Page 7 - City of Cessnock Water Supply and Sewerage Service Utility

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Buttai Reservoir is within the City of Cessnock Municipality and its
located on part of Portion No. 14, Parish of Maitland. The Junction of the
East Greta branch pipe-line was made at the presentsiteof Heddon Greta booster
station and which is part of Lot No. 11, Parish of Heddon (See drawing Plan No.
11823).

The Australian Agricultural Company, the great original coal monopolist,
had also joined the rush to extend operations from the Newcastle coalfield to
the N3w South Maitland area and commenced the sinking of Hebburn Colliery. By
27th April, 1905 the township of Weston was connected to the Kurri spur water
main. The 1905 Water Board Annual Report indicated that the Board was very
cognisant of mining population explosion and the mining expansion. In 1905
it was decided that water storage should be provided in this mining area. An
elevated site was selected at Pelaw Main. Crown land, being part of Portion
No. 76, Parish of Stanford, was set aside; this was gazetted on the 17th
September, 1904 for future water use.

Abermain Colliery, Neath Colliery and the Aberdare Collieries group in
the Cessnock region, all brought their own little mining hamlets, which in the
case of Cessnock, quickly grew into a large town. By 24th April, 1906
Abermain was supplied with water. Maggie Wallace (Nee Kennedy) still an
Abermain resident, recalls that when the water main reached Abermain, the then
mainly settled area was that which is now known as 'old school hill'. A
central stand-pipe,placed just below the original public school, serviced this
area, and it was a 'chore' for children to obtain the house-hold water needs in
a 'cleaned' kerosene tin. Alternatively Patterson and Jones, local men who
worked with horse and dray, would carry a cask of water for one shilling.
Cessnock was joined by a temporary main via Aberdare on 5th December, 1908.

It is a worthy note that the sinking of Aberda~e Shaft had commenced
in March 1904, and Aberdare Extended Tunnel was being driven in 1906. The
miners in Cessnock at that time like many other earlier mining areas had depended
to some extent on water holes in creeks and also on early farm wells. James
Lightfoot, a carrier of Briqge Street, Cessnock provided a supply of water
conveyed in a small tank on a horse dray. Henry Scanlon, well known later
in mining union circles and his wife Grace, can both recall from their childhood
days, when water for household purposes was obtained from water-holes and a small
'made' dam in the creek, just beyond the present East Cessnock Primary School
site.