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Produced and published by the School of Historical & Philosophical Studies, The University of Melbourne
Published July 2008
Published July 2008
Partners
(3108, 14 km E, Manningham City)
Local government began in the City of Doncaster and Templestowe when the Templestowe Road District was proclaimed in 1856. In 1875 the Shire of Bulleen replaced the roads board. One of its three ridings became the Shire of Doncaster in 1889 with the remaining two constituted as the Shire of Templestowe. In 1926, the two shires merged to become the Shire of Doncaster and Templestowe, which was declared a city in 1967 and was incorporated in the City of Manningham in 1994.
European settlement commenced in Doncaster and Templestowe in 1838 when the Wood brothers established a cattle station on the Bulleen flats. John Anderson, who settled on Anderson's Creek at the junction of the Yarra River, followed them. In 1841 Frederic Unwin purchased a Special Survey bounded by the Yarra River and Koonung Creek under the New South Wales colonial government's 1840 land regulation. The property was later purchased by James Atkinson, who called it the Carlton Estate.
Louis Michel found gold at Warrandyte near Anderson's Creek on 13 July 1851, attracting a variety of prospectors, including German settlers, who established communities along the Koonung Creek. The German settlement was known as Waldau. By 1880 more than 1500 people had settled in the Shire of Bulleen. The principal industries were dairying, market gardening, flower farms and orchards. But by the end of the 19th century orchards began to predominate. The shire's first cool-store was erected by the new fruit-growers' association in 1892.
The Box Hill and Doncaster Tramway Co. constructed a tramline in 1889, the first electric tram service in the southern hemisphere. The electric tram transported tourists from Box Hill to the Doncaster tower, erected in 1877. Offering views of the surrounding district, the tower attracted visitors attending Melbourne's International Exhibition, but the tram only lasted until 1896. No other fixed public transport services were developed and the shire, wedged between the Yarra River and its tributaries in the north and west and Koonung Creek in the south, remained isolated from Melbourne.
Artists were attracted to the Doncaster and Templestowe district in the early 20th century, particularly around the Yarra River at Warrandyte and to John and Sunday Reed's property, Heide, at Bulleen, which was acquired by the State Government in 1981 and now operates as an art gallery.
Suburbanisation occurred after World War II. Brick-makers opened new clay pits at Templestowe and Bulleen to meet the demands of Melbourne's city growth. The lighter yellow clay appealed to architects, builders and house-buyers. Project builders established display homes to advertise their wares. Winter Park, Doncaster, an early form of cluster housing opened in the 1970s with homes by architect Graeme Gunn and landscape designed by Ellis Stone, influenced changes in subdivision legislation.
Doncaster and Templestowe's population increased threefold between 1950 and 1960 and Doncaster Shopping-town opened in 1969 to provide for the region's increased population. By 1986 the City of Doncaster and Templestowe's owner occupation rate was 86%, one of the highest in metropolitan Melbourne, and by 2001 more than 20% of the population were over the age of 60. Ratepayers became activists in the last decades of the 20th century, opposing the extension of the Eastern Freeway through the Koonung and Mullum Mullum Creek valleys.