Christmas Bell Flowers
Christmas Bell Flowers, Alstroemeria pulchella
Epping to Eastwood Walk, NSW Australia
Laughing Kookaburra
Epping to Eastwood Walk, NSW Australia
Australian Darter
Australian darter, Anhinga novaehollandiae
Epping to Eastwood Walk, NSW Australia
Terry's Creek Waterfall 5
Terry's Creek Waterfall
Epping to Eastwood Walk, NSW Australia
Terry's Creek Waterfall 3
Terry's Creek Waterfall
Epping to Eastwood Walk, NSW Australia
Terry's Creek Waterfall 2
Terry's Creek Waterfall
Epping to Eastwood Walk, NSW Australia
Terry's Creek Waterfall 4
Terry's Creek Waterfall
Epping to Eastwood Walk, NSW Australia
Terry's Creek Waterfall 1
Terry's Creek Waterfall
Epping to Eastwood Walk, NSW Australia
Sandpaper Sotol
Sandpaper Sotol, Dasylirion serratifolium
Epping to Eastwood Walk, NSW Australia
Whale Rock 2
Epping to Eastwood Walk, NSW Australia
Man Fern
Man Fern, Balantium antarcticum
Epping to Eastwood Walk, NSW Australia
Whale Rock 1
Epping to Eastwood Walk, NSW Australia
Turpentine Ironbark Forest
Brush Farm Park in Eastwood, Sydney. These veteran trees are up to 30 metres tall.
Grey Ironbark in the centre, Turpentine on the right. This area is a remnant of the endangered ecological community Sydney Turpentine-Ironbark Forest.
"Eastwood House", formerly the home of Edward Terry, now part of Marist College Eastwood, 38-44 Hillview Road, Eastwood, NSW
The land on which "Eastwood House" stands, in the Sydney suburb of Eastwood, was originally part of a locality called the Field of Mars in the Ryde area. It had been granted to ex-marines in 1792 and refers to Mars the god of war. It was then sold to the merchant banker and settler, William Rutledge (1806-1876) in 1835. Rutledge was known as 'Terrible Billy' because of his explosive temper and intemperate language. He called the property Eastwood, and this name was later given to the present-day suburb. Rutledge had the original section of "Eastwood House" built for him from 1837. Shown here, it comprises an elegant single-storey Colonial Georgian house with a verandah supported on timber posts. The central timber-panelled entry door has a semi-circular fanlight above while its windows are timber-framed double-hung with 6 panes per sash together with timber shutters. The house faces south, a popular mistake of colonial builders, turning its back on the north-facing Australian winter sun.
In 1840 at St James' Anglican church in Sydney, William Rutledge married Eliza Kirk (1820-1888), the fifth daughter of Rupert Kirk of Woodford Park, North Shore. It was to "Eastwood House" that William took his bride and they began to raise a family and lived there until 1844. Rutledge was a government contractor and a director of the Commercial Banking Company of Sydney but they later moved to Victoria.
In the late 1840s "Eastwood House" and estate was the location for an early short-lived local industry for the Ryde area, that of sericulture or the production of raw silk. This industry was introduced to the colony by James Beuzeville (1809-1887). Born in Spitalfields, London, Beuzeville's family were refugees from France in the early 1700s. They established a silk weaving firm in London where James eventually entered the family business. He emigrated to Australia in 1848 and tried to interest several local investors as to the advantages of silk production and to constitute a board of management for a proposed 'Experimental Silk Institution', with himself as superintendent at Eastwood. Twelve acres were planted with 4,500 mulberry trees near the village of Ryde but in the meantime the inhabitants of Sydney were asked to collect and dispatch their own mulberry leaves to the Eastwood Institution. The Beuzeville family lived at "Eastwood House" and its spare rooms housed silkworms, reels and workers. Eggs were to be brought from China and India. The whole experiment did not last long as Beuzeille ran into financial difficulties as subscribers to the experiment failed to keep faith. In November, 1849, he resigned as Superintendent and the following year was bankrupt and forced to abandon the experiment.
The Eastwood Estate, comprising 90 acres, the house and outbuildings, was purchased by Dr William Sherwin of Parramatta in 1856. He had been the first Australian-born doctor to gain his medical qualifications overseas. Dr Sherwin refurbished the house and added an orchard. He then sold it to John Ross who in turn advertised it for sale in 1863. At this point "Eastwood House" was described as a comfortable, well finished brick-built family residence of six rooms together with a kitchen and servants' rooms. There were also detached stables, a coach-house, gardener's house and other outbuildings. Most of the estate had been 'cleared and stumped' and a considerable portion had been planted with 2,800 fruit trees, mainly oranges, apples and plums.
Eastwood Estate was purchased by Edward Terry (1841-1907), the brother of Richard Terry of nearby "Denistone House", now part of Ryde Hospital, and grandson of the convict, Samuel Terry. Edward brought to "Eastwood House" his young bride, Isabel Elizabeth nee Benson (1845-1918) who he met and married in Hobart in 1865 on his way back to Sydney after a European tour.
Edward set about adding to the house with a wing fronting present Hillview Street. It was designed by the Sydney architect, John Frederick Hilly, and built in 1866. Within a few years Terry had expanded his holdings with the purchase of an adjoining 170 acres. He landscaped part of the estate, creating a series of ornamental lakes for boating and punting, complete with small islands and black swans. There were ornamental fish ponds, palm trees, lawns and garden beds laid out around the house. Other amenities included a tennis court, a large croquet lawn, and even a racetrack.
Terry was the first mayor of Ryde, serving three terms, and was twice elected as the Member of the Legislative Assembly for the district. He was a notable sportsman and horseman and for many years the mainstay of hunting about Sydney. He was master of the Sydney Hunt Club and for some time maintained a pack of hounds at his own expense. Apparently, he was fearless rider and occasionally rode to success in amateur steeplechases. Edward Terry and his extended family lived at "Eastwood House" for over forty years. Terry died there in 1907 at the age of 66 after a short illness and was interred at St Anne's churchyard, Ryde.
Over the years the estate was subdivided into much smaller house lots and eventually the house itself was acquired by the Marist Brothers in 1929 and became the first Catholic Presbytery in the district. It was converted into an administration block when the Marist Brothers opened St Kevin's Boys' School on the site in 1937 with 107 students. In the 1960s the school was known as Marist Brothers' High School, Eastwood, and from 1993 it became Marist College Eastwood. "Eastwood House" continues to be used as the central administration block for the College today (2022).
"Denistone House", formerly the home of Richard Rouse Terry, now part of Ryde Hospital, Denistone Road, Eastwood, NSW
Crowded among the necessary buildings and services of Ryde Hospital in the Sydney suburb of Eastwood, stands an elegant Victorian mansion built for Richard Rouse Terry, completed in 1874 and called "Denistone House". The Terrys were prominent in the Ryde district and the house became a social mecca. After Terry's death in 1898, the estate was gradually subdivided and eventually acquired by the Holman Government in 1913. A men's convalescent home opened there two years later, known as the Eastwood Convalescent Hospital. By the end of the First World War community pressure was generated to convert the institution into a war memorial hospital. A committee worked busily towards this end, fundraising and lobbying until finally, in 1928, the Minister for Health handed over the entire property to the committee. The first section of the Ryde District Soldiers' Memorial Hospital opened in 1934 and "Denistone House" was converted for use as the Nurses' Home until new accommodation was completed in 1937. In the following years "Denistone House" opened as the hospital's maternity ward. Gradually more and more wards and patient services were added engulfing the old house and grounds. Today, (2022) "Denistone House" continues to be used for hospital purposes although considerable modifications and additions have disfigured the original house.
The property on which "Denistone House" was erected was purchased in December, 1872, by the wealthy land owner, Richard Rouse Terry (1838-1898). Terry was the grandson of Samuel Terry (c.1776-1838) who had arrived in New South Wales in 1800 as a convict but eventually prospered as a merchant and landowner to such an extraordinary extent that he was dubbed the 'Botany Bay Rothschild'.
On his Ryde land, Richard Terry built this fine two-storey Victorian Regency home for his wife, Jane Emma nee Peters (1845-1921), who he had married while in England in 1864 at Brixton, Surrey. The house was called "Denistone", after the estate on which it was located, and completed at the end of 1874. It features walls of smooth-tooled ashlar masonry, quoined corners, bracketed eaves and a verandah around the ground floor supported by cast-iron pillars and a decorative valance. Long narrow sash windows, originally equipped with shutters upstairs, are grouped in threes across the front façade except above the entrance portico which features a pair. On one side is a two-storey faceted bay while a two-storey wing to the rear was also erected. The house's designer is unknown although its stone stables, still surviving nearby, were completed under the supervision of the Sydney architect, John Frederick Hilly, also in late 1874.
A visitor to Denistone in the 1880s left a description of the house and its legendary views over the suburb of present-day Denistone, named after the estate:
"We stopped at a gate opening into a splendid carriage drive, which disclosed a handsome mansion…plainly constructed of dressed freestone, a picture of elegance and comfort…The mansion and surrounding gardens are situated on a plateau with the ground falling away somewhat abruptly in front, leaving the house a commanding and uninterrupted view of the picturesque country spread map-like at its feet. Immediately in front and beneath you are pretty villas snugly enclosed in their setting of fruit blossoms, while here and there, peeping out of the gloomy-looking forest, are comfortable cottages surrounded by their clearings… shut off from the outer world by an impenetrable bulwark of silent bush".
Richard Terry's brother, Edward, the first Mayor of Ryde, lived nearby at "Eastwood House", now part of Marist College, Eastwood. Together, their families played an active role in the local Ryde community, sporting and church affairs. Of Richard Terry's family, one son and five daughters, Florence, Millie, Mabel, Stella and Laura, survived childhood. Another son, William Charles Terry, died in infancy and a stained-glass window was erected in his memory in St Anne's Anglican Church, Ryde, in 1879.
An altogether happier ceremony at St Anne's in 1888 was the grand wedding of Richard and Jane Terry's eldest daughter, Florence, to Frank Muller, eldest son of the late Dr Charles Muller of Sydney. As was befitting the Terry's status in the Ryde community, the church and adjoining streets were decorated with flags. St Anne's was awash with flowers and the carpeted aisle strewn with rose petals thrown by no less than fifteen basket-carrying flower girls, while Florence was attended by five bridesmaids. The school children of Ryde Public were treated to a half-day holiday, probably on account of Richard Terry being the Chairman of School Board. Attired in their 'Sunday best', they formed a guard of honour. After the wedding, the bridal party returned to "Denistone House" where on their arrival they were greeted by the house servants and labourers with 'lusty cheers'. The verandah was festooned with evergreens and camelias, and over the front porch were the initials 'F.F.M' together with a double heart made of velvet flowers and the motto ''Health and Happiness". A large wedding breakfast followed on the lawn in front of the house with champagne, a 7-tiered wedding cake and entertainment supplied by the Ryde brass band.
The Denistone Estate was a social centre for the area and many hunting parties and balls were held there. In 1893 Richard Terry took his family on an extended trip to Europe and leased his estate for 2 to 3 years. Advertising for the property's lease described the house containing:
"over 20 rooms, exclusive of the kitchen, laundry, pantries and storerooms, all thoroughly lighted and ventilated, surrounded by a wide verandah…The house commands a view such as can be seen in no other part of Australia and must be seen to be appreciated. The outbuildings, which like the house, are of solid stone, comprise men's quarters and stables etc".
The Terry family had returned to Sydney by 1898 and Richard Terry tragically died after a bout of influenza later that year. Apparently weakened after the flu, his heart gave out during a late-night game of cards! He was only 57 and interred within the grounds of St Anne's.
Following Richard's death, his Denistone Estate was leased to a number of tenants and by 1913 extensive subdivisions were being offered by the trustees of his estate including 169 lots. Also in 1913, "Denistone House" and 18 acres of land were acquired by the New South Wales Government for use as a convalescent hospital for men, complementing the Strickland Convalescent Hospital for Women (Carrara) at Vaucluse. Patients began moving into "Denistone House" in August 1914, and it was officially opened by the Premier, W.A. Holman, on 25 February, 1915. Twenty-five men were accommodated in the old house, known as the Eastwood Convalescent Hospital, to recuperate after treatment in various metropolitan hospitals. They were cared for by a matron, a female nurse and four male attendants. The Hospital was practically self-sufficient with small dairy herd and large vegetable garden.
War broke out in Europe in 1914 and over 500 men from the Ryde district enlisted. In 1917 a group of citizens called a public meeting in Ryde Town Hall to consider the question of erecting "a memorial to perpetuate the memory of the men who had sacrificed their all in the Great War in defence of the Empire". The result was the formation of the Soldiers' Memorial Committee to raise funds for the erection of a memorial to the soldiers. Eventually it was decided this would take the form of a cottage hospital with a stone slab at the front with the names of all the soldiers who had volunteered in the Ryde Municipality. "Denistone House" was suggested to be the nucleus of the hospital and this idea was favourably considered by the Minister for Health. Fundraising was gradually undertaken with a hospital ball in 1922 and a nine-day carnival held in Ryde Park in 1923. This took the form of a shooting gallery, merry-go-rounds, darts, chocolate wheels, boxing tournament, trotting, dancing, a baby show, school sports competitions, queen of the day and grand procession. The carnival was a great success and similar ones were held over the following years. It was not until March 1928 that the Government finally handed over "Denistone House" and its 18 acres to the Committee, on the condition that they would not insist on the pound-for-pound subsidy to the which it was entitled for construction costs of new buildings.
The convalescent patients gradually left the house and plans were made for the new hospital buildings, although the foundation stones for them were not laid until 8 April 1933. It was agreed that the hospital would be built under the Unemployment Relief Scheme and it opened on 12 May 1934 as the Ryde District Soldiers' Memorial Hospital by the local State member, E.S. Spooner. Accommodating fifty-six beds, the hospital comprised casualty and outpatients' departments, private, intermediate and public wards as well as doctors' and surgeons' quarters and an operating theatre. The kitchen and administration offices were in separate blocks. The new buildings were described at the time as blending in harmoniously with "Denistone House", which was converted into what was said to have been one of the finest nurses' homes in the State with its spacious lofty rooms and cedar joinery. The house's old stone stables were reused as accommodation for the domestic staff, complete with quaint attic rooms.
Scarcely had the hospital opened when the Hospital Board felt the need for increased accommodation. It was decided to convert "Denistone House" again, this time into a maternity ward. A new nurses' home was opened in 1937 and new private and intermediate ward block, called "Spooner House", opened the following year. A separate auxiliary was formed to raise money for providing amenities for the twenty-eight bed "Denistone House" maternity unit, and this opened on 5 October 1938. The local press noted some of its up-to-date equipment including pillar phones, Dunlopillo mattresses, Monel metal food tables and cabinets, tubular chairs for visitors and electroplated tea and coffee services.
The honour of being the first baby born in the "Denistone House" maternity ward went to the son of Mrs E.H. Poole, who appropriately named him Dennis. The second infant was a little girl, named Denise, while the third was called John Denistone.
On the north-eastern side of "Denistone House", a new three-storey block was opened on 11 September 1943, called "Trigg House", in recognition of generous donations made by Ernest Trigg, the former proprietor of the Meadowbank Manufacturing Company. "Denistone House" was finally lost to public view from Denistone Road in 1969 with the opening, directly in front of the elegant historic house, of the hospital's Patient Services Block. Further changes of a more drastic nature occurred in the late 1970s when a two-storey brick addition was attached directly to the northern wall of "Denistone House". This was to provide new labour wards, nurseries and shower and toilet facilities. The local press described the extensions with considerable criticism noting that the hospital's maternity section had given birth to an "architectural monstrosity". The hospital defended the additions arguing the Board was conscious of the historic importance of the house but had to provide for improved facilities for its patients.
In February 1975 the hospital's name of was changed from the Ryde District Soldiers' Memorial Hospital to Ryde Hospital. This was brought about largely because of the cumbersome nature of the original name and the fact that it was often mistakenly thought to be a hospital for returned servicemen.
Major references
Coupe, Shena. A Healthy Memorial: A History of The Ryde Hospital. The Ryde Hospital and Ryde-Hunters Hill Area Health Service, Eastwood, 1984.
Geeves, Philip. A Place of Pioneers: The Centenary History of the Municipality of Ryde. Ryde Municipal Council, 1970.
"Brush Farm", formerly the home of Gregory Blaxland, 19 Lawson Street, Eastwood, NSW
In the Sydney suburb of Eastwood stands the historic homestead of "Brush Farm" which was the home of the early settler and explorer, Gregory Blaxland (1778-1853). Over the last 200 years the house and property have been reused for a variety of purposes from a farm school and reformatory to a mothers' and babies' home and prison officer academy!
The land on which the homestead is located has been owned by some of the most influential early settlers of New South Wales. Beginning with a land grant made to Zadoc Petit, a private in the NSW Corps in 1794, it was then acquired by William Cox who arrived in Sydney in 1800 to succeed John Macarthur as Paymaster of the New South Wales Corps. In 1804 Cox found himself in financial difficulties and in 1805 was forced to sell his farms to D'Arcy Wentworth who owned it briefly before selling 450 acres of it in 1807 to the early settler, Gregory Blaxland (1778-1853). Blaxland had arrived in Sydney the previous year and with his brother, John Blaxland, of "Newington House", now part of the Silverwater Correctional Complex, did much to establish the early cattle industry in Australia. Gregory Blaxland is a household name for his historic crossing of the Blue Mountains with Wentworth and Lawson in 1813.
Gregory Blaxland, his wife, Elizabeth, and children moved to the "Brush Farm" property in 1808, before the current house was built. The original homestead (now gone) on the property was located near the present two-storey sandstock brick house built between about 1819 and 1821. At the time of its construction, it comprised drawing and dining rooms, an entrance hall, upper hall and bedrooms, while below were extensive cellars. Two side wings were added in the 1820s. The east wing contained domestic offices downstairs and small rooms upstairs, while the west wing had a sub-basement, ground floor reception room and a top storey once accessible by an outside stairway. There were also a four-stall stable and ox house, granary, various outbuildings, yards and landscaped grounds with a carriage loop in front of the house.
Governor Macquarie described the property as "a very snug good farm and very like an English one in point of comfort and convenience". Due to its elevation, for many years a location on the Brush Farm Estate called One Tree Hill was used as a signal station to communicate messages on ship arrivals at South Head. Until 1829 these were relayed via Observatory Hill and Gladesville to Government House at Parramatta.
At "Brush Farm", Blaxland conducted experiments with crops and grasses. He was unsuccessful with tobacco and hops but did well with buffalo grass and viticulture. He had brought vines from the Cape of Good Hope and after finding a species resistant to blight, took a sample of fortified wine to England in 1823 for which he won a silver medal for it from the Society for the Encouragement of Arts, Manufactures and Commerce (renamed the Royal Society of Arts) in London. This was the first export of wine from Australia.
After financial difficulties, Blaxland sold the Brush Farm Estate in 1831 to his daughter, Eliza, and son-in-law, Dr Thomas Forster (1781-1856), a British Army surgeon. Blaxland then unsuccessfully pursued his former economic interests and disappeared from public life when his other estates were taken over by creditors. For a man who achieved so much, he ended his life at Parramatta on New Year's Day 1853, a broken and embittered man. His passing was hardly mentioned in the press.
Dr Forster continued with the wine production and in 1844 leased the property for 40 years to his son, William Forster (1818-1882). William had been born in Madras, and educated in India, Wales and New South Wales. Between 1839 and 1867 he ran stations near in the Clarence River District and New England District and near Moreton Bay in Queensland. At the same time, he developed an ability to write fine poetry and prose and in particular satire and political essays. Forster's other love was politics, in which he was prominent in NSW, briefly serving as Premier of NSW for five months between 1859 and 1860 and serving in various capacities in Parliament until his death in 1882.
"Brush Farm" was purchased in 1881 by the theatrical entrepreneur, John Bennett, who made his fortune establishing theatres on the Victorian and NSW goldfields and importing acts to perform in them. He also loved horse racing and in 1882 formed the Rosehill Racing Club. Three years later he opened the Rosehill Gardens racetrack and leisure grounds and by 1888 had a private railway line built to the track.
In about 1883 the Victorian modernisation and extensions to "Brush Farm" house were supervised by Bennett's wife, Emma, which included the addition of the front verandahs. Extensive orchards were also planted on the estate. Around this time the estate was being subdivided and in 1894 Emma Bennett leased the house and its remaining 60 acres of land for the Carpentarian Reformatory for Boys operated by the Department of Charitable Institutions. The house was modified to accommodate and train 50 to 60 wayward and homeless boys where they were provided with rudimentary tuition in gardening and orcharding.
From 1908 it became the Brush Farm Reformatory and was operated by the Department of Public Instruction. However, the farm provided inadequate training for useful work in agriculture and in 1911 it was closed and subsequently sold. The younger boys were sent to the Mittagong Farm Home for Boys and the older ones to a 700-acre site at Somersby where they literally built and established the Gosford Farm Home for Boys which opened in 1913. This later became the Mount Penang Training School for Boys from 1946.
By 1915 the "Brush Farm" house was used as the Eastwood Home for Mothers and Babies, an institution which accommodated expectant mothers (unmarried girls) both before and after their confinements. From 1922 it was used as a home and school for intellectually handicapped girls operated by the State Children's Relief Department accommodating about sixty girls. Known as Brush Farm Home, it used both Montessori and Kindergarten teaching principles and endeavoured to provide some degree of schooling and vocational training. Over the years new buildings were constructed for the home and in 1974 handicapped boys were admitted as well. The Department of Youth and Community Services withdrew from "Brush Farm" in 1988 and the property passed to the New South Wales Department of Corrective Services as an academy for training prison officers. In 1990 "Brush Farm" house was purchased by Ryde City County and the building restored between 2006 and 2007. It is now used for various community purposes.
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Address: 81 Balaclava Road, Eastwood, NSW, 2122
Phone: 0478 897 858
Former Chrisitan Bethren Church, Eastwood, Sydney, NSW.
165 Shaftsbury Rd, Eastwood, NSW .
St Andrews Cross Spider (Argiope aetherea), Terrys Creek Reserve, Spencer Street, Eastwood, NSW. 31st December, 2020
The female hangs sedately in the centre of her cross marked web, several of her eyes fixed on her smaller suitor, who is no doubt keen to do his part in fathering the next generation, without having to take the ultimate one for the team.
Eastwood, NSW, 31st December, 2020.
Hand prints!
50707773173_b5fc7c8fbd_b
St Philip's Anglican Church, Eastwood, Sydney, NSW.
29 Clanalpine St, Eastwood, NSW.
The Catholic Church of St Kevin, Eastwood, Sydney, NSW.
2122/36 Hillview Rd, Eastwood, NSW.
The Catholic Church of St Kevin, Eastwood, Sydney, NSW.
2122/36 Hillview Rd, Eastwood, NSW.
Former Shop, Eastwood, Sydney, NSW.
38 Terry Rd, Eastwood, NSW.
Ghosts of Vines Overgrown
Epping to Eastwood Walk, NSW Australia
