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McKenzie's Tomato Seed Extraction Factory
284 O'Sullivans Road, MARONG VIC 3515 - Property No 231764

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Greater Bendigo City

McKenzies Tomato Seed Extraction Factory looking east.

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Statement of Significance
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Statement of Significance

What is significant?

The former McKenzie's Tomato Seed Extraction Factory is located in open countryside at the corner of McKenzie and O'Sullivans road south of the Marong. It is an abandoned tomato seed extraction factory of humble construction and utilitarian character and materials. The complex is oriented north to south; at the south end is a single-storey gable roofed structure clad in corrugated sheet steel, which may have been a store. The weatherboard one and two-storey component at the centre of the site is the former seed extraction room, and has corrugated sheet steel cladding to the upper sections of the north and south elevations. Both structures are built on a concrete base. A pole-supported barn is located at the north of the contiguous linear factory; a gable-roofed shed with a bush pole frame is at the north end of the complex; and a further timber-framed shed is located to the north-east of the complex. The machinery was relocated to a museum at Lockwood in 1999. An under-fired boiler, manufactured by L B Coulsell and Brothers, North Melbourne, survives at the site, fixed in a brick base to the west of the factory building.

How is it significant?

The former McKenzie's Tomato Seed Extraction Factory is of local historical and technical significance.

Why is it significant?

The former McKenzie's Tomato Seed Extraction Factory, an abandoned factory complex, is of historical significance (Criterion A), for providing evidence of the once significant local tomato growing industry. It was built by Duncan McKenzie during World War II and is an example of a utilitarian industrial complex of humble proportions built of low-cost materials. Its location is relatively isolated, being in close proximity to the fields where tomatoes were previously grown, and some distance from the Alternative Calder Highway to the east. Tomato seeds from the Grosse Lisse variety of tomato were extracted in the factory, and the seeds sold to tomato growers in the Bendigo region and beyond. The tomato pulp residue was also processed on site for sale to tomato sauce manufacturers. The former factory (Criterion C) is also significant for its capacity to demonstrate aspects of its original function, at least in terms of the production process as reflected in the layout and arrangement of the built components. The machinery for the seed extraction process was built locally, and included recycled mining equipment; however, with the exception of the under-fired boiler, the machinery has been relocated off-site for storage at a local museum.

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