Staircase to a Plum Government Job

This is the way to an upstairs bedroom in the Serviceton Railway Station (b.1896) featured in Extra photos. I cannot fail can I to excite your interest in this building and its history, but with a photo of the staircase rail.

In extra photos you can see an image of a basement area that was a dungeon where it is alleged the people held there in shackles included the miscreants who did not have the money to pay the excise on goods they were transporting by rail across the border between South Australia and Victoria.. Today the population of the village immediately adjacent is 22 adults and a few children. In its heyday between 600 and 700 residents serviced the station and its area and associated industry. 

When my friend and I were rambling through the ground floor of the building a passenger train hurtled through. As the train hollered and clattered past its great bulk threw a shadow over the entire interior after the initial outline of its front engine that I first saw as a great round steam engine and imagined a ghost train.

Built on Disputed Land as it is called, disputed by Victoria and South Australia the station is still owned by the Victorian Railways. A local has laboured over this project almost alone restoring its structure so it is preserved today.

Link to photos