barry wants to do some further research on Austral projectors.
