1940-1958

Melocco History

1725 -1971

by Samantha Trenoweth

May 2001

1725 Giovanni Melocco, grandfather of Peter, Antonio and Galliano established the family in Toppo, in Udine, an area of Italy, which traditionally supplied mosaic workers to Venice and France.

1883 On March 18, Pietro (Peter) Oliver Melocco was born, the first child of Giovanni Battista Melocco and Teresa Fabris, in the tiny town of Toppo in the province of Udine, north-eastern Italy.

1885 On January 24, Giovanni and Teresa Melocco’s second child, Maria, was born.

1886 The second of the Melocco Brothers, Antonio (Tony), was born on December 20.

1888 The fourth of Giovanni and Teresa Melocco’s children, Rosina, was born on July 29.

1893 At the urging of the local primary school teacher, who told Teresa Melocco that her eldest boy should further his education, Peter Melocco left his home and family at just ten years old. He travelled overland to Genoa, where he boarded a ship bound for New York. For the journey, his mother packed him a small case of clothes and six hard boiled eggs.

1894 In America, Peter lived with his Uncle Constante and his Aunt Eufrasia. He attended five years of high school and worked part-time delivering bundles of fabric flowers which were made by inadequately paid outworkers in the poorest parts of Manhattan. The experience affected the teenager deeply — colouring his opinion of America and of the gap in all societies between rich and poor.

1897 Back in Toppo, the youngest Melocco brother, Galliano (Galli) Eugene, was born on March 6.

1898 At age 15, Peter left high school and began to study the trade of a mosaic worker at the Cooper’s Union Academy in Art and Drawing. Peter studied by night and worked by day with his three uncles, Constante, Valentino and Vincenzo — all skilled in the crafts of marble, terrazzo, mosaic and decorative plaster. In the years that followed he worked, not just in New York, but all over the United States.

1905 Giovanni and Teresa Melocco’s eldest daughter, Maria, married Antonio Cicutto on March 7. The Cicuttos were another established family in Toppo (Antonio’s father was Luigi Cicutto and his mother was Felicita Tonitto). Maria and Antonio’s eldest son, Romolo, was born in Toppo on December 3 that year.

1907 Peter and a group of friends attended a lantern slide show at their club, the eccentrically named Independent Order of Oddfellows. A visiting Australian architect showed slides of Sydney, including some of the recently completed Anthony Horderns building on Brickfield Hill. Peter saw, in Australia, both a working environment of enormous potential and an appealing home. Disillusioned by what he saw as corrupt American business practise in the building trade, he quickly began planning his move.

On October 11, Maria and Antonio Cicutto’s eldest daughter, Egidia (Edith), was born in Toppo.

1908 In 1907, Peter returned home to Toppo, where he renewed contact with his family and met his youngest brother, 11-year-old Galli, for the first time. He had already booked his passage from Italy to Australia and, on May 6 1908, Peter arrived in Sydney with six shillings in his pocket. Within three days of his arrival, Peter had arranged accommodation at Mrs McCabe’s boarding house at 242 Glebe Point Road, Glebe, and a job as a tile layer for GE Crane and Sons. In October that year, Peter commenced his own working operations at 16 Regent Street, Redfern, and Melocco Bros Pty Ltd was born.

1909 Peter had kept in touch with his brother, Tony, by mail throughout much of his long absence. Tony had completed his primary schooling in Toppo, then moved to Paris where he too had trained in the mosaic, plaster and marble crafts. When Peter left New York in 1907, Tony organised to replace him in their uncles’ business. Throughout 1908 and 1909, Tony Melocco worked hard and lived frugally in America, sending any money he could save to Australia to subsidise his elder brother’s fledgling business. Peter meanwhile was beginning to receive significant commissions, including the black and white mosaic foyer to Dymocks House in George Street.

On December 6, Maria and Antonio Cicutto’s son, Giovanni Battista (Remo), was born in Toppo.

“I’m fairly certain that Tony trained with a man called Gian Domenico Facchina, who is famed for inventing mosaic-on-paper, the modern mosaic technique that we know today. He was born in 1826 in Sequals in Friuli, which is just five or six kilometres from Toppo. He moved to France in 1847 but he generally sourced his workers from Friuli. By the time Tony arrived in Paris, his studio would have employed 100 or so people. He was extremely well respected and he and his men worked all over Europe, from St Petersburg to Trieste and of course Paris.” — Frank Colussi

1910 Peter sent word to Tony in America and to his parents in Italy that his business in Sydney, though still small, had made significant progress. Not least of its successes was a commission to create a mosaic floor for the Irish Chapel in St Mary’s Cathedral. When Peter first heard the cathedral was planning a mosaic, he approached Cardinal Moran, who explained that he already had a quote from a European firm, but the young artist would not take no for an answer. Poring over a copy of the Book of Kells by gaslight, Peter completed his design, based on ancient Celtic iconography, in less than a week. He prepared a quote for the job, which he later learned had undercut the European firm by half, and won his first major commission. For much of 1909 and 1910, Peter woke early each morning to refine and execute his designs, finally lugging the finished slabs of marble and terrazzo mosaic across town to the cathedral by wheelbarrow and by tram.

Later that year, Tony and Galliano Melocco arrived in Sydney. Tony immediately set to work helping his brother complete the Irish Chapel commission and Galli was sent, as a weekly boarder, to school at Knox College, across the harbour at North Sydney.

1911 With the Irish Saints Chapel completed, Peter and Tony returned to the work which dominated the company’s early years — the installation and design of terrazzo bathrooms in the eastern suburbs of Sydney. Melocco Brothers introduced terrazzo to Australia and it quickly became popular as a bathroom material. During these years, the brothers lived frugally and often still transported their materials by foot or by tram.

“My father (Galli) came home from school on weekends and helped in the workshop. His job was often to run down the embankment near the workshop to the railway line and collect lumps of coal for fuel that had fallen from trains running between Central and Redfern stations.” — Ann Melocco Trenoweth

1912 Two of Melocco Brothers’ early jobs (completed around this time) were the foyer at Kodak House and the floor of the Tattersals Club in Elizabeth Street Sydney. Kodak House was a black and white marble mosaic, about 20 square metres in size. It was later removed and preserved on show at the Melocco Bros Booth Street factory. (Its present whereabouts are unknown.) The work in the Tattersals Club was mainly in the hallways and consisted of Grecian-style mosaic borders with a centre strip of terrazzo. These were destroyed when the club was demolished in the 1980s.

1913 Anthony Horderns closed its marble business and sold much of its equipment to Melocco Brothers. Peter and Tony had previously finished their work with hand tools and contracted all their marble cutting to Anthony Horderns. Also in 1913, Galliano Melocco completed his schooling and began his Marine Engineering apprenticeship with a Mr Smith of Drummoyne.

1917 Maria and Antonio Cicutto’s son, Karol (Charles), was born on March 20 in Trenchin, Czechoslovakia, where they had moved. Galli Melocco completed his apprenticeship and joined the Merchant Navy. Over the following four years he worked on board a number of magnificent old steam ships, including the Niagara (the first ship to plie the Canadian/Australasian route which it continued to travel until it was sunk by a German mine off the coast of New Zealand in 1941), the Zealandia and the Riverina.

1918 Maria and Antonio Cicutto’s son, Anthony John Cicutto was born on September 1 in Trenchin, Czechoslovakia.

1919 Peter and Tony purchased their own premises at 1 Booth Street, Annandale — formerly the property of Moodie Bros — and, with some expansions across the road, this remained the firm’s headquarters until the business was sold to BMI in 1961. Melocco Brothers was already benefiting from a nation-wide building boom which would continue through the 1920s, keeping between 100 and 200 men working for the company. Movie theatres and banks would be their dominant commissions in the coming decade. Melocco Bros worked on most of the large banks in Martin Place, including the Government Savings Bank, the Bank of New South Wales, the Rural Bank, MLC House and the Prudential Building.

1921 Galli left the merchant navy on August 3 and planned to go into business with his brothers. On December 24, Peter married Josephine (Zeppa) Victoria Asioli.

“My mother was the eldest of four Asioli sisters who lived with their parents at Mosman on the north side of the harbour. The three younger sisters ran their family’s cafe at Circular Quay. Zeppa worked as a seamstress but helped her sisters in the family business when she had time to spare. That’s where Peter met her and gradually he began dropping by the cafe more and more frequently on weekends when he knew Zeppa would be working as the cashier.” — John Melocco

“They married on Christmas Eve because the only days Dad ever took off were public holidays. They spent four days in the Blue Mountains. That was their honeymoon.” — Jean Hynes

1922 On March 13, the foundation stone of the Government (now Commonwealth) Savings Bank building in Martin Place was laid and work began (with architects HE Ross and H Ruskin Rowe) on one of Melocco Brothers’ great monumental public buildings. Peter and Zeppa’s eldest daughter, Helen Therese, was born on December 26. Earlier that year, Tony had married Victoria della Rosa, a school teacher from the far northern Italian town of San Giorgio. Galli, meanwhile, travelled to Italy, where he spent time with his mother and his sisters and explored the country of his birth. On his return, Galli began work at Melocco Brothers — not initially as a partner but as a salaried worker like any other. From the beginning, his interest lay, not in artistic endeavours, but in the concrete and construction side of the company. Melocco Bros was the first private company to use mechanical concrete mixers. The half cubic yard Smith Mixer was used in the early twenties for the Dental Hospital building in Elizabeth Street, Sydney.

“Uncle Peter insisted Dad ‘earn his stripes’ working from the ground up and save what he could from his wages to buy his third of the business.” — Graham Melocco

1923 Tony and Victoria’s son Albert was born on March 11.

1924 Peter and Zeppa’s daughter, Jean Louise, was born on August 29 and all four moved into the house he had built on land purchased at 84 Johnston Street, Annandale. The house was roughly modelled on the family home in Toppo and based in the Palladian style. He shortly thereafter bought a rambling Victorian terrace on the adjacent block (86) and erected five flats in which to house members of his family who were, one by one, moving to Sydney from Italy.

1925 Within months of Jean’s birth, Peter and Zeppa travelled home to Italy with their daughters. Primarily, it was a business trip. The brothers never returned to Italy without scouting for talented craftsmen who might be persuaded to move to Australia. This time, however, Peter was more specifically looking for a craftsman skilled in the old Italian art of scagliola which he and Tony felt was the only technique that would fit the architects’ requirements for the work they had been commissioned to undertake on the new Government Savings Bank building in Martin Place. Zeppa and the two girls spent six months in Toppo while Peter travelled throughout Italy and the United States. He found no one who could help him in Italy. An artisan with some experience of the material was located in America and later brought to Australia, however his craftsmanship was deemed insufficient and it fell ultimately to Tony to perfect the Melocco Brothers formula.

While Peter was in Toppo he managed also to persuade his mother to move to Australia. Her husband, Giovanni Battista, had died some years previously and all three brothers had decided their mother would be more comfortable with them in Sydney. Business had increased substantially in the early part of the 1920s and they felt confident of their ability to support her comfortably.

1926 Galli returned to Italy to collect his mother, Teresa, and travel with her to Australia. Also in 1926, his sister Rosina and her husband Umberto Fabris arrived in Australia, as did Remo Cicutto. Teresa moved into the large Victorian terrace at 84 Johnston Street, Annandale, which Peter had bought and subdivided. It was right next door to his own home at 86 Johnston Street. Rosina and Umberto bought farmland at Parramatta. Meanwhile, across the road at 39 Johnston Street, Tony and Victoria’s daughter Lena was born on October 20 that year.

1927 Peter and Zeppa’s son, John Peter, was born on January 27 and, soon after, work began on the Bank of New South Wales building at 341 George Street, Sydney, which featured prominent sienna yellow scagliola. The 1920s also saw the opening of a number of Sydney’s great department stores. Melocco Brothers worked with plaster, marble, mosaic and scagliola on David Jones, Farmers and Mark Foys (now the Downing Centre).

1928 The Government Savings Bank (now the Commonwealth Bank) in Martin Place was completed and opened on December 12. It was for this project that Tony resurrected the old Italian technique of scagliola (an imitation marble made of cement), the architect having requested columns too large to be cut from marble in one piece. Tony spent days and nights in the Melocco Brothers’ workshop refining both the technique and formula until he developed the much prized scagliola which became a Melocco Brothers’ trade secret. Indeed, during construction, the columns in the bank were surrounded by hessian screens to preserve the secret. Melocco Brothers also completed some of its most elaborate plaster and marble work for the interior.

Also in 1928 (on April 7), the Capitol Theatre opened near Central Station. Union Theatres had converted it, with Melocco Brothers’ craftsmanship, from a circus/hippodrome to what was, at the time, Australia’s largest and most sumptuous picture palace (though it was somewhat eclipsed by the even more showy State Theatre the following year).

“Melocco Brothers worked on nearly all the big picture palaces in the twenties. The one I liked best was the Prince Edward but they also worked on the Capitol, the Regent, the Liberty. The only one they didn’t do was the Paris, which was designed by Walter Burley Griffin. My father had a big argument with Walter Burley Griffin. They were both hard headed men. And Dad claimed Walter Burley Griffin’s flat roofs leaked.” — John Melocco

1929 Work began on the BMA building (135-137 Macquarie Street) and on June 7, the State Theatre in Market Street, Sydney, was opened. It was the most flamboyant of the many picture palaces on which Melocco Brothers worked throughout the 1920s and featured a number of intricate mosaics as well as work in marble, plaster and Tony Melocco’s trademark scagliola. It was also one of the last elaborate public buildings Melocco Brothers worked on before the onset of the Great Depression. In 1929, the Melocco Brothers certificate of incorporation was officially altered to include Galli as a partner in the firm and, with the economic downturn, his interest in the nuts-and-bolts construction side of the business was fortuitous. Also in 1929, Remo Cicutto played soccer for Australia. Earlier both he and his sister, Edith, had represented Czechoslovakia internationally in gymnastics.

“I remember my father used to say he told the architects that the marble they had chosen for the staircases in the State Theatre was not right for walking on — it was not terribly hard — but they insist on using it. Sure enough, if you look at it now, it has cracks. It should never have been used but the architects liked the colour.“ - Jean Hynes

1930 By the middle of the year, work in the marble, mosaic and decorative plaster trades had declined significantly. The building industry had been hit hard by the economic downturn. Galli proposed concrete road work and Road Constructors Pty Ltd was formed with Galli as manager. Their first job was the tiny Onslow Place, behind Elizabeth Bay House in Sydney’s eastern suburbs. A great number of Department of Main Roads and Council contracts followed and ultimately led to the company’s involvement in pre-mixed concrete.

“My father spent hours every day on the phone ringing architects, builders, anyone he knew, and asking if they had work for his men. He was offering to do brickwork, a bit of concreting, anything because they had amassed a very large workforce throughout the twenties and my father was determined to keep them employed.” — John Melocco

1931 The Elizabeth Bay mansion, Boomerang, was completed for the Albert family, music publishers and retailers best known for their Boomerang Songbooks. The six-bedroom, seven-bathroom Morroccan-inspired villa was Melocco Brothers' most elaborate domestic commission, featuring great expanses of mosaic, ornate fountains and relief sculpture. Meanwhile, as a further measure to maintain turnover during difficult economic times, Galli travelled north to Brisbane, from where he aimed to generate enough additional business to keep Meloccos’ men fully employed. Maria’s son, Remo, who had also joined the family business, followed Galli as commissions from Brisbane increased. Also in 1931, in Trenchin, Czechoslovakia, Maria’s husband Anthony died.

1932 On October 29, Galli married Eva Bell, whom he had met through mutual friends in Brisbane.

1933 Galli and Eva Melocco’s son, Graham Peter, was born on September 11 in Brisbane. In December that year, the young family returned to Sydney and settled in the northern suburbs. Remo remained in Brisbane until 1935.

1934 The ANZAC Memorial in Hyde Park was opened by the Duke of Gloucester. Melocco Brothers worked on the building alongside sculptor, Reynor Hoff, and architect, C Bruce Dellit. Melocco Bros cut and layed all the marble work on the interior of the memorial, as well as making and installing all the brass stars on the domed ceiling. Metal work was not the company’s forte but they had a loose policy, it seems, to try anything. Also in 1934, Maria Cicutto’s eldest son, Romolo, arrived in Australia from Czechoslovakia and began work at Melocco Brothers.

1935 Galli and Eva’s daughter, Ann, was born on March 17, and Remo Cicutto returned from Brisbane to Sydney where he moved, once again, into 86 Johnston Street. He worked with Galli in the concrete and construction arm of Melocco Brothers and, in his spare time, he began studying for his pilot’s license.

1936 Maria Cicutto arrived in Sydney with her youngest sons, Romolo, Anthony and Charles. They all moved into the flats at 86 Johnston Street. Also in 1936, Colin Henry Arnold was commissioned by Peter Melocco to find a good source of quality Australian marble, which he discovered at Wombeyan in NSW. Meanwhile, Galliano secured the company’s most substantial concrete road contract to date, which included Gardeners Road, Botany Road and many others.

1937 Architects Budden and Mackey won a Sulman Award for Railway House (now Transport House) in York Street, on which Meloccos worked.

1938 Architects Budden and Mackey won another Sulman Award for the Water Board Building, which featured some of Melocco Brothers’ finest scagliola. During the thirties “composite stone” was also developed. This was a combination of cement, dye and marble-stone chips made up into pre-cast panels and used as a facing on many Sydney buildings, such as the pink panelling on the old Rural Bank and the building on the corner of King and York Streets.

1939 Maria’s only daughter, Edith, arrived in Sydney with her husband Aristed (Dido) Ripka and their son Galliano (Galli). They had fled the German invasion of Czechoslovakia and escaped on foot over the Dolomites to Italy, from where they secured their passage to Australia. Dido went on to become Tony Melocco's right hand man and carried on his work with scagliola after Tony's death. On June 17, Remo Cicutto married Ivy Ruth Barnett but in November that year, he was tragically killed when a light aircraft he was piloting collided with another plane over the Georges River in Sydney’s south.

1940 In June, Italy entered World War II and, within days, Peter Melocco was arrested and interred, first at Long Bay gaol, then at Orange, as a prisoner of war.

“We had a telescope that we had been given and it was out on the front steps. Mum had a little Kodak camera. A neighbour, whom we allowed to walk through our grounds as a shortcut to get the bus, reported Dad to the police. He said we were looking for submarines. All these policemen marched into the house. They confiscated the telescope and confiscated Mum’s camera and took our father away to Long Bay where he was thrown into a cell with concrete floors. We took Dad blankets the next day.” — Jean Hynes

“After Uncle Peter was arrested, I remember Mum saying the police came to our house and turned it upside-down. They looked under the house and in the roof. Mum said they were looking for short-wave radios or transmitters. Dad travelled to Orange most weekends while Uncle Peter was in prison, taking him food and medication for his asthma. He lobbied everyone he could think of for his release.” — Ann Melocco Trenoweth

“It was winter. I went to school — I used to walk to the Christian Brothers in Rose Bay — and, on the way, I saw a big sign up for ‘The Sun’ newspaper saying that Italy was in the war. Mine was the only Italian name in the school. It was a pretty rough day. They gave me a very bad time. I walked home feeling sorry for myself and I came into the house and my mother was in tears. The police had just left and taken my father with them. Uncle Galli came that night and, the next day, we all went out to Long Bay gaol. I remember the reception we got from the police and the wardens at Long Bay. They were as rough as nails. Within a matter of days my father was taken up to Orange, which is probably the coldest town in New South Wales, and he suffered from his asthma horribly. They had to break the ice every morning to wash their face and hands. He was there for five weeks. The building trade and the architects were very upset. They wrote to Mr Beazley Sr and he spoke to the Prime Minister. My father was the first one out but he was never the same again. It shortened his life.” — John Melocco

1941 One of Melocco Brothers’ most significant works, the mosaic map and terrazzo floor in the foyer of the Mitchell Library, was completed in 1941. The mosaic is a detailed reproduction of a decorated 17th Century hand-drawn map showing the discoveries of Abel Tasman during voyages in 1642 and 1644, as well as the discoveries of earlier navigators. The Tasman Map is generally known as the Bonaparte Tasman Map, after Prince Roland Bonaparte, a famous 19th Century French traveller and authority on geography, who once owned it. In 1933, it was presented by his heir, the Princess George of Greece, to the Mitchell Library.

1944 Teresa Melocco died on August 21 and was buried (grave 30, section 11) at Rookwood Cemetery.

In October, Melocco Brothers launched its pre-mixed concrete business, Certified Concrete, which set itself apart by guaranteeing the weights and measures of concrete delivered from its batching plant in Wigram Road, Annandale — the first of its kind in Australia. Certified Concrete also introduced to Australia the first contemporary-style concrete mixer based on the Archimedes Screw. Galli designed the mixer and 18 of them were built by Jim Bunyan — all two-and-a-half-cubic-yard inclined axis transit mixers, based on descriptions Galli had heard of American machines. These units, powered by Dodge-4 engines and using Model T Ford gearboxes, were mounted on International KBS.5 and ex-army Chevrolet trucks. The largest pour made by the fleet was 223-and-three-quarter cubic yards at Waddington’s, Granville, one Saturday morning.

1945 Work began on the terrazzo inlay floor of St Mary’s crypt in Sydney. Peter Melocco’s design, in the shape of a Celtic cross, was created in consultation with the late Rev Dr W Leonard, a theologian at St Patrick’s College, then in Manly. This was the last and greatest work of Peter Melocco and is considered one of the finest mosaic floors in the world.

Meanwhile, as soon as the war ended, the Melocco brothers began to organise an humanitarian relief effort. Through the Red Cross and other agencies, they channelled aid to a devastated Italy and they tried also to assist the increasing numbers of refugees from Italy arriving in Australia.

“I remember both Uncle Peter and my father going down to the docks to meet some of the ships that came in from Italy, to talk to the men, particularly, and see if there were any they could help with offers of work or in other ways.” — Ann Melocco Trenoweth

1946 On June 27, Tony Melocco died. He had been unwell for many years, suffering from what, at the time, was described as a variant of Parkinson’s Disease. His contribution to the firm and to the decorative arts in Australia had been immense. He had brought his knowledge of the finest mosaic art in Europe to Australia and he had painstakingly reinvented the ancient craft of scagliola. He was a skilled and disciplined craftsman who showed, by example, the high standard he expected of those who worked alongside him. His loss to Melocco Brothers, to those who worked with him and knew him was enormous.

“He was a quiet man and very gentle. He never raised his voice. Like Galli and Peter, he was dedicated to his work to the point where we really didn’t spend a great deal of time with him.” — Lena Hannam

“He used to get up early and go down to the factory — he was gone by the time I got up. He came home for dinner and then, every night, he went across the road to see his mother, Nonna.” — Albert Melocco

“He worked six days a week. Occasionally, on the seventh day, he would take us for a drive or to the beach.” — Lena Hannam

“Or Mum would say Dad had gone to church so we would race down to the factory and fossick around. Dad didn’t want me going down to the factory.” — Albert Melocco

“He was quiet and he was a dignified chap. He and Aunty Victoria made a very elegant couple. They looked much like they’d popped up from a page of Queen Victoria’s scrap book. The most important thing about Uncle Tony, though, was his skill. You know, Frank Colussi told me just the other day that he can still walk over the mosaic at the entrance to the old Mark Foys building and identify the bits that Tony did because they’re so much better than the rest.” — John Melocco

“A Friuli man is born with a trowel in his hand.” — Franco Colussi

1947 The post-war years were ones of enormous growth for Melocco Brothers. The finer trades — marble, scagliola and mosaic — did not pick up until the early Fifties’ city office building boom. However, Australia’s industrial growth at the end of World War II required many new factories with concrete floors, and these, along with roadwork and pre-cast and in-situ terrazzo for hospitals and retail stores, became Melocco Brothers’ primary sources of revenue until the late Fifties .

1948 Peter and Zeppa took their three children back to Italy, partly to check on friends and family who had remained there during the war years but also so Peter could undertake further research for what was becoming his labour of love, the mosaic on the floor of the St Mary’s crypt.

“When we went to Italy in 1948, he had finished the work around the altar and he was very pleased with it. It was just then that the seed of the idea of doing the rest of the crypt came to him. He would take us on these drives and we drove all around Italy to see paintings and mosaics — he was always looking for ideas he could use on the crypt floor or the crypt wall. I took all the pictures that he wanted. He got much of his inspiration from the Sienna Cathedral — its floor is done in a similar way but it’s not as colourful. He would talk about it. When he started off, he hadn’t a clue what to do but ideas came one by one. He planned most of the floor on that trip and he wrote his ideas on little note pages in pencil. I still have some.” — John Melocco

“When we came back home in 1948, we brought a dozen people back. Things were crook in Italy after the war so Dad found them jobs and advanced them the money for their fares.” — John Melocco

1949 Work began on the Interstate Booking Office at Central Station (now incongruously surrounded by a garish fast food outlet). The artist whom Peter Melocco chose to work on the designs for the project was Guido Zuliani, whose paintings Peter had come across at an exhibition in Spilimbergo the previous year. Immediately he asked the curator who the young artist was, a meeting was arranged and Peter persuaded him to come out to Australia on a two-year contract with Melocco Brothers. Zuliani worked in the design office with Corado Tassie and Giulio Ciurletti, first on the Interstate Booking Office and later on designs for the St Mary’s crypt. Melocco Brothers work in the booking office includes travertine counters, a wall frieze and a marble and terrazzo floor mural. The mural consists of a white marble map of Australia, showing major rail links, over a terrazzo checkerboard pattern and a series of wavy dissecting strips flanked by the emblems of the six states of Australia. The technique employed for the wall frieze involved sand blasting scagliola, which, despite its striking effect, was never used by Melocco Brothers again.

1950 Galli and his family travelled to Europe to source craftsmen and to study developments in the marble and concrete industries. They also visited Toppo to check on family friends.

1952 The premises at 1 Booth Street were expanded and rebuilt with long-time associate, Nicholas Mackey, as architect.

1953 On March 18, Romolo Cicutto died. Romolo had studied architecture at the University of Prague and spoke six languages. He had worked as an architect in Czechoslovakia, before fleeing the rise of fascism in Europe with his mother and brothers and taking up a position at Melocco Brothers. He worked alongside Galli in the concrete and construction side of the firm, where his keen intelligence and generosity of spirit were irreplaceable. When he died, Peter Melocco said, “We have lost the key to the front door.”

“Romolo was one of the great men of Melocco Brothers. He was a magnificent man. In fact, he was more a father to me than my father. And he did more to expand the company, in the great years of the fifties when it became quite an empire, than anybody, in my opinion. His gift was to get things done. It was all very well to make the policies in the boardroom but everybody looked to Romolo to get it done. He died far too young.” — John Melocco

“The only time I ever saw my father shed a tear was when Romolo died.” — Ann Melocco Trenoweth

1958 The mosaic floor of St Mary’s crypt was completed. Peter Melocco, now seriously ill, oversaw the final work from his wheelchair. His last major project was by far by far his most ambitious — artistically, practically and theologically — and would have been even more so had he remained in good health. Peter’s intention to decorate the columns and vaulted ceiling with mosaics was not fulfilled. A large mosaic mural was planned for the wall behind the Polding Altar and a cartoon was completed by the artist, James Gleeson, picturing the Day of Judgement. This was later rediscovered at the Melocco factory and is now part of the St Mary’s Cathedral archive. The mosaic for the crypt floor was commissioned by the late Cardinal Gilroy and produced, in part, using a grant from the O’Neil family, who were business associates of Peter and Galli. However, the O’Neill family’s grant came nowhere near the final cost of producing the work and Melocco Brothers funded much of the work from its own coffers.

“Peter Melocco’s most significant work is the crypt at St Mary’s Cathedral. This was the key work that gave me my inspiration to use the medium of terrazzo as artwork.” — David Humphries, mosaic artist

“As a work of inspiration, chiefly Celtic, the mosaic floor has no rival. It is as vivid today as when it was completed. Few churches, even in Europe, have such a beautiful floor. It has been compared with the pictures of prophets and sibyls in the Cathedral of Sienna but these are represented in black and white. The fine mosaic work in the floors of some Roman churches is hardly as ambitious as the floor of the crypt of St Mary’s Cathedral.” — Elizabeth James, historian

“The floor of the crypt, now an integral part of the cathedral... is an enduring monument to Peter Melocco and his artists and craftsmen. This legacy would be enhanced by the completion of his plans for the church beneath a church.” — JB Gadson

1958 The mosaic floor of St Mary’s crypt was completed. Peter Melocco, now seriously ill, oversaw the final work from his wheelchair. His last major project was by far by far his most ambitious — artistically, practically and theologically — and would have been even more so had he remained in good health. Peter’s intention to decorate the columns and vaulted ceiling with mosaics was not fulfilled. A large mosaic mural was planned for the wall behind the Polding Altar and a cartoon was completed by the artist, James Gleeson, picturing the Day of Judgement. This was later rediscovered at the Melocco factory and is now part of the St Mary’s Cathedral archive. The mosaic for the crypt floor was commissioned by the late Archbishop Gilroy and produced, in part, using a grant from the O’Neil family, who were the majority shareholders in Blue Metal Industries and business associates of Peter and Galli. However, the O’Neil family’s grant came nowhere near the final cost of the floor and both Melocco Brothers and Peter Melocco personally funded much of the work themselves.

1959 Peter Melocco was, by 1959, gravely ill and could no longer be involved in the day-to-day running of the company. His son, John, had joined the company in ‘47 and Galli’s son, Graham, had joined in ‘55. Meanwhile, in the laboratory of (Melocco Brothers’ subsidiary) Certified Concrete, technicians had discovered that, by altering the size and proportions of the aggregate used to make concrete, the strength of the final material could be increased and the cost considerably reduced. It was a discovery of enormous importance for Melocco Brothers and for the building industry. Certified Concrete had, by this time, become an enormous consumer of sand and gravel — a thousand tons a day of aggregate — which it sourced from Blue Metal Industries. Certified Concrete approached BMI to supply aggregate in the new sizes. BMI refused, so the Meloccos’ team decided to produce the aggregate itself. Peter, Galli and John Melocco had long had their eyes on Shaw’s Island, a large deposit of gravel and sand in the Nepean River. Some years earlier, they had bought a property adjacent to the island in the hope of eventually gaining access to the gravel. In 1958, the company obtained a permissive occupancy from the NSW Government over Shaw’s Island. In May ‘59, the Meloccos’ subsidiary, Yarramundi Properties, began extracting two thousand tons a day of gravel and sand — enough to meet the firm’s needs for many years to come. This was viewed as a threat, not only by BMI (which had lost one of its largest contracts), but by other concrete and aggregate producers. A number of public companies — including Ready Mixed Concrete, Standard Cement, Hawksley Pacific, Boral and BMI — approached Melocco Brothers with a view to amalgamation or takeover.

1960 Following eight months of negotiations, Melocco Brothers was sold to Blue Metal Industries (BMI) in March 1960. It was the end of an era. Galli, John and Graham stayed with the company and Galli joined the Board of BMI. He remained a Director until his death in 1971. John left the company in 1963 to pursue his interests in architecture and property development. Graham left the company in 1964 to raise cattle on his farm near Mudgee.

Melocco Brothers was probably the first company outside the United States to develop a ready mixed concrete operation as we know it today. Of the company’s many achievements, the least known is its pioneering contribution to the concrete and construction industry. It was also a company for and about family and community. It existed because of the dedication, not only of the three brothers who steered it, but of their family members (men like Romolo and Remo Cicutto) and the skilled artists and artisans who came largely from the Italian community in Australia and abroad. Lastly it could exist only because of the devotion and sacrifice of the Melocco women, beginning with Peter, Tony and Galli’s mother, Teresa, who saw in her boys the potential to grow beyond the boundaries of their tiny northern Italian town.

“My father thought that Melocco Brothers was the greatest firm ever built and to work for Meloccos was a privilege. He liked the men who worked there and every morning, after the morning conference, he used to go down into the shop and he’d walk around and talk to every one of them. He knew them all and he liked them all and, if he could help them, he would. Most of them came from Friuli and it was like a family.” — John Melocco

“There was a man working at Melocco Brothers called Sam Guido and Dad heard that his wife and child were about to arrive from Italy but he hadn’t finished the house he was building for them. So Dad took him aside and Sam told him the story and Dad asked, ‘So how much work is there still to be done on this house?’ And Sam said, ‘Well, I don’t have the roof on yet.’ So Dad asked him how much it would cost and lent Sam the money to finish the house before his family arrived. That sort of thing happened in the company a lot. It was a family company. My father knew every one of the men who worked there, even when there were more than 100 of them.” — Graham Melocco

1961 On July 22, Peter Melocco died and the congregation at his funeral filled St Mary’s Cathedral. He had been a patriarch and a visionary. His life had been devoted to his family, to his community and to his art. Aside from his tireless work with Melocco Brothers, he had spent ten years as a Director of the Prince Alfred Hospital and seven years as a Director of the Chamber of Italian Commerce. In 1946, the Italian Government had conferred on him the honour of Knight and in 1950 he had received the Medal of Merit from King George V of England. After his death and in recognition of his life’s work, Melocco Brothers received the highest international honour for marble and mosaic from the United States National Terrazzo and Mosaic Association.

“My father expected himself and everybody else to be perfect. He was a hard taskmaster. He sacrificed more for his work and his art than he should have. He denied himself so much but he adored working. I never crossed him. No-one stood up to him. You’d walk into a room and feel the vibrations — and he was a little guy. We all wanted his approval. I still do.” — John Melocco

“I don’t think I ever heard my father call Uncle Peter by his first name. He was always ‘The Boss.’” — Ann Melocco Trenoweth

“Peter was an exceptional person — small in stature but big in wisdom, audacious, brilliant and fatherly, living his life with immense simplicity in true Friulano fashion.” — Joseph Tonitto

1971 On December 26, Galliano Melocco died in Hornsby Hospital. His funeral, like his brother’s ten years earlier, filled St Mary’s Cathedral. He was buried at Rouse Hill on the way to the property at North Richmond which he loved. With his brothers, he built an empire in cement and stone but he never lost his affection for the simple rural life of his childhood. Galli spent some of his happiest hours sitting beneath the grape vine at Richmond, carving slices of Friuli cheese and green apples, looking out across acres of lucerne to the orange grove, enjoying the conversation (though he was a far from effusive man) of family and friends.

“My father was a good man. His personal motto was honesty and integrity above all else. As a father, he was kind and gentle but always firm about what was right and wrong. In 1956, just prior to my trip overseas, my father called me into the living room and said, “Ann, Italians are a proud race of people and we Meloccos are a proud family — especially proud of our womenfolk. You are about to embark on a wonderful trip but, while you are overseas, I want you to remember, at all times, who you are.” — Ann Melocco Trenoweth

“My father was an incredibly fair man. He was a kind man and a generous man, but you couldn’t put anything over him. He dug his heels in if he thought someone was taking advantage of him. He adored his family. He was motivated by the knowledge that he was building something for the benefit of the family.” — Graham Melocco