Orielton, Harrington Park, NSW

Orielton

179 Northern Road, Narellan, NSW 2567

Part Lot 7, DP 270613

Orielton Homestead c2000 (CamdenAdvertiser)

History and Description

Edward Lord was granted 655.5 hectares in the Parish of Narellan that he then named Orielton Park in about 1815.

In 1834 Orielton was noted in letters written by David Waugh as being a productive farm. By 1835, 93 hectares of Orielton Estate was amalgamated with the neighbouring Wivenhoe.

In 1847 it was purchased by John Perry who later subdivided a portion of the estate and leased the main property to Charles Thompson, Clerk of the Bench to Camden Court. During the whole of this early period the estate seems to have been used mainly for grazing, with some limited agriculture.

In 1863 Abraham Davy of Harrington Park purchased Lot 1 of Orielton Farm (24 hectares) from three Sydney businessmen who had earlier purchased the estate - John Lait of Sydney, James Ryan of Emu Plains and James Jones of Sydney.

During the early 1870s the sport of coursing (the pursuit of live hares by greyhounds across the countryside) was introduced to Orielton which became a popular activity at both the Orielton and Harrington Park estates. By the 1870s Harrington Park House had established a reputation as a gentleman's country seat, with "hospitality, picturesqueness and the hunt bringing interesting associations to the English eye".

In 1874, Harrington Park and Lot 1 of Orielton was purchased by William Rudd Snr, a grazier of Houtong Station in the Lower Murrumbidgee who changed the perceptions of Orielton and Harrington Park as a "gentleman's seat" to that of a graziers property. Rudd also gained control of the remaining parts of Orielton estate. Harrington Park and Orielton remained within the Rudd and Britton (descendant) families until 1933 when it was sold to Arthur and Elaine Swan. By 1938 the Swans has also purchased all the remaining parts of Orielton, and managed the two farms as a single entity.

During World War Two the Camden district was the scene of much military activity, and Orielton was occupied by the army for training and residential purposes. Since 1944 Orielton has been owned by the Fairfax family who also own nearby Harrington Park. The Fairfax family resided at Harrington Park, and Orielton was managed as part of the Harrington Park estate. The subdivision of Harrington Park in the 1990s for urban development has visually encroached upon Orielton estate, although the original grant and its management for grazing can still be understood in the broader landscape of the Narellan valley.

Homestead Group and entry drive:
The main homestead group focuses on the east and south with open rural land as its traditional address. The existing entry to Orielton follows the Old Northern Road easement in a north south direction curving sharply to the north west. At this point the drive is bordered by old pines and to the south is Narellan Creek. Towards the homestead group is evidence of previous hedges and remnant gardens formalised to the south. Located west of the main homestead is a dam. An old well structure remains near the top of the north ridge.

The homestead consists of an early building with a large complex of additions. To the east of the main house is the stables and horse agistment area. To the north of the stables is evidence of an earlier garden or entry that orientates to the east. (State Heritage Inventory)

Condition and Use

Former use was a farming estate, while current usages is a residence.

Orielton is rare as a relatively intact estate with its main homestead group still in its traditional rural context. (State Heritage Inventory)

Heritage Significance

Orielton: outline of significance:

- It still retains its quintessential landscape character - based on the traditional juxtaposition of homestead area, with its dominant garden, and cleared pastureland beyond;

- Its historical relationship to other nearby early grants (Harrington Park, Wivenhoe and Kirkham) and its place in the development of the local area can still be appreciated;

- It has associations with some notable people;

- The place retains its historical local prominence and serves as an important local landmark; (State Heritage Inventory)

Heritage Listing

Camden Local Environment Plan    No 48

State Heritage Register  No 01693

Read more on Orielton Homestead  Click here

Camden Heritage List Click here

Hope and loss on the urban fringe

Mount Annan new housing subdivision 2002 (Camden Images/P Mylrea)

Winners and losers on the urban fringe

Sydney’s rural-urban fringe is a site of winners and losers.

It is a landscape where dreams are fulfilled and memories lost. The hope and expectations of newcomers are met with the promises of land developers in master planned suburban utopias.

At the same time, locals grasp at lost memories as the ruralcountryside is covered in a sea of tiled roofs and concrete driveways.



Conflict over a dream

As Sydney’s rural-urban fringe moves across the countryside it becomes a contested site between locals and outsiders over their aspirations and dreams. The conflict revolves around displacement and dispossession.

Sydney’s rural-urban fringe is similar to the urban frontier of large cities in Australia and other countries. It is a dynamic landscape that makes and re-makes familiar places.

More than this the rural-urban fringe is a zone of transition where invasion and succession are constant themes for locals and newcomers alike. 

Searching for the security of a lost past

 As Sydney’s urban sprawl invades fringe communities locals yearn for a lost past and hope for some safe keeping of their memories. They use nostalgia as a fortress and immerse themselves in community rituals and traditions that are drawn for their past. They are drawn to ever popular festivals like the Camden Show and Campbelltown's Fishers Ghost Festival which is celebration of the rural heritage of Sydney’s fringe.


Richmond NSW (cc Flickr/D Whiteman)

Local communities respond by creating  imaginary barriers to ward off the evils of Sydney's urban growth that is about to run them over. One of the most important is the metaphorical moat created by the Hawkesbury-Nepean River floodplain  around a number of the fringe communities of Camden, Richmond and Windsor.

Fringe communities use their rural heritage to ward off the  tentacles of the Sydney octopus that are about the strangle them. In one example the Camden community has created an imaginary country town idyll. A cultural myth where rural traditions are supported by the church on the hill, the village green and the Englishness of the gentry's colonial estates. 

Hope and the creation of an illusion

Outsiders and ex-urbanites come to the new fringe suburbs looking for a new life in a semi-rural environment. As they escape the evils of their own suburbia they seek to immerse themselves in the rurality of the fringe. They want to retreat to an authentic past when times were simpler. It is a perception that land developers are eager to exploit.
 


Ex-urbanites are drawn to the urban frontier by developer promises of their own piece of utopia and the hope of a better lifestyle. They seek a place where "the country still lookslike the country". These seek what the local fringe communities already possess – open spaces and a rural countryside.

The imagination of new arrivals is set running by developer promises of suburban dreams in master-planned estates. They are drawn in by glossy brochures, pollie speak, media hype and in recent times subsidies on landscaping and other material benefits.

Manicured parks, picturesque vistas and  restful water features add to the illusion of a paradise on the urban frontier.  Developers commodify a  dream in an idyllic semi-rural setting that new arrivals hope will protect  their  life-savings in a house and land package.

Destruction of the dream

Oran Park housing development 2010 (Camden Images/P Mylrea)

Dreams are also destroyed on  Sydney’s urban frontier for  many new comers.  Once developers of master-planned estates have made their profit they withdraw. They no longer support the idyllic features that created the illusion of a suburban utopia.

The dreams of a generation of ex-urbanites have come  crashing down in suburbs like Harrington Park and Mt Annan. The absence of developer rent-seeking has meant that their dreams  have evaporated and gone to dust.   Manicured parks have become overgrown. Restful water features have turned into dried up cesspools inhabited by vermin.

Paradoxically the invasion of ex-urbanites has displaced and dispossessed an earlier generation of diehard motor racing  fans of their dreams. The destruction of the Oran Park Raceway created its own landscape of lost memories. Ironically new arrivals at Oran Park  bask in the reflected glory of streets named after Australian motor racing legends and sculptures that pay tribute the long gone raceway. 

The latest threat to the dreams of all fringe dwellers is the invasion of Sydney’s southwest urban frontier by the  exploratory drilling of coal seam gas wells. Locals and new arrivals alike see their idyllic surroundings disappearing before their eyes. They are fearful for their semi-rural lifestyle.

So what of the dreams?

Sydney’s rural-urban fringe will continue to be a frontier where conflict is an ever present theme in the story of the place. Invasion, dispossession, opportunity and hope are all part of the ongoing story of this zone of constant change. 


Read more @  Imaginings on Sydney’s Edge: Myth, Mourning and Memory in a Fringe Community  (Sydney Journal)