Upstream from the Banksia Street Bridge, cows grazed on the land that had been Ricardo’s farm. In 1930 it was a dairy farm, its pasture sloping gently down to the river. John and Sunday Reed purchased had the land and restored the old farmhouse calling it “HEIDI”. (Source: D.T. H.S. Newsletter, Nov 1979 p1)
John and his wife were keenly interested in the arts and they encouraged young contemporary artists. The Reeds had the means to do this in a practical way as John was a practising solicitor and Sunday a member of a wealthy family. At Heidi they supported struggling artists, running a small dairy farm as a commune and provided them with canvases and paints. The Reeds introduced artists to galleries helping to exhibit the work of contemporary artists such as Sydney Nolan and Joy Hester. In this house looking down on the Yarra such paintings as The Kelly series and “The Bathers” were painted.
In 1964 the Reeds commissioned architect David McGlasham to design a new home “Heidi II”, constructed of Mt. Gambier stone timber and glass. The Royal Victorian Institute of Architects awarded the house, “The Outstanding Building of 1968.” After the death of the Reids, Heide II became an art gallery and the land with its English Kitchen Garden and contemporary statues by Australian sculptors, a public park.
Artists have been attracted to the Yarra for many years. In the 1860’s Eugene von Geurard set up his easel and painted a sweeping landscape of the Yarra flats, “Sunset on the Yarra”. A critic described this painting. “There is a picturesque variety of rocky and verdue-clad banks and steep and striking forms with rich colourings of foliage in trees and shrubs with a thousand lake-like bits of water.”
Louis Buvelot painted “Summer Evening near Templestowe”, a pastoral scene of the river flats at the end of Thompsons Road also “Winter Morning Near Heidelberg”, a similar river scene on the north bank. A group of artists, Tom Roberts, Frederick McCubbin (who had been taught by Buvelot) with Aurthur Streeton Charles Condor and others, after camping at Box Hill came to Heidelberg in 1888. Here they painted many views of the Yarra landscape. It was such painting as Streeton’s “The Purple Noon’s Transparent Light” that established Australian impressionism.<$FText of Footnote Golden Summers>
Across the river opposite Templestowe, Captain Swanston disliked the long trip over the unmade road to Eltham Township. He found it easier to row across to Templestowe. To make the crossing easier he built a suspension bridge close to the junction of Ruffeys Creek. By the 1920’s Swanstons Bridge, one of the few private Bridges had deteriorated and in the 1934 flood it was washed away. (Source: Brien Mullens, personal communication)
Across the river opposite Templestowe, Captain Swanston disliked the long trip over the unmade road to Eltham Township. He found it easier to row across to Templestowe. To make the crossing easier he built a suspension bridge close to the junction of Ruffeys Creek. By the 1920’s Swanstons Bridge, one of the few private Bridges had deteriorated and in the 1934 flood it was washed away. (Source: Brien Mullens, personal communication)
From Banksia Street to Warrandyte is a long stretch without a river crossing. The shires each side of the river selected a site for a bridge at Fitzsimons Lane, but it was ten years of argument and persuasion before work began. The Board of Works, who were to do the construction, wanted to build a one lane bridge. Fortunately the councils insisted on two lanes.<$FText of Footnote City of Doncaster and Templestowe Engineer personal communication> On 13th October 1961 the Fitzsimons bridge was built but during the 1960’s
The Catholic church purchased Swanston’s land to build The Blessed Father,s Monastery. On the day the monastery was opened, because of the remote site, the church built a temporary bridge of steel scaffolding. Afterwards, the scaffolding was removed leaving the Fathers the need row across the river to reach the the road to Melbourne and St. Patrick’s Catheral. Soon they erected a suspension footbridge across the river. Now this serves Odyssey House.
From Heidelberg to Warrandyte is a long stretch without a river crossing. The shires each side of the river selected a site for a bridge at Fitzsimons Lane, but it was ten years of argument and persuasion before work began. The Board of Works, who were to do the construction, wanted to build a one-lane bridge. Fortunately, the councils insisted on two lanes. (Source: City of Doncaster and Templestowe, Engineer communication)
On 13th October 1961 the Fitzsimons bridge was completed. The Board of Works engineer, Paddy O’Donnell, had doubts about its value. The land north of the river was occupied by farms, south of the river seemed a deserted area and the prospect of traffic here seemed unlikely. At the opening of the bridge he said, “This bridge is a mismatch. It is the biggest mistake we have ever made, it will never be used.” (Source: City enginner, City of Doncaster and Templestowe) The bridge had three lanes, two for traffic and one lane for pedestrians and if it is needed the pedestrian lane can be converted for traffic. People did use this new crossing. it gave access from areas north of Eltham to suburbs south of the river. When the Eastern Freeway was opened ending at Bulleen the bridge became became another access route to the freeway and twenty years later the bridge could not cope with amount of traffic crossing during peak hours.
In the first decades after the 39-45 war few people thought of the Yarra as a place of recreation or used its bushland banks to walk and enjoy nature. They were busy rebuilding family life, houses and schools. The Bulleen river flats had been looked on as a place for the local rubbish tip. Many councillors of the time thought that any land that was not used for a practical purpose such as housing, farming or for sports, was waste land. By 1960 the gullies along the river on Bulleen road were being filled in with rubbish, later to become football and cricket grounds.31 During the 1970’s and 80’s public attitudes changed on many subjects such as conservation and life styles. Then the gullys were cleans out and the ground raised and levelled for a sports area. By that time attitudes to sports had also changed. Bulleen Park, set in a curve of the Yarra held,as well as football grounds, space for archery, model aeroplane flying, and hockey.
The river flats have been changed. Golf courses, the park grounds of Carey Baptist School and Bulleen Park have been made places for active sport. Melbourne Water have made river paths and set aside areas for passive recreation on the natural bushland around the billabong and now fishermen relax in its peaceful setting where once aborigines speared fish, also a series of Metropolitan Parks provide picnic places in delightful riverland areas
From Yarra Glen, the river runs through a flood plain then swings round in a series of wide curves with sandy beaches in the corners. After running below the high slopes of Mount Lofty, another curve encloses Yarra Brae. It was here at the end of 1948 that 10.000 scouts camped.
Melbourne was selected to run the Pan Pacific Scout Jamboree in 1948. The Jamboree Council faced the problem of finding a site where temporary services of water supply, electricity, sanitation, roads, telephone, and other communication could be provided. Lord Clifford, who lived on the banks of the Yarra at Wonga Park, offered his estate “Yarra Brae” as the site for the Jamboree.
The Victorian branch of the Scouts Association began the task of preparing the land for a major camp area to cater for the large number scouts coming from all around the world. The Country Roads Board helped to clear the camp site and build roads. A water supply, pumped from the river, was laid down, telephone lines erected, shops, banks and the Jamboree headquarters built. The Scouts lived in tents that they erected when on arrival.
The area was perfect for such an occasion. The campground stood on a hill in a curve of the river surrounded by gum trees and spectacular hilly bushland. The Jamboree became a colourful spectacle, with camp sites decorated, often with designs from their countries, and carved bush timber signs at the entrance to sites. Flags hung from flagpoles some as high as sixty feet. Visitors from other countries brought the symbols of their own ethnic cultures. The New Zealanders performed a Haka during assemblies and the Lithuanian boys made an unusual dining table where they sat around a circular trench with the ground in the centre decorated with leaves and pine cones. All over the area, boys in their full uniform marched and ran over the land happily calling out, yelling and singing.
Lord Rowallan, the Chief Scout of the British Empire, and Governor General Mr. McKell, the Chief Scout of Australia opened the Jamboree. Lord Rowallan said that Wonga Park alongside the Yarra was the finest Scout Camp in the world. Then every day an interesting program kept the boys occupied, but possibly the most important aspect for the scouts was meeting boys from other countries. They experienced the spirit of being a Scout, whatever their race or country and the ten days of the Jamboree broadened their minds. When they left, they were no longer the same boys.
In 1955, again scouts from twenty nations came to Wonga Park for another Pan Pacific Jamboree. Again Lord Clifford provided his land Yarra Brae, now called Clifford Park, for the Jamboree. It was larger, this time 15,000 scouts poured onto the site and 10,000 visitors came to see the boys. The planning, organisation and catering was on a massive scale. Nearly one hundred miles of wire was used in the camp’s telephone system. Up stream on the Yarra, two pumps, one 150 horsepower and a smaller for back up, pumped water to a tank on the top of the hill for the camp’s supply and the tank took six hours to fill. There were scouts everywhere. On the roads, there were always groups going somewhere and when the scouts assembled to welcome Lord Rowallan, the mass of boys stretched away into the distance.
Heavy rain during the days before the Jamboree had soaked the ground and soon the boys' boots churned the earth into mud, unfortunately rain continued. The river was running fast and was dangerous, so the leaders strictly controlled swimming to one place where there were always life guards on duty and they arranged a roster of times for each group to swim. (Source: Official Scout Newspaper for the 1948-9 and 1955-6 Jamborees)
The Jamboree ended on 7th January 1956. The boys left but for the next month the work of cleaning up the ground continued. The general rubble had to be removed and the temporary buildings and fittings dismantled. Clifford Park remaind as a Scout Camp area and volunteers built Rowallan Hall as a centre for camps. Scout groups came to camp throughout the year but at Easter and after Christmas large meetings were held. Then in 1961 Rover Scouts came to this park on the Yarra for the 7th World Rover Moot.
In 1962 Lewis Clifford succeeded his brother and became Lord Clifford of Chudleigh. He left the next year to live on one of his estates in Spain and died in 1984. Scouting had been one of his great interests and as he lived on this land on the banks of the Yarra, Lord Clifford had the opportunity to express his love of scouting in a practical way.. He followed the preparations for the Jamboree not only helping but providing thousands of dollars for the project and later formed his own Scout Troop at Wonga Park.
Clifford Park is now a permanent Scout Camp and a fitting memorial to the man who did so much for scouting in those years.
Beyond Warburton
The Board of Works planned its most ambitious scheme, the Upper Yarra Dam, at the end of the 1930s and had the site selected and ready to build the Upper Yarra dam but then World War 2 commenced. After the delay during the war years work went ahead and was completed in 1957. It was the largest single storage in the Melbourne’s water supply system holding 300,000 mega litres with 75, 000 hectares of catchments. (Source: Jim Viggers, River Yarra Conference 1991)With the completion of the dam, the Yarra came racing down the mountain slopes to flow smoothly into the dam. From the outflow it poured into a modest river course bur as the river went tributaries added to its volume and an ample stream wound through the river flats at Yarra Glen. Through Warrandyte the Yarra tumbled over rocks and hurried along the gorge at Kew. Finally the river that had provided the site fro Melbourne proudly flowed through the city to lesuirely flow out into Port Phillip Bay.
During the 1950s work started on a new bridge at Kings Street. The Utah Corporation constructed not just a single bridge but three spans carrying sweeping roadways that came from under an overpass in Flinders Street, and swung round the the right and left down into Yarra Bank Road, with a central road that sweeped up over the river then up to the tops of buildings where it fed traffic on an expressway to right across and over City Road then down into Kingsway.
The bridge was proudly opened on 12 April 1961. A giant crane boom spread right across the bridge approach blocked traffic. Henry Bolte, then Premier pressed a button that blew a siren and the crane driver raised the boom allowing traffic to swarm across the bridge. “Kings Bridge” not Kings Street Bridge, that cost 4,100,000 pounds was a great success for it brought Western end of the city within a few minutes of South Melbourne. (Source: The Age, 13 April 1961) The triumph of the bridge did not last long. Soon after it was opened a loaded semitrailer coming from South Melbourne decided to try the new bridge, as the truck drove up the approach ramp the driver felt the back drop. He quickly changed down to a lower gear to get out of what felt like a hole. A section of the the bridge overpass had broken. At first, the truck driver was blamed for breaking the bridge but when it was found that the bridge had cracks along its length, people realised that the truck driver, by finding that the bridge was faulty, may have avoided a serious accident. The bridge could have broken over the river with fatal consequences...
Experts found that the problem was the result of, the type of steel used combined with the design and the incorrect welding techniques used. The bridge was repaired and strengthened. Engineers attached steel cables to the girders. These were stretched, compressing the steel beams preventing the numerous cracks from spreading. The restored Kings Bridge was reopened two years later. (Source: Graham Haarck, Civil Engineer personal communication.)
Near the mouth of the Yarra, every day, long lines of traffic, on both sides of the river, waited for the Williamstown Ferry. There were frequent demands for a bridge to replace the ferry. This would not only connect the wharves at Williamstown and the factories on the west with South Melbourne and the southern suburbs but would also give a faster route to Geelong. As a result, the West Gate Bridge was planned, with a freeway approach from Geelong Road on the north, to a freeway through South Melbourne. In the late 1960s, work started on the bridge, it rose up fifty-four metres over the Yarra to be above the masts of ships sailing up the river. As work started tall slender columns rose up into the air and from the sides the deck of the bridge grew out to reach the columns. From the ground, the men working up in the air looked like ants.
In previous years, bridge builders built platforms over the water to support the deck of bridges during construction, but here the decks of the roadway were being held by cables. During October 1970 one section of road deck was twisted in this insecure situation and could not be correctly joined to the next. Weights were placed on one side while cables pulled up the other to straighten the section. When the section would not bend bolts were removed. Without the security of the bolts the joint was weekend. The workmen struggling to straighten the section had the horror of hearing the the section break away. In one horrible instant, the steel decking with all its workmen fell to the ground. Thirty five men were killed. After a long inquiry the bridge was redesigned and new contractors, John Holland and Dorman Long, this time using different construction methods, completed the bridge in 1978.
The opening of the Westgate Bridge was the first great celebration of a bridge since the opening of Princes Bridge eighty years before. For more than two years, people had been watching the giant spans take their place till there was no longer any gap. All night people had sat in their cars to be among the first to cross the great structure. West Gate was ushered in with great pizzaz , a brass band played Star Wars, a squadron of Macche Jets flew over, a cavalcade of vintage cars followed by four grim looking army personell carriers led the way across the bridge followed by a swarm of pedestrians. At four o’clock the Police Inspector gave the order to open the barriers and the first of 20,000 cars drove over the bridge during the first six hours.
Behind all the excitement hung the memory of the thirtyfive men who died during the construction. Relations and friends of the men laid wreaths on the memorial at the base of the columns where the men’s names were inscribed. One eleven year old girl laid a wreath to the father who had died when she was only two years old and Bob Setha, a rigger who was working on the span when it fell recalled how he rode it down into the Yarra. He remembered his two mates who were working with him and had died.<$FText of Footnote The Herald Sun 16 November 1978>
People marvelled at the magesty of the structure with the thin ribbon of roadway rising up into the air to cross the water so far below. As they drove over the bridge there was a feeling of apprenshion, knowing that it had once collapsed killing so many but the view of the hills in the distance and the City of Melbourne laid out before them their apprehension turned to admiration for the grandure of this engineering feat.
The simple pleasures to be found on the river were forgotten in the 30s when people had cars to take them to farther places. Possibly it started during the 1930s depression but, among people in the inner suburbs there had been a lack of interest in the Yarra in the past. To many the Yarra became merely a river, that had to be crossed on a bridge, and seen from a car was just a stream of dirty water. The Yarra had often behaved badly, particularly during the 1934 flood. The river seemed to be more of a problem than an asset after all it was a diry brown colour. Melbourne suffered from the inferiority complex that nothing we had was really good.
The river that runs upside down became a popular saying. As the Yarra flows through its 240 kilomstres being fed by tributaries it collects a high sediment from the soil giving the water a dirty brown colour. . Actually it could be said to run upside down.. At high tide salt water flows into the river. The salt water runs under the fresh water and the salt precipitats the sediment leaving clear water underneath. Where the Yarra flows through the City, the water at the top may be muddy but about a metre underneath there is clear clean water. (Source: Dr. Brian Finlayson, Yarra River Conference 1991)
Source: Tales of the Yarra River - Irvine Heber Green. Unpublished Manuscript.
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