North Mountain History

This page is currently under construction.

This page is based partly upon the album presented to Mount Dandenong Primary School by John Lundy-Clark c1974 and its subsequent facsimile ‘A Pictorial History of Harmony Vale, Mount Dandenong and Kalorama’.

First Nations History: Corhanwarrabul & The High Ridge

For tens of thousands of years, the high ridgeline of Mount Dandenong held cultural and practical significance for traditional custodians, influenced by its elevation and topography.

  • The central ridge and main summit of Mount Dandenong was known in the Woiwurrung language as Corhanwarrabul. The ridgeline formed a natural travel route, allowing passage along the backbone of the range without having to navigate the overgrown, tangled floors of the deep fern gullies.
  • Mount Dandenong is traditional country for the Wurundjeri people. Rather than hosting large, permanent winter camps due to the cold and damp high-altitude climate, the ridge was utilized during warmer months. Clans ascended along watercourses like Olinda Creek (historically Running Creek) to hunt lyrebirds, wallabies, and possums, and to gather food like edible fern roots and berries.
The etching was executed by German artist Gustav Mützel, who worked from the sketches of German explorer Johan Wilhelm Theodor Ludwig von Blandowski (see Marn Grook: name of the early australian football game).
Hardy 1860 Map of Olinda State Forest highlighting surveyed tracks

Colonial Exploration & Surveying (1830s–1850s)

Before European families established permanent claims, the high ridge was mapped by government surveyors charting the hinterland east of Melbourne. In the 1840s, botanists like Daniel Bruce and surveyors including Assistant Surveyor Robert Hoddle (who mapped Melbourne’s grid) ventured into the ranges. Early surveyors climbed toward the main ridge to establish crucial trigonometric reference points on what is now Mount Dandenong.

Splitters in the State Forest
Photo, copied from the Tourists' Guide to the Dandenong Mountains (1904)

Timber & Temporary Encampments

Between the onset of the Victorian Gold Rush in 1851 and the first domestic selections in 1855, activity across Kalorama, Mount Dandenong, and Olinda was dominated by unregulated timber splitting.

  • Harvesting Mountain Ash: The damp, high-rainfall slopes surrounding Olinda and Mount Dandenong contained dense stands of massive Eucalyptus regnans (Mountain Ash). Timber splitters felled these giants to supply Melbourne’s rapid growth with building timber, roof shingles, fence posts, and palings.
  • Rough Tracks and Sawpits: Long before any proper roads existed, splitters cleared crude bullock tracks along the ridgelines, often following established First Nations pathways. Sawpits were dug into the hillsides around Kalorama, Mount Dandenong and Olinda to process logs on-site before haulage down the steep western escarpment.
  • Posing as Miners: The forest of the main ridge was initially held back from formal survey and land selection. To clear land and erect rough shelters prior to official sales, early occupants such as those detailed below, who settled the Harmony Vale caldera area in 1855, entered the ranges under the guise of gold miners. This allowed them to establish homesteads along Olinda Creek before formal land selection was officially gazetted

1855 European settlement begins

Issac Jeeves, Matthew Child & Jabez Richardson arrive in the district and build on the creek. Richardson calls his house Harmony Vale, which gives the name for the settlement. The selections taken up by the pioneers in 1861, after having lived on them, nominally as miners, since 1985 are shown below on Hardy’s 1878 map of Dandenong State Forest overlaid on a modern map from OpenStreetMap. (Logged in members can click on the map to open a full interactive map with many layers of information). Allotments 925, 920 and 919 were subdivided longitudinally 1863 when leasehold was granted. The homes stood on the remaining half, still subject to license to occupy. A technicality in the law forced this step which is evident in the long ribbons of the selections

1878 Map of the northern part of Mount Dandenong showing the selections of Jeeves, Richardson and Child
Isaac Jeeves First Home
Isaac Jeeves arrived in 1857 to take up land. The photograph taken in 1917 shows his first home, which he left c1872. The small building in the right foreground was his first dwelling. On the left is a barn. Behind them is the roof of the house with the tree fern floor. The glass house came much later.: Black and white photograph showing the first home of early settler Isaac Jeeves. Photo taken in 1917.

People

Matthew Child
Matthew Child was considered to be the first of the settlers to set foot in the valley as he scouted it for the others (Isaac Jeeves & Jabez Richardson). He was not the first to settle in the valley - that was Isaac Jeeves.: Copy of portrait photo of Matthew Child.
James Madden
James Madden was the father of Ethel (Mrs. Edward Child) and Maria (Mrs. Bert Child).: Black and white photograph of James Madden. He is middle aged, bearded and wearing a suit. He has a walking stick in his right hand. This photograph has a detailed inscription on the back handwritten by John Lundy-Clarke.: James Madden father of Maria and Ethel Madden.
Hubert Child
Bert Child son of Francis Matthew father of Jack, Bert and Len. Husband of Maria Madden. Died 1926.: Black and white photograph of Bert Child as a young man. He is sitting in the grass near a wooden building. This photograph has a detailed inscription on the back handwritten by John Lundy-Clarke.: Bert Child son of Francis Matthew father of Jack, Bert and Len. Husband of Maria Madden. Died 1926.

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