BEN LOMOND STATION AND VILLAGE VISIT

 

 

Saturday 14th April 2012

 

On Saturday 14th April 2012, the North West Chapter and the New England joined together on a coach trip into the New England Rangers, to Captain Thunderbolt's (Fred Ward 1835-1870) country, for a visit to the Historic Ben Lomond Station and Village.

The North West Chapter left Tamworth at 8am with our commentator and North West Chapter Member Suzanne Turner (nee Streeter), who kept us informed of historical facts about the places we passed that tied in with the History of settlement of the New England.

We stopped at Armidale and the New England Chapter joined our coach.

 One of the New England members was celebrating her 92nd Birthday, Mrs Emma Parker, goes to show, age has no barrier to showing an interest in OUR history!

Ben Lomond Station was first known by the name of "Llangothlin" and was settled by Thomas Perry in 1839, it was originally over 240,000 acres, taking in land from Glencoe to Guyra. It was passed on to a Mr Rawson in 1844, Charles Codrington in 1854.

He came from Wiltshire England with his new bride and travelled from Morpeth northward through Maitland, the Hunter Valley, skirted the Liverpool Plains, finally after climbing the Moonbi Rangers, he pressed on till they came to the first unclaimed land which happened to be the Llangothlin run recently abandoned by Rawson.

In 1861 the Begot Brothers took over and renamed the run Ben Lomond. Christopher Bagot could see potential, he was a man before his time, he is credited for planting some of the oldest trees in the New England, Elms, Oaks, and as he also had some good ideas on improving the land, he cleared 800 acres for cultivation, a self-closing gate, galvanized iron for roofing, a mechanized milking dairy.

In 1874 a mill was constructed from local stone with a wooden and steel wheel, water from the nearby Llangothlin Lagoon was used by damming the creek to turn the mill. The diameter of the wheel was 32ft 10 inches and sat atop of walls on two 2ton granite blocks, the wheel worked two pinions designed to operate a saw mill, flour mill and later on a woollen mill.

The ruins of this mill can be seen in the paddock near the stockyards. On the 14th March 1879 Christopher Bagot was declared insolvent by the Bank of New South Wales.

In 1920 a Mr H. Taylor was caretaker of the property for the Bank it was sold to Suzanne Turner's Father.

Mr Archie Streeter purchased the homestead block of 640 acres in 1926 with his new bride Constance.

Streeter's maintained the garden and planted more trees, they owned the Station for 74 years, Archer Streeter died in 1976.

Robert his son took over running the station. Suzanne said that we all had a good life, sometimes it was not that easy but always enjoyable. Robert sold Ben Lomond in 2000, to the present owners John and Pat Young.

The Young's were very happy to show us around the homestead and garden,

 even providing a golf buggy for our 92 year old so she did not miss out on the tour of the garden and park.

Emma Parker

John Young did the driving pointing out the old trees and interesting parts of the garden and old sheds, with stories to go with them.

 

Our high light was when we arrived at the home gate of Ben Lomond, our coach driver, Peter Bowden, bag-piped us off the coach.

 Boarding the coach we headed for the Village of Ben Lomond were we were treated to lunch in the War Memorial Hall by the Ladies of Ben Lomond Hall Committee.

During lunch we were given the history of the Village by a very passionate history lover Mrs White, a resident and Farmer of Ben Lomond, the facts and information was fascinating.

The Railway line came into service in 1884 and it brought many changers to the people from the Ben Lomond Station and surrounding farms.

The Railway Station is the highest Station on the Great Northern Railway as stated in the Australian Railway System, being

4,473ft above sea level and it lies 401 miles from Sydney.

Now listed on the N.S.W. Register as an Historic Site. But now sad to see it now stand by the side of 8 rusting rail line with brambles and weeds on and around the buildings and platform.

 

Both Chapters enjoyed a wonderful day together, in a wonderful part of the New England, we are looking forward to sharing in some more adventures together in the future.

 

 

Written By Patricia Worrad

President; on the 3rd May 2012,