Category - South Coast Pioneers
The ‘colony’ of New South Wales started to expand beyond Sydney in the early nineteenth century and, from the early 1820s, settlers moved to the South Coast. The area had many attractions: the land was fertile, much of the land had been ‘cleared’ through regular burning by its Aboriginal inhabitants (providing ideal ‘instant’ pasture to cattle), there was timber aplenty from which houses could be built, ample supplies of fresh water were available, and settlers could foresee that they would be able to provide for themselves and their families (for example, by timber getting or by producing butter or cheese for export to Sydney). Communication and transport links to Sydney and elsewhere, however, were very real challenges – so the pioneer settlers had to be resilient, imaginative, and innovative.
These are just a few examples of stories about South Coast pioneers and subsequent significant South Coast trailblazers. Who else should we now be remembering? Please send your suggestions (and, if you have them, any details about them) to southcoasthistory@yahoo.com
