History of the Men’s Shed:
When Ted Donnelly and his mates started meeting up to do woodwork in a shed in Lane Cove in 1998 they could never have known that 16 years later there would be more than 1000 men’s sheds across the country.
- Ted Donnelly Co-Authored the first ‘How to start a Men’s Shed manual’
- The first men’s shed was opened in 1998 in Sydney
- There are now over 1000 sheds across Australia
- The Men’s shed movement has expanded to New Zealand, England, Ireland and Canada
- Each Shed decides on what activity or interests it wants to pursue
SBS 2 – “Men’s Shed Movement” (Video below)
Notable Quotes:
Dan Brem, Member (Strathfield Men’s Shed):
“It’s hard to motivate yourself when you’ve got nothing to motivate you”
“The number of times I’ve considered THAT path was beyond count”
Depression: “Regiment of get up in the morning because you’ve got to take tablets”, If my diary didn’t have anything in it, I’d sit at home. I knew there had to be something done, I hadn’t decide what.”
The Men’s Shed: I walked into the shed, I was welcomed into the shed, I felt that it was going to change things”
“The guys were into doing things, they encouraged community projects. They would encourage you to…even if all you did was have a cup of coffee, you were part of the group”
“It was very very good to find a place that had the ideals and camaraderie that I was looking for.”
“Sometimes I come in to the shed just to get away from the rest of my problems, just to forget about the medical stuff. Forget about the crap that’s going on. You come in here and you don’t ask for help, you get the peer support to self help and that’s what it’s all about. And support is necessary for everybody.”
The first men’s shed was opened in 1998 in Sydney.
Ted Donnelly – Founding member of Men’s Shed – (Lane Cove Mens Shed):
“It has been pointed out to that if we were shed here in Australia, I’m the last founding member and I’ve been going here for 16 years. I’m the longest serving Men’s Shedder in Australia.
There are now over 1000 sheds across Australia.
The Men’s shed movement has expanded to New Zealand, England, Ireland and Canada
“Men who, when they left work, they were having problems. The work was a big social aspect of their life. And when they left they found that they were really out on a limb. This was creating a lot of health problems. We really are part of a preventative system in that we certainly cut out the social isolation and I think this is a very big factor.”
“Well men have been brought up really that they have this stiff upper lip and they don’t talk like things like that. That’s part of being a man. That’s one of the biggest things that I see at the Men’s Shed here. That men are much more able to talk freely here about these various things. Women speak face to face to each other, men don’t do it that way. Men learn a lot better standing with another man at the side of him and showing and doing things together and chatting whilst their doing it.”
When you go overseas and you talk about it, they all refer to this as the Australian phenomena. They’re all willing to acknowledge that all this started here.
The very common thing is what people say is that the shed is the reason I get out of bed in the morning
William Abbott, Member (Strathfield Men’s Shed):
“I’ve been coming to the shed for about 12 months, I’m a fairly new member. It’s given me a different outlook on everything. A completely different outlook. Different people to talk to. Great group of men. Different occupations and it’s interesting to find out what they’ve done. And it also gets you off your tail. I really enjoy coming here, there are no two ways.
What do you usually do when you’re at the shed?
“Nothing. How ’bout that. I sit and talk”
John, Member (Strathfield Men’s Shed):
There’s a lot of people that are 50 and over, doing nothing, but if I could tell them about the shed then they might want to come just for a look. You just look forward to something when you know you fit in. I don’t want to be known as the token blind man or anything like that. I just want to be one of them. One of the shed people. They’d make me feel welcome that way.”