Daylesford - Culture and History

Prior to European settlement the area is thought to have been occupied by the Djadja Wurrung Aborigines. The first European settler in the area (1838) was Captain John Hepburn. In 1848, Irish immgrant John Egan took up land on the future townsite (then known as 'Wombat Flat'). He and a party of searchers found alluvial gold in 1851 on ground now covered by Lake Daylesford, thereby initiating the local goldrush. Other finds quickly followed. Two or three hundred diggers were reported in the area in 1852. A townsite was surveyed in 1854. Initially called Wombat, it was soon renamed by Sir Charles Hotham after the English birthplace of Warren Hastings, the first governor-general of India.

In 1859 about 3400 diggers were on the local diggings, 800 of whom were Chinese. They preferred alluvial workings, planted extensive market gardens and had their own village with a Joss House and store. Daylesford was declared a municipality in 1859 and a borough in the early 1860s. A flour mill was opened in 1863, reflecting the emergence of local agriculture.

Novelist Joseph Furphy worked as a threshing-machine operator in the district in the 1860s. He was married at Daylesford in 1867 and took over the lease on a small local farm and vineyard belonging to his mother-in-law.

By the 1860s the alluvial gold was exhausted and a shift to quartz reef mining began. This continued, on-and-off, into the 1930s. However, the town is best-known for the odourless, effervescent mineral water which emanates from its many springs (hand pumps and continuous-flow pipes dispense the water free of charge) and Daylesford became a fashionable spa resort, particularly when the railway arrived in 1881. The resort fell out of favour in the Great Depression. However, since the early 1980s interest in the local waters has revived and the town's fortunes have been rejuvenated. Thousands of people from a great range of social backgrounds now visit the area each year.

In conjunction with the springs and spas there are innumerable businesses and individuals offering a number of 'alternative' services, including every kind of massage known to humanity, as well as reiki, shiatsu, acupuncture, aromatherapy, reflexology, spiritual healing, tarot and psychic readings etc. They are listed in a brochure available from the Daylesford Visitors' Centre.

For a list of local festivals and events see entry on Hepburn Springs.