5. Civic Pride in Oakleigh
- Aboriginal Views
- Early White Views
- Straight Lines
- The Gippsland Railway
- Civic Pride in Oakleigh
- Land Use and Industry
- Endnotes
May Keeley spent two years going through the minutes of Oakleigh Borough, Town and City from 1890,1990 and putting this information together with contemporary reports from the local papers. Out of this wealth of data she constructed a year by year chronicle of the municipality. The following section draws heavily on that chronicle. [29]
In 1891, the Borough of Oakleigh was separated from the Shire. The 1880s boom had produced a township of about 300 buildings and a population of about 1200. The crash of the 1890s put a stop to building and one of the councillors, who had lost heavily on the stock exchange, committed suicide. However, during 1891 the infant council did have time to embark on an ambitious program of civic beautification.
Oakleigh was proclaimed a Borough on 13 March and the newly elected council held its first meeting on 13 May. From then on, the council moved fast. A map of the municipality was commissioned and the successful draftsman was appointed Engineer. There were plans to form and channel Atkinson and Drummond Streets and Eaton and Portman Streets were declared 34ft highways with 16ft footpaths. Gas light was on its way to Atherton Road and a standpipe was erected outside the post office on Broadwood. However, the councillors seem to have devoted much of their energy to the question of parks and gardens.
The vast sum of 800 pounds was set aside for tree planting in the centre of Broadwood. In six places, the centre of the road was dug up and provided with soil. Pine trees on the north and south sides of the road were removed and the new trees planted and protected with fences. The species are unclear. Palms were removed from the area in 1945, but late nineteenth and early twentieth century photographs shows trees, which look more like elms. Certainly, the Council received 180 elms from Guilfoyle in 1892. [30]
An even more ambitious plan was put forward for the area known as the recreation reserve. This was between the Police Paddock, the Pound and Scotchman's Creek. The Curator of the Ballarat Gardens came out to inspect the area and proposed turning it into what were later described as 'botanic gardens'. The aim seems to have to produce something 'picturesque', with one winding path planted with oak and Pinus insignia (80 trees) and another planted with Ficus macrophylla and Schinus molle. Scotchman's Creek itself was to become a fern gully. The pines certainly survived and were proposed for removal in 1945. [31] The Gardens Committee also proposed tree planting on all principal streets.
In fact considerable tree planting had already taken place. Although the early residents began their occupation of the area by cutting down the native trees and selling them for firewood, they were at pains to plant what they considered 'ornamental' trees, especially around buildings. Many early photographs show well grown pines and although it is not clear, these may have been private rather than Shire plantings. Pines were removed from either side of Broadwood in 1891, but pines survived for many years around the Catholic Church and parishioners remember them there well into the twentieth century. They parked their buggies and carts under them during services. [32]
Other streets where there were pines before the 1890s were Drummond and Atkinson streets, Atherton Road, Caloola Avenue and Warrigal Road. [33]
Most were removed in the 1920s in association with the stringing of electricity supply wires. 'Shade trees', in Atkinson Street were proposed to replace them in 1929. In the 1890s, the park south of Scotchman's Creek was known as the Recreation Reserve and later as Oakleigh Park. The Cricket Club area only came to be called the Recreation Reserve in the twentieth century.
In the 1890s, the focus of the town was still Broadwood and the northern ends of Drummond and Atkinson Streets, despite the existence of the railway further south. The temporary reserve of ten acres on Warrigal Rd, north of the cemetery was first made in 1871, at which stage it was well south of the town. In 1875 two acres were taken out of the reserve and the State School built. The remaining land was gazetted as a permanent reserve in 1884. At that date, cricket, tennis and lawn bowls were associated with the reserve and football was definitely played there from the 1890s. [34]