Mountain Tales: Issue 07

The Mount Dandenong & District Historical Society aims to collect, preserve and share the rich history of the district. The society is especially interested in the communities of Mount Dandenong, Kalorama, Olinda, Sassafras, Ferny Creek and Tremont. These are the ridgetop villages on the mountain range clearly visible from metropolitan Melbourne. The society welcomes new members with an interest in local history and meets each month. It maintains a small collection of significant local history material. We have some limited volunteer capacity to assist with private research. Many of the stories here have previously appeared on the society’s Facebook page. If you would like to learn more, please contact the society’s Secretary via email at mtddhs@gmail.com November 2025 No.7 Two early tourist guides, p.2 This stunning image of `Kelway’ in Sassafras graphically illustrates the transformation of the landscape in the Dandenongs at the turn of the 20th century. `Kelway’ was the name of the first Storrie family property in Sassafras Gully, settled by James Storrie in 1895. From 1907, a guesthouse of that name was run from the property. (Members of the Storrie family down the generations since, both male and female, have had Kelway as their second name.) The image shows neat rows of raspberries, the house and outbuildings, neat fencing as the farms drops into the fern gully below juxtaposed against a stand of ringbarked mountain ash, like dead sentinels over the property, and in the background a grove of the huge still living timber. How evocative of the struggle to “tame” the hill country for agriculture. November 2025 No.7 Tourism Early guides to getting around the hills Two very early tourist guides covering the hills (in part) appeared in the late 19th century. One focussed on short trips from Melbourne and a second specifically on the Yarra Valley and Dandenong Ranges. In 1868, possibly the earliest guidebook for those seeking an escape from the confines of city life was published in Melbourne. This was entitled Outs: The Excursionists’ Guide from Melbourne. It offered a range of “outs” for those looking for an outing for a day, or two, or even longer “for shooting and fishing scenery and picnic, outs on the Bay and the Yarra and for walking, riding and driving”. Published in Melbourne by H. Thomas, it was `Dedicated to all in search of Health, Recreation and Pleasure’. The guide, modelled on the famous Bradshaw’s railway guide published in England, contains a range of advice on camping out, how to shoot a gun, dealing with drowning and snake bite, fishing, hints on hiring horses and so on. The balance of the guide is devoted to descriptions of places to visit within easy reach of the metropolis. Of most interest to us are `A Day’s Ramble Along the Spurs of the Dandenongs’ and `Dandenong Ranges: Fern Tree Gully’. The `Ramble’ item was also published in some contemporary newspapers. In recounting a ramble along the spurs, it noted: “The trees are of stupendous height, some which have been cut down measuring over 400 feet … Fern trees fill all the hollows, and the note of the lyrebird is no infrequent sound in this secluded region. From this our route brought us suddenly on a picturesque group of settlers’ cottages in a sheltered nook to which has been given the euphonious name of Harmony Vale, a name most applicable, it is reported, to the life of the families who reside in it. We visited one of the settlers best known to our guides.” `Harmony Vale’ was the name given by early settler Jabez Richardson to his property at what eventually became Kalorama. For a time, it referred to the small settlement that grew there with the Jeeves and Child families from the mid-1850s. Fern Tree Gully had already become a popular tourist spot by the late 1860s, despite the fact there was no railway and getting there required an arduous journey from the city by coach, on horseback or on foot. The fern gully so named had been made famous through an 1857 painting by Eugene von Guérard (1811-1901). In describing the allure of the locality, Outs noted Fern Tree Gully “combines the vivid verdure, the cold freshness, and the shadowy softness of an English woodland stream, with the luxuriant richness and graceful forms of tropical vegetation.” As the railway arrived in the district two decades later, another guide appeared – this one wholly about the Yarra Valley and the Dandenong Ranges. The Visitors’ Guide to the Upper Yarra and the Picturesque Holiday Resorts of the Region Eastward of Melbourne was published by A.H. Massina in 1888. Part guide, part land developers’ advertorial it anticipates the arrival of the railway at Fern Tree Gully a year later, while the Lilydale line had opened in 1882. It also spruiks the future of the Oakleigh-Fern Tree Gully tramway and proposals for tramlines into the hills at One Tree Hill and Sassafras Gully, none of which eventuated. Of Fern Tree Gully, Massina’s guide notes: “The general effect on the observer is to make him hold his breath in rapt contemplation of the scene. The striking contrasts in the foliage and habit of the various plants, the perfume of the musk and the wattles, the crisp, cool, bracing air, the rushing of the swift-running creek over its stony bed-all go to make the picture perfect and the sense of delight supreme.” There are also detailed descriptions of One Tree Hill and Sassafras Gully, together with accounts of lower lying hill settlements. Copies of both Outs and The Visitors’ Guide are available in the State Library of Victoria, the former online in digital format. A later edition of Outs is also available online from the NSW State Library. 2 November 2025 No.7 Icons of the Hills More than 100 years of hospitality News of the recent mortgagee sale of The Cuckoo restaurant, idle since 2021, has locals wondering what next steps will be for a site that has served continuously as a hospitality venue for over 100 years. Long before The Cuckoo there was the Quamby Tea Rooms, later renamed the Quamby Café. Quamby began as a modest venture by the Dorey family, who grew vegetables on the property. These were sold at Edward Dorey’s shop in Ferntree Gully and at a later one in Sassafras. As they prospered, 61year-old Martha Dorey built a small roadside stall at Olinda in 1914 selling fruits, vegetables, summer drinks and afternoon teas. Extended in 1917 and subsequently, the tea house thrived as tourism took off in the hills. It was initially managed by her daughter Mary. When she died suddenly in 1918, the running of Quamby fell to another daughter, Iris. The “Miss Dorey” on the business card shown here would have been Iris, dating from the early 1930s. The interior shot of the premises can be dated to after 1934 (when the fireplace was added) and the name changed to Quamby Café. Café to Cuckoo: (Clockwise from top left) The Cuckoo today; Quamby interior set up for a wedding reception 1930s; the first tea house c.1920; Quamby in winter c.1940s. (Pictures: John Schauble, private collections) Quamby became an important centre of community life in Olinda and many of the town’s gatherings, celebrations and functions were held there. The detailed story of Iris (Dorey) Woolrich and her long association with Quamby is very well told in H.L. Speagle’s book Village Pioneer: The Life and Times of Iris Woolrich of Olinda 1894-1993, published in 1997. Long after the cafe was sold and became The Cuckoo in 1958, Iris was always a welcome visitor at the restaurant, where she celebrated her 99th birthday not long before her death. 3 November 2025 No.7 Shopping Put it on the account, would you? There was a time, barely half a century ago, when basic goods and services could be obtained without leaving the ridgetop in the Dandenongs. While Olinda still has some shops and services tailored to the locals, other centres such as Sassafras pitch their wares wholly to the tourist trade. Aside from the old general stores, there were once butchers in Sassafras and Olinda, a greengrocer in Ferny Creek and a dairy in Sassafras (with delivery). A bootmaker traded just up the main road from the pharmacy in Sassafras, where years before there had been a grain and produce store. Many businesses extended credit to customers who could settle their accounts at the end of the week or even on a monthly basis. By the 1960s, small supermarkets were beginning to appear in the foothills and the major ones followed. Shoppers took their business off the hill and, one by one, the local specialist traders disappeared, followed in time by the general stores Guesthouses The loss of Mountjoy 50 years ago A sad anniversary recently passed was of the destruction by fire of the Mountjoy guesthouse at Kalorama 50 years ago. CFA brigades from around the hills were summoned to the historic property above Five Ways on the morning of 25 June 1975. The property was well alight by the time firefighters arrived and nothing could be done to save the 60square building. The cause of the fire was believed to be accidental. Mountjoy was built by the Paynter family around 1904 and was an imposing, much photographed presence on the hillside above the intersection. It was purchased by Ellis and Eliza Jeeves in 1908 and run as a popular guesthouse for the next three decades. In 1914 it was offering billiards, golf and Images: Rose Series postcards, SLV hot showers! The Jeeves family operated the property until 1943. In that year, the workers’ social club from the Maribyrnong Explosives Factory leased Mountjoy to provide a place of respite for workers engaged in the dangerous business of making munitions during wartime. By the end of the war, it was again functioning as a public guesthouse and in the 1950s was operated by Mr & Mrs R.J. Palethorpe. Later it is understood to have been run as an elderly people’s home before being given over to communal living “without the hippies”. There were 15 adults and six children living there when the fire occurred. According to a report in The Age, it was owned at the time by prominent restauranteur and Lebanese community leader Mr Louis Fleyfel. 4 November 2025 No.7 Families The Kennons of Sassafras and Kallista The Kennon brothers and their families were prominent in the hills in the 1920s and 1930s, scions of a large leather tanning business founded by their father in Richmond. Thomas and Squire Kennon were attracted to the hills at a time when the `great and the good’ were establishing country estates here. The rest of the time they resided in Hawthorn. Both branches of the family would become much involved in the activities of their adopted local communities. Squire Kennon (1853-1920) and his wife Elizabeth (1861-1937) acquired the property at South Sassafras (Kallista), known as `Chestnut Hill’ in 1908. It was Elizabeth who built the country house, now a convention centre, after her husband died in 1920. On top of the hill, Thomas Kennon (1855-1933) built `Kenloch’ at Olinda in 1919, to which he retired with his wife Margaret (1855-1940). They were generous benefactors to all manner of local activities and to charities beyond. The Arboreal Hall built in the grounds was originally for use by community groups, becoming a masonic lodge in the 1940s and more recently the home of the Hills Medical practice. `Kenloch’ remains one of the grand properties of the hills, built in the midst of an extensive garden. In time it would become a popular restaurant and reception centre, before reverting again to private occupancy in 2017. When Thomas died in 1933, his wife provided for the erection of a memorial Presbyterian church in Clarkmont Road, Sassafras. It was opened in January 1937 and later became home of the Uniting Church after amalgamation with the Methodist congregation in Sassafras. Faced with declining numbers and a shrinking parish, the church was sold in 2023 and is being converted into a private residence. Thomas Kennon’s son J.W. (Bill) Kennon was closely associated with the Hawthorn Football Club as a player and later as the club president who shepherded the Hawks into the VFL in 1925. Descendants remain closely associated with the club to this day. Photos: Thomas and Margaret Kennon (above), Squire and Elizabeth Kennon (left). (Sources: ‘The Story of the Log Cabin Presbyterian Congregation, Sassafras’, c.1937; https://www.chestnut-hill.com.au/about/history) Recreation Roller skating in Sassafras Not many people would associate roller skating with the hills but for a short time in the late 1920s and early 1930s it found favour among the younger set in Sassafras. Roller skating was around in Melbourne from the 1880s, although it waxed and waned in popularity. (Ice skating experienced similar peaks and troughs over the years.) The early 1900s were a time of when roller skaters ruled the rinks, of which there were several around Melbourne. In September 1927, the Fern Tree Gully News reported that “many young people at Sassafras have beaten away from the track of dance, preferring rather to exercise themselves in the graceful evolutions of roller skating. This pastime, although only recently introduced into the hills, is recently gaining in popularity at Sassafras.” In June 1931, the Sassafras Mechanics Institute was given over to roller skating on Wednesday evenings for the price of a shilling, with six pence extra for skates. The old hall was certainly large enough to accommodate a modest skating rink, albeit not on the scale of some of the larger city venues. 5 November 2025 No.7 Politics Funny business What passes for “truth” in journalism has always been a bit vague. This story, with a headline that sounds more like an Agatha Christie story title, was an attempt to hose down a bit of inflammatory letter publishing by that noted Melbourne journal of record the Sun NewsPictorial, and in the process create a news story out of the thin mountain air. “LOYALIST” of Olinda wrote to the paper in early 1934 complaining that “we have had at Sassafras a camp of Communists who, when visiting local entertainments, lie on the floor and make insulting remarks when the National Anthem is played”. Indeed, following the New Years Eve dance at the Sassafras Mechanics Institute, the incensed correspondent continued, “these unwashed individuals hoisted the Red Flag and were openly insulting to the Union Jack”. The clearly near-apoplectic scribe added: “As one who has served his country, I do not see why a patriotic district like this should tolerate such behaviour”. A succession of responders to “Loyalist” noted that in fact there had been no such disrespect, let alone damage, accorded the Union flag. The president of the mechanics institute wrote that no disloyalty had been demonstrated and that “the committee will be pleased to welcome this labor camp party on any future occasion”. The newspaper, in the final word on the matter, noted: “three or four very young men from this camp who apparently had communistic tendencies attended [the dance] in addition to other camp-mates.” When they lay down on the floor during the playing of the national anthem, the youths were asked to apologise to the locals and leave. They did. Meanwhile, at Belgrave in 1934 a body called the Deutsche Arbeitfront (German Labour Front) built a club house complete with a photo of Hitler and a swastika on the wall. The clubhouse was occupied until 1939. Never exceeding 30 in number, the group comprised Nazi sympathisers. (The Nazi flag was also flown at weekends.) The building was torn down after the war began and the group’s leaders were interned. There is no record of what “Loyalist” thought of that curious development in his patriotic district. (Image: Sun News-Pictorial 16.1.1934) Recreation Fishy business Even the earliest visitor guides to the Dandenongs bemoan the fact that the area was not much good for fishing. One native species which did attract attention, however, was the unfortunately delicious southern river blackfish (Gadopsis marmoratus) which continued to attract fishers even after the establishment in Victorian waters of the introduced brown and rainbow trout by the end of the 19th century. Blackfish (or wirrap in the Woiworrrung language) can grow up to five kilograms and are noted for their sweet tasting flesh. Large specimens are rarely seen these days, as blackfish populations have seriously declined under immense pressure from habitat loss (including the desnagging and silting of rivers), overfishing and predation by other species, notably introduced trout and redfin. While no longer abundant, blackfish can still be found in Olinda Creek, which rises on the eastern face of Mount Dandenong, and in other tributaries of the Yarra such as Woori Yallock Creek and Sassafras Creek. (There are trout in these streams too.) Protected in South Australia, Queensland and New South Wales, blackfish have a closed season, size and bag limits in Victoria, and size and bag limits in Tasmania. 6