About Us

Warrandyte (approx. population 8,000) is situated on the Yarra river, some 35 km from Melbourne. The site of the first official gold discovery in Victoria in 1851 it soon established its character as a small, isolated community situated in a beautiful river valley. Around the year 1900 the miners, orchardists and small farmers were joined by a number of young painters who were founding the Australian nationalist arts tradition. Although now a commuter suburb of Melbourne, the natural beauty, community spirit and sense of independence of Warrandyte has been largely retained.

Source: Warrandyte Diary, page 2

Warrandyte is almost unique in its maintenance of the identity of the village that emerged from the original mining settlement. Ongoing preservation of Warrandyte history is an essential community activity. The Warrandyte Historical Society, established 1976, is a small band of volunteers dedicated to preserving and displaying the history of Warrandyte.

Our mission is:
To collect, catalogue, preserve and present the ongoing history of Warrandyte (past and present) focusing on the main themes of;

• Gold
• Art
• Indigenous history
• Social history

Today's news is tomorrow's history

Our activities centre around the heritage listed Warrandyte Post Office Museum.

These activities include:

• Collating, cataloging and archiving historical records (text and image) in a manner consistent with established historical archives acquisition and disposal policy
• Capturing the memories of our more senior citizens using audio recording (to be subsequently transcribed to text)
• Encouraging current residents of and those with connections to Warrandyte to share their historical infomation
• Offering a resource for the support of and encouragement of research into Warrandyte's history

Our main resource is the dedication of our volunteer members and the subscriptions of a wider membership, occasionally subsidized by grants.

We invite you to join with us in support of this important work through membership subscription, donations and/or sponsorships.

Preserving the History of Our Town