Ramornie Meat-Preserving Company’s Works, Clarence River.

Rare engraving of the Ramornie Meat-Preserving Company which was situated at Urara River, a tributary of the Clarence, and are about ten miles distant from Grafton. It was established by Charles Grant Tindal who was the first to establish meat works in Australia. Mr. Tindal explored Queensland (present northern NSW), and subsequently bought Koreela Station, at the head of the Clarence, then known as Big River. Early in the 1850’s he sold Koreela and purchased Ramornie Station, a portion of which ran to within eleven miles of Grafton, and which is now in the possession of the late Mr. Tindal’s son, Mr. C. P. Tindal. He started a boiling-down works, which later on developed into the Ramornie tinning and meat extract works. To do this he went to England in 1862 and formed a small limited company. The meat works were opened in 1865 or 1866, and have worked for a portion of every year since, being by far the oldest meat works in Australia. To it came from England many men who became well known in the meat export trade, amongst them the late Mr. T. Cordingley, as chemist, and later founder, with Mr. Tindal, of the North Queensland Meat Export Company, and Mr. Alban Gee, of the Sydney Meat Preserving Company.

From the original edition of the Town and Country Journal.