Aug 28 2008
The Hills Hoist
Sad to say, but the Hills Hoist is becoming rare these days. Have you ever watched a way of life passing and no one seems to care?
Once the Hills Hoist was synonymous with our way of life and every backyard across the continent had one. Usually with a few socks and a towel to dry in the wind.
My generation grew up agile, lean and lissome from countless hours swinging around and around. I would start at the back door, take a deep breath, break into a long, loping run and then literally fly through the air, across the rhubarb patch, to grasp the bars in one fluid movement. We all did.
Some Australian innovations have become national icons, and the Hills Hoist is definitely one of them.
The old Hoist has done just about everything from starring at the Olympics to being the only thing left standing in Darwin backyards after Cyclone Tracy devastated the city.
Lance Hill was a motor mechanic who made a clothesline for his wife when she complained about her washing continually falling off the prop washing line. The year was 1945. The place was Adelaide, South Australia.
His clothesline was a single steel pole with metal ribs spreading out from the centre pole. Between the ribs he strung rust-proof wire from which the clothes would hang. He invented a way of winding up the top part of the centre pole so that the clothes could be raised high to dry in the wind.
In 1994, Hills celebrated the sale of its 5 millionth Hills Hoist, an event the whole country stopped to recognise as a milestone. The “Hills Rotary Hoist” had become an emblem of Australian enterprise.
Starring in the Arts Festival
As a closing chapter of the first fifty years of the Hills Company, the 1996 Adelaide Festival of Arts chose the “Hills Rotary Hoist” as a symbol to promote and market their programme of cultural events to the world. Held high like a flaming torch, the hoist expressed a celebration of individual effort and Australian endeavour.
Featuring in the Olympic Games
In a celebration of Australian Icons the familiar Hills Hoist was prominent in the closing ceremony of the Sydney 2000 Olympic Games. If it hadn’t brought tears of nostalgia to my eyes I would have jeered at the ugly looking thing. How could an old piece of iron for drying nappies and tea-towels evoke such bittersweet memories? Bring on the violins. Heaven only knows what the rest of the world thought.
The Hills Hoist brings back many memories of childhood for Australians. There are still some around, even in this age of smaller houses and clothes draped to dry over a million balconies.
I can’t even look at one without a sudden incredible urge to swing.
Like to shout me a cold beer?
