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In 1892 agreement was reached for the
construction of the railway between Heidelberg
and Eltham. It was opened in 1902 and the
extension line to Hurstbridge was opened in
1912. In 1923, the railway line to Eltham was
electrified. Mr Orford of Eltham recalled,
“After
the railway came to Elth m the craze for picnics
on weekends and holidays began… drags often
came out from Melbourne.”
At the station were ice-cream carts and a man
ringing a bell. During the wattle season, wattle
trains came to Eltham frequently. The visitors
roamed the creek pulling great armfuls of wattle
blossom to take back with them to Melbourne.
In his book,
Pioneers and Painters – 100 Years
of Eltham and its Shire,
Alan Marshall describes
Eltham at this time as being a
“picturesque
village with charm enhanced by cherry-plum
trees, hawt orn hedges, willow trees, wattle trees
and a rich growth of green grass.”
The native tree featured within this panel is the
Eucalyptus tricarpa
or the red ironbark.
Carriage
AND RED IRONBARK
PHOTOGRAPHS
View of a group of men beside
a railway carriage
State LibraryVictoria
Photographer Albert Jones
View at Eltham,
from the Rose series collection
State Library
Photographer Rose Stereograph Co.
INFORMATION
Marshall,Alan.
Pioneers and Painters: One hundred
years of Eltham and its Shire
(1971)