A collection of quotes about Eaglemont

from Nilss

Nilss has been busy sending in lots of things he has found about Eaglemont and the surrounding area.  Below is a collection specifically about Eaglemont.  Some of the other references about the wider area will be posted with a future newsletter.  Happy Reading!

• Heidelberg News and Greensborough and Diamond Creek Chronicle, 12.12.1914, Page 3
  HEIDELBERG DISTRICT PROGRESS ASSOCIATION. The usual monthly meeting of the Heidelberg Progress Society was held in the Scots‘ Hall on Monday evening last. [..] The plans of the subdivision of the Eaglemont Estate had now been prepared, and a town planning expert from England had spoken highly of the plans, and had said he would not improve upon them.
• Albert Jones Reserve (Instagram Oct 2024)  Have you visited Eaglemont's very own Albert Jones Reserve? Just a short walk from Eaglemont Village, you'll find this idyllic reserve on the corner of Devon and Mount Streets.
  Boasting a lovely playground with lots of great features including dual wave slides, a straight slide, walkway, climbing wall, abacus, telescope, cafe shop front, rope climbing frame, climbing mat, animal panels, clock panels and nicely panelled bridge, there's plenty to keep the little ones entertained.
  For the bigger kids, the basketball court will have them shooting hoops for hours. And our furry friends are not forgotten with an off leash area.
  Why not stop by for a picnic? Stock up in @eaglemontvillage on your way and enjoy a spring meal out in the open. (Unfortunately the closest public toilet is in Heidelberg! - Ed)
• Skiing without Snow (The Argus, 19.05.1933, page 7) Arrangements have been completed for the annual skiing class conducted by the Melbourne Walking Club for the assistance of beginners. It will be conducted on May 28 at Eaglemont. It is extremely unlikely that there will ever be snow at Eaglemont but there are some slippery grassed slopes there, on which the elements of skiing may be taught with safety. Skis will be provided.
• The Argus, 02.02.1952 Blackout  Power failed at Eaglemont about 8 p.m. on Thursday, and was off for 21 1/2 hours. No tea, hot water, or cooking, and wasted food. Can anyone in the State Electricity Commission explain? - A. G. BAYNE (Eaglemont).
• Odenwald Road, Eaglemont As with the Righi this street was first listed in 1898 in the directories with Francis J. Wright, a salesman, listed as first resident in 1910. The name comes from the Odenwald range of hills overlooking the Neckar River and Heidelberg in West Germany. The hills rising 2045 ft. are noted for their fruit and wine and have several interesting towns, the chief being Michelstadt. Source: The Heidelberg Historian: the first fifty years, Heidelberg Historical Society 1977
• Historic property “Odenwald” on this road. Circa 1936 till December 2009 owned by only two families. Source: Heidelberg and Diamond Valley Weekly December 8, 2009 p, 47
• Melway” street directory first edition (1966) - the black dots show the locations of public telephones. (There is still a public phone in Eaglemont Village – are there any others nearby? – Ed)  Pre-metric times - the clearance of the Ashby Grove railway underpass is 10 ft. 4 in.

• Eaglemont Dairy (yallambie.wordpress.com)  There was a time years ago when non-homogenized milk was delivered to houses in glass bottles topped with foil. The magpies would peck at the top to get at the cream if you left the bottles out late in the morning. In the Heidelberg area milk came from the Eaglemont Dairy.
• Eaglemont Dairy (yallambie.wordpress.com)  Harold Bartram of Viewbank Farm built the silos in the years before the Second War as fodder storage for his dairy cows, siting them at a prominent place overlooking the Banyule Rd and using plans he found in an Australian Home Beautiful homecrafts series, “Concrete and Cement Work”. Bartram’s farm supplied distributing dairies in the area like Gillies at Eaglemont until both the farm and Dairy disappeared with the spread of suburban sprawl.
• Eaglemont (yallambie.wordpress.com)  At nearby Eaglemont, where elm trees were once saved at the expense of those in Yallambie, the forester William Ferguson planted a great pinetum, the largest in the colony, on the summit of “Mount Eagle” for J H Brooke as a prelude to a grand estate envisaged for that place. The first curator of the Geelong Botanic Gardens, Daniel Bunce visited in 1861 and recorded that “under the skilful management of his gardener Mr Ferguson”, Brooke had accumulated “the largest number of conifers of any establishment in the colony”. The house was never built and Ferguson left the project in 1863 with Brooke himself leaving for Japan four years later. However, in the 21st century at least some of Brooke’s trees remain, hidden away inside the private gardens of wealthy Eaglemont homes, proof of the enduring nature of the grown landscape and especially the legacy of 19th century pinetums.
• Eaglemont (The Canberra Times 07.04.1985, page 42)  Many years ago, when Heidelberg was a park-like stretch of country dotted with a few cosy-looking homesteads, a minister of the Crown purchased the fine eminence known as Eaglemont. Laid out with rare shrubs and trees as a setting for a mansion, the original plan was never completed, an eight-roomed weatherboard house, evidently intended as a temporary building, taking its place.
  The property passed through different hands, till in 1888 it was owned by an estate company of which Charles Davies was secretary, a caretaker named Jack Whelan being the only occupant of the place. Davies, who was the brother-in law of David Davies the artist, invited Streeton at this time to live in the house on the hill, which was now crowned with lofty trees. From here there was an expansive view of the valley of the Yarra; and Blamire Young has made the suggestion that it was this panoramic landscape that served to develop Streeton's matchless sense of perspective.  
• "After supping at the village," said Streeton, describing the first night he spent at Eaglemont, "I laboured up the hill with a large swag of canvases and paints, and camped in one of the empty rooms. (The ‘village’ must be Heidelberg, as this was before the Eaglemont station and village were there – Ed).
• "I lay on the floor in my clothes, my boots for a pillow, and I had no company except my pipe, a bottle of wine, and a candle. About this time, I met Conder, who had come over from Sydney, and I invited him and Roberts to join me. We soon made beds from saplings and flour sacks and painted luxuriously and successfully for two summers."