The Dingo Flour sign is a stylised silhouetted

dingo The dingo (''Canis familiaris'', ''Canis familiaris dingo'', ''Canis dingo'', or '' Canis lupus dingo'') is an ancient (basal) lineage of dog found in Australia. Its taxonomic classification is debated as indicated by the variety of scient ...

in red on the side of a historic and

heritage-listed This list is of heritage registers, inventories of cultural properties, natural and man-made, tangible and intangible, movable and immovable, that are deemed to be of sufficient heritage value to be separately identified and recorded. In many i ...

working

flour mill A gristmill (also: grist mill, corn mill, flour mill, feed mill or feedmill) grinds cereal grain into flour and middlings. The term can refer to either the grinding mechanism or the building that holds it. Grist is grain that has been separated ...

in North Fremantle,

Western Australia Western Australia (commonly abbreviated as WA) is a state of Australia occupying the western percent of the land area of Australia excluding external territories. It is bounded by the Indian Ocean to the north and west, the Southern Ocean to ...

. The mill is in a complex known as the Great Southern Roller Flour Mills Limited. On the site (which dates from 1922) are

silo A silo (from the Greek σιρός – ''siros'', "pit for holding grain") is a structure for storing bulk materials. Silos are used in agriculture to store fermented feed known as silage, not to be confused with a grain bin, which is used ...

s, an office and laboratory and other buildings. There was a second Dingo Flour mill in Narrogin from 1903 to late October 1912, when a new company was formed to take over from the Co-operative company. The

Heritage Council of Western Australia The Heritage Council of Western Australia is the Government of Western Australia agency created to identify, conserve and promote places of cultural heritage significance in the state. Prior to its creation, considerable variance in policy and p ...

says: “…the place has a landmark quality with strong vertical proportions, height and massing of the mill and silo structures, the Dingo Flour brand image, and the

Norfolk Island pine ''Araucaria heterophylla'' (synonym ''A. excelsa'') is a species of conifer. As its vernacular name Norfolk Island pine (or Norfolk pine) implies, the tree is endemic to Norfolk Island, an external territory of Australia located in the Pacific ...

; the place has been commonly referred to as 'Dingo Flour Mill' for many years, showing the impact of the symbol, and has developed its own set of myths, including that it was painted by

Alan Bond Alan Bond (22 April 1938 – 5 June 2015) was an English-born Australian businessman noted for his high-profile and often corrupt business dealings. These included his central role in the WA Inc scandals of the 1980s, and what was at the time ...

, demonstrating that the 'dingo' contributes to the community’s sense of place…” The mill was designed by

architect An architect is a person who plans, designs and oversees the construction of buildings. To practice architecture means to provide services in connection with the design of buildings and the space within the site surrounding the buildings that h ...

Allen, of Allen and Nicholas, and the office building was designed by Powell, Cameron & Chisholm Architects. The sign and the rest of the site was heritage-listed in 2008. The dingo logo was painted by artist Les Nash in 1940 for £40. According to his daughter Mona Rankin it took her father about a week to complete the logo. Nash first sketched the dingo onto graph paper and then used the gridded panels on the silo to guide his large-scale transfer of the design onto the silo itself. It is about five and a half storeys high. It was painted over during

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the World War II by country, vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great power ...

, but its outlines were still faintly visible.

Refugees A refugee, conventionally speaking, is a displaced person who has crossed national borders and who cannot or is unwilling to return home due to well-founded fear of persecution.

and

migrants Migrant may refer to: Human migration *Human migration *Emigration, leaving one's resident country with the intent to settle elsewhere *Immigration, movement into a country with the intent to settle * Economic migrant, someone who emigrates from o ...

coming to

Fremantle Fremantle () () is a port city in Western Australia, located at the mouth of the Swan River in the metropolitan area of Perth, the state capital. Fremantle Harbour serves as the port of Perth. The Western Australian vernacular diminutive for ...

saw the sign, and it remains a useful reference point for boaters and anglers. It was mostly re-painted in March 2001. In 2010 the flour mill was renovated, and the dingo now gets re-painted every month.

References

{{commons category-inline Landmarks in Perth, Western Australia Heritage places in Fremantle Individual signs in Australia State Register of Heritage Places in the City of Fremantle 1940 establishments in Australia

See also

References