THE shipping news was once big news everywhere - so big that the first owners of The Advertiser built two triple-storey office blocks on Port Adelaide’s Divett Street.
Not that the glorious bluestone buildings at 11 and 13 look anything like office blocks.
Only the massive safe doors in the corners suggest commerce.
Those, and the cellars.
There’s an entire storey underground.
It’s unlikely that precious records like the shipping news were stored there - the area has always been subject to king tides.
Craigh and John just wanted somewhere to put down a few bottles of wine.
That’s what they came looking for after taking their leave of the public service in Canberra (as is traditional when government changes hands, redundancy packages were proffered when John Howard came to office).
What they found was a superb cellar below a grand home, and a small, tight-knit community of merry-making home-makers.
“We’d gone back to Canberra to pack up and my sister was looking after the place, and there was a note put through the door … the neighbours had organised a party to meet us,” Craigh says.
He and John couldn’t make it, but the party went ahead without them.
“It was that sort of atmosphere, about 10 years ago, that made the place so appealing - you knew all the other people who were around the place,” Craigh says.
“They’d seek you out.
“They used to get together and have little events just before Christmas, and things like that.”
“It was very much a village atmosphere,” John says.
Some thought them mad.
“When we told my mother, I knew what her reaction would be so I prefaced it by saying to her: ‘Do you want to hear the good news or the bad news?’
“I said: ‘Well, the good news is that we’ve bought a house in Adelaide. The bad news is that it’s in Port Adelaide.’ She said: ‘Well, I’m never setting foot on your bloody doorstep.’
“It didn’t take long for her to come around … but that was the stereotypical attitude.”
On the other hand, Craigh’s father was a truck driver who came to the Port every other day, and often brought his family for an outing.
“ For a lot of people there was some sort of maritime attraction,” John says.
“It wasn’t like that for us.
“We’re not boating people, we weren’t yachting enthusiasts.”
Craigh calls an accident.
“We’d never considered that we’d come to Port Adelaide … but having come to Port Adelaide, we became huge converts for the place.
“Our only condition on the purchase of the property was that the council give permission for us to have dogs - we had three huge Briards. They lived inside anyway, so they were no trouble.”
“And we fell in love with the building, so we started going back through the old land titles.”
It was then a historical precinct.
“There were no new developments at that stage,” John says. “There were renovations, or alterations to existing old buildings - such as what happened here.
“There is a stereotype. We say to people we live at Port Adelaide, and they say: ‘Oh in the new development?’ We say no, in the old part, and they say: ‘Oh, in a warehouse conversion?’ We love warehouse conversions, but this place was never a warehouse.”
It was a busy newspaper office - a century ago, Port Adelaide rivalled Adelaide in commercial importance. At the same time, several other businesses occupied the building.
Later, it was a bank.
Port Adelaide Racing Club had its offices there, for a short period.
The developers, Dunns, bought 11 and 13 as derelict shells.
They were pioneers.
Most of the people who lived in the old places then have left - including the Dunns - either because those people have moved on to new renovations in greener pastures or because the nature of their little village changed as the focus changed from renewal of the old to the knocking down of the old and building of the new.
“They were people who had moved in in the first phase of the Port becoming a new living environment,” John says.
“Some became a little disenchanted.”
Craigh and John are still in love with the place, despite the loss of the old village spirit and the threat of flooding.
Their cellar was inundated last July.
A king tide lapped at their door and, after seawater filled a mains access pit, the packing around the water pipe blew out and a few thousand litres rushed in.
Despite being built on what was a swamp, the place is solid.
“The building’s tilted - it leans out to the street about 5 degrees,” Craigh says.
“It’s been here 130 years and hasn’t fallen down, though.”
Safe as houses.
The streets are pretty safe, too.
“It’s always been safe (to walk in the streets at night) while we’ve been here,” Craigh says.
“One of the old-timers used to tell stories about the back lane behind us. It goes from the pub behind us to the one at the other corner.
“He used to be a nightwatchman.
“They had their guns taken away from them because someone shot themselves in the foot. He said that while he was without a gun, he would not walk down the back lane.
“We’ve not had any trouble.
“The people have largely gone who used to drink the metho and live along the wharf … although if you’ve got a dog no-one bothers you. In fact, because dogs are non-judgemental they would go up to those people for a pat and those people would talk to you as well.
“They were never threatening.”
The dogs also led the couple into conversation with great Port characters like Keith Leleu - a staunch defender of the area’s heritage.
“He was someone we wouldn’t have met, otherwise - a really interesting guy,” Craigh says.
“Keith used to get around in an orange boiler suit. He owned a maritime museum. He died about 18 months ago. There’s a tug he owned that’s up out of the water on the other side of the river - he bought it for one dollar, so it’s called the One Dollar. They tried to make him get rid of it, so he drilled holes in it, so it wouldn’t float.
“We used to hear him talking on the radio.
“People like him have gone. You’re getting young people coming into the Port now who will just steam-roller over you to get to where they’re going.
“That’s the change that’s happening.
“With the new developments, the old-timers are disappearing. And the new people don’t want to know anybody but themselves.”
Still, there’ll always be Craigh and John.
So, if you see a couple of bearded chaps out for a walk with a big, hairy dog with a big, lolling grin on its face, say g’day.
It’s only proper, at Port Adelaide.
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