Crossland Antiques & Collectables

In 1936, a submarine telephone cable snaked its way across Bass Strait from Apollo Bay to Stanley, making this tiny Tasmanian port the first place in Tasmania connected by phone to mainland Australia. The town’s relationship with unlikely arrivals stretches back further still: several of its 1830s and 1840s buildings, including the Van Diemen’s Land Company Store and the Bond Store, were constructed from bluestone shipped from England as ballast in the bellies of wool-laden vessels, then repurposed into warehouses, cottages, and stores.

The Van Diemen’s Land Company had already been importing things it didn’t strictly need for a decade by the time that cable arrived. Founded in London in 1825 and granted 250,000 acres on the promise of merino wool, the company shipped its English staff to Circular Head in October 1826, along with livestock, equipment, and, eventually, an entire prefabricated church, ordered from London and reassembled on site for a total cost, freight and erection included, of under 400 pounds. The result is a town that has spent two centuries importing its infrastructure piece by piece, whether by ship’s hold or by cable, and has never once shipped anything back.