Land where Mr. E. Carson's residence is situated today (No. 1 Rockpool Road – with windmill)) was taken up and the factory built on that site. Trolley lines ran to the wharf on the lake side and another down the road as far as present residence of Mr. Richard in Coral Street. The early directors , Messrs Tom McBride, J. McBride, Ern Wright, Harry Mathias, Bob Milliken and J. Coates had purchased the old ice works of Ben Coombes which had been situated where the marina stands today and the engine and boiler were moved up to the new co-operative where they were installed to produce the ice necessary for the factory's use and also for sale to fishermen and the general public.

Mr. G. Perkins erected the necessary buildings from local timbers and the line extending down the mills was for the purpose of carrying the waste timber to fire the boilers of the factory.

Manager was a Mr. Noble, Alex Coombes engineer, Les Dreyer butter maker, Tom Batchelor fireman and "Laddy" Coombes general hand.

Originally Stan Wright ran the "cream" boat - a launch which toured round the lake calling at various wharves picking up milk and cream leaving the empty cans of previous trip and carrying the product to the factory. Here it was off-loaded to the rail trolley and wheeled to the factory for the processing. Later boats were run by Millikens. Butter manufactured here was of high standard and generally shipped out to Sydney aboard the SS "Tuncurry" and SS "Allenwood" - locally built steamers.

Thus with the one-horse power railway bringing in timber waste as fuel, the factory was fairly cheap to run and with the wastes from the manufacture of butter being piped back up to the piggery which occupied that area between Beach, Wharf and Wallis Streets, the production of pigs gave the factory a secondary source of income.

In addition, certain lines of produce - as cattle fodder such as bran, pollard and various cattle meals were also retailed to farmers and delivered by the cream boats.

In 1924, the old steam engine became redundant and the factory installed a 75 hp Tangye diesel, which ran until 1950.

Mr. Noble resigned in 1927 and he was replaced by Mr. C. M. Wright who had been at Dyers Crossing factory. In 1928, at the instigation of Mr. Wright franchise for the supply of electricity to the area by the factory was granted and including the supply to the township of Forster by submarine cable. The first generator purchased for this job was on 32 kva capacity. Over the following years as demand increased further engines were purchased - a 50 hp Rushton Hornsy in l935 and two years later in 1937, a l50 hp engine - then finally a 450 hp in the post War (l945) period. While power was rationed throughout the State this never occurred at Tuncurry-Forster and although there was a 10 pm cut-off every night except in special circumstances, this area carried on "business as usual".

Mr. Roy Benjamin was the electrical engineer employed, while over this period the engineer whose skill kept the engines turning was Mr. David Sinclair, who died in 1982.

The electricity supply was taken over by the Manning River County Council on May 5, 1950 and this section of the old factory closed down. The advent of better roads, more rapid transport of milk by road and supply generally of whole milk to the Milk Board put an end to the milk treatment part of the factory, leaving its only product sale of ice to the general public - since the Fishermen's Co-operative had installed their own ice making plant and well remembered are the long queues waiting for the ice to "come out" but the refrigerator put a end to that and so a whole industry grew and died as new ways brought a "better method".

We are grateful for information from Mr. Ken Bachelor whose family was always concerned with the engineering side of the factory, Mr. Thomas Bachelor having worked as engineer with Goodlet and Smith before joining the co-operative.