'Historically significant': Toilet pit excavation could uncover opals

Peter Glogauer, a history enthusiast, is putting the area's opal mining history in the spotlight and raising the hackles of the local history society.

Mr Glogauer thinks he has found the rubbish hole - and toilet hole - of Jack Murray, who he calls the first registered opal miner and therefore the most significant figure in the area's opal mining history.

But the Lightning Ridge Historical Society doesn't believe the site has any relevance or link to Mr Murray's history - and they believe the historical gravitas should be given to a man by the name of Charlie Nettleton, who they say sank the first mine, and is commemorated in statue form in Lightning Ridge.

Mr Glogauer, a second-generation miner who grew up near the opal fields, is working with TV's 'opal queen' Kelly Tishler - who features on the Discovery Channel's Outback Opal Hunters - to excavate a site in Lightning Ridge.

The pair claim to have found the "historically significant" site on Ms Tishler's land after following maps and historical and archaeological clues.

"Jack Murray was the first recorded opal miner here in 1901, he lost his job as a boundary rider for digging holes on Dunambral run," Mr Glogauer told the Daily Liberal.

" ... [Ms Tishler] and I have located his lost camp site, we plan on excavating the rubbish hole as it is a treasure trove of early [20th] century artefacts. We've even found an opal thrown away over 110 years ago."

According to the pair, Mr Murray and his family lived in a hut on the site, and they think the real treasure could be located in the toilet pit - where no-one would want to look for it.

So far, they have found opal chips, glass bottles, crockery, drill bits and horse paraphernalia.

"The man was a boundary rider and fencer and in the old days they used split timber, and they drilled holes for the wire. We found two of those drill bits," Mr Glogauer said.

"We've also found numerous bottles and other artefacts. I've dated some of the bottles."

Mr Glogauer said the opal shards show Mr Murray's wife's handiwork as the first opal cutter.

"She used to lift flakes off the opal with a knife, then then rub them on a big stone and polish them. She was the first person to cut black opal in Lightning Ridge and that was in 1901," Mr Glogauer said.

He claimed a man by the name of Dan Ryan, who was living to the north with his family, teamed up with Mr Murray and they walked to White Cliffs to sell the first opals.

Ms Tishler said, as an opal cutter herself, she is "very fascinated in a lot of this stuff" and is keen to find out what they discover in the pit.

"Just imagine what life would have been like for these people living very remotely with not much water, especially in the summer, in the dry landscape that we've got - what life would have been like," Ms Tishler told the Daily Liberal.

She planned to put the opal shards and other artefacts uncovered at the site in a collection which she would hold for historical significance.

"Back then, the purples and the blues [stones] were not considered valuable because you've got to remember this is a brand new gemstone just hitting the world market," she said, adding the red and orange gemstones were considered of more worth at the time.

"But a long way from anywhere to sell opal, you're finding these amazing rocks that the world's never seen.

"So it would have been a very exciting time for discovery back then."

The Lightning Ridge Historical Society has a different take on the matter. The group members believe Mr Murray was not recorded to have lived on the land Ms Tishler owns, and therefore the site being excavated is not Mr Murray's dump site.

Among their arguments, they say they have records showing Mr Murray lived in a house, not a hut, and this was in a different area.

A spokesperson for the society said the man Mr Murray teamed up with to sell the opals in White Cliffs was another man, Charlie Nettleton, and he was the one who ultimately knew what to do with the stone.

A life size bronze sculpture, called the Spirit of Lightning Ridge, stands in the town and commemorates Charlie Nettleton as the founder of the black opal industry in Lightning Ridge. The sculpture was commissioned by the Lightning Ridge Historical Society.

"Jack Murray was the first registered opal miner, and Charlie Nettleton was actually employed by a syndicate of businessmen in Lightning Ridge to sink a shaft, and we have commemorated the shaft ... " the spokesperson said.

They continued: "One was the first person to find the opal, the second person knew what to do with it."