Medindie. George Goyder built a cottage on his 30 acres here in 1856 which he enlarged to a grand house in 1866. He sold it in 1883 and new owners added an upper floor.

Goyder and the Goyder Family.

George Woodroffe Goyder was born in 1826 to his English parents. His father David was a minister in the Church of Swedenborg who married another member of the church Sarah Etherington in 1821. They had many children and within a couple of years of the marriage David Goyder was busy publishing books on philosophy, education, psychology and the church of Swedenborg. George came from a family of intellectuals with strong characters, resoluteness and perseverance. David Goyder eventually studied medicine and practised as a doctor as well as a minister. George Goyder attended the Glasgow Grammar School for some years and developed skills in engineering and surveying as he was fascinated with the new railways. He was soon employed with a railway engineering firm designing rail bridges. In 1848 at the age 22 he migrated to Melbourne before travelling overland to Adelaide in 1851. He married a member of the New Church or Swedenborg Church, Francis Smith in Adelaide later that year. Their marriage was soon blessed with children but some of them never survived infancy. Their names were used by Goyder for the streets of Port Pirie many years later. Offspring from his first marriage to Francis were: Francis Ellen

1852(died), Florence Sarah 1854, George Arthur 1855, Emma Gertrude 1856, Ellen Mary 1858, Isabella Agnes 1859, David John 1862, Alexandra 1863 (died), Frances Charles 1863 (died), Frank Etherington 1865, Thomas Underwood and Norman Underwood both 1866. Francis’ sister Ellen Smith either lived with the family or nearby to assist her sister with all of these children. After the death of the twins in 1863 followed by another set of twins in 1866 Francis was stressed and depressed and returned to England to her family for recuperation. She took her sister Ellen and the children with her. As was usual for those times she took medicinal doses of opium because of her fragility. In April 1870 Francis died of an opium overdose in Bristol England. It was ruled as accidental. Her sister Ellen and children returned to Adelaide in August 1870. Goyder claiming ill health took leave of absence from his position and sailed for England in February 1871 leaving the children with Ellen. He got back on 17th October 1871. (While he was in England Queen Victoria had assented to a SA parliament bill that allowed a man to marry his deceased wife’s sister which became law in June 1871.) On 20th November 1871 Goyder married his sister-in-law Ellen Smith at St Luke’s Anglican Church in Whitmore Square followed by a New Church ceremony immediately after. John Harvey Goyder was born 10 months later on 28 September 1872. After his marriage to Frances Smith on 8 December 1851 daughter Frances Ellen was born exactly 9 months later on 5 September 1852. After all his nick name was “Little Energy”. His marriage to his sister-in-law Ellen Smith produced a further two children twin girls Ethelwynn and Margaret in 1873.

 

Goyder and Medindie.

As a senior public servant George Goyder soon wanted an appropriate house for his growing family. He married in 1851 and by 1856 there were four children in the family. At this time he was renting a cottage in Lower

North Adelaide near his parents-in- law and his two brothers-in-law. These brothers-in-law had established themselves on a small farm at Medindie and another at Walkerville which were soon flower and plant nurseries. Brother-in-law John Smith developed Clifton Nursery which ran between Robe Terrace, east of Hawkers Road and up to Dutton Terrace. It was next door to George Goyder’s new property of over 30 acres which he purchased in 1856 facing Robe Terrace but to the west of Hawkers Road. Goyder simply called his house Hillside which he later changed to Medindie. Hillside was a substantial six roomed stone cottage. In 1866 Goyder sketched and planned himself a massive extension of his Medindie home at a cost of over £900. The Goyder house was now a substantial villa not a cottage. Frances Goyder only stayed here for one year before she returned to England where she died. Following his marriage to Ellen the new Goyder family continued to live in Medindie House. The family stayed on at Medindie after the purchase of Warrakilla in 1879 until 1882. They were waiting for that mansion to be renovated and extended before they moved to it in 1883. The Medindie property was then sold in 1883. A later owner, a Mr Meucke converted the nine roomed villa into a fashionable two storey mansion around 1890 which was renamed The Myrtles. It sold in 2014 for $5 million.

 

Goyder’s Work as Surveyor General.

Goyder entered the SA public service in 1851 the year he married Frances Mary Smith. He worked in the drafting office of the SA public service and in 1855 he was promoted to General Superintendent of Field Surveys and First Assistant to the Surveyor General. Then in 1857 he wrote a diary on his explorations to the north of the state. His explorations were reported in the press and Goyder become a known figure. The State Library has a copy of his original 1857 diary which in simply marked 1857 Dy (for diary) Sr O (Survey Office). His survey took him to the Pichi Richi Gorge, the Willochra Plains and the Flinders Ranges. Goyder and three others went further and discovered a large freshwater lake teeming with ducks, birds and wildlife which was Lake Blanche. Goyder made the mistake of thinking the lake always had fresh water and he never overestimated the nature of the South Australian countryside again. His boss Surveyor General Freeling had travelled around Lake Blanche before and had only found desert and his assessment was the correct one. Despite this error Goyder was appointed as Surveyor General of SA upon Freeling’s retirement in 1861 as well as Valuator of Runs and Inspector of Mines. Goyder held these posts and others until his own retirement in 1894 just a few years before his death in 1898. He was involved in all major aspects of the development of SA in the 19th century not just land and surveying. His involvement covered:

•Surveying systems. He developed the Hundred as base unit and continued with the County system set up by Colonel William Light. (Over half of all Hundreds in SA were declared during Goyder’s time as Surveyor General). He developed the ideal rectangular grid town surrounded by parklands like the plan of Adelaide done by Colonel William Light. Beyond the parklands were suburban blocks of several acres each. He was criticised for naming towns after prominent white men (Jamestown, Germein, and Pirie etc.) and streets after his children such as the streets of Port Pirie after his children and the streets of Darwin after his sister-in-law and relatives in the Smith family.

•The Northern Territory. Goyder got the Northern Territory near Darwin surveyed and he laid out Darwin and selected the site of the town. He worked hard and despite getting malaria started white settlement there.

•South East drainage system. He saw the need to drain the swamps of the South East to open up the country for pastoralism and farming. He planned and supervised the major drainage scheme that still operates in the South East whereby channels cross the ranges and drain water to the southern end of the Coorong or to the sea near Millicent.

•Forestry. Goyder was behind the first forests acts and plantations in South Australia. He wanted to see more trees planted in SA and he was concerned about trees being felled. He was the man who introduced Radiata pine from California to SA as he was aware of the climatic similarities. He was first Conservator of Forests and he was the person to develop the first commercial forests anywhere in Australia. His forest experiments and developments were at Wirrabara, Bundaleer and the South East.

•Water and Water Conservation. Goyder got the government to sink wells for town use and general farmer use and pastoralist use. He recognised the importance of water to all SA land owners and he was involved in the development of the first country reservoirs in SA at Beetaloo and Bundaleer.

•Railways. Goyder was involved in a committee that looked at the railway system in the early 1870s and pushed for all lines to be connected in a way that would link the rural railway lines to the Adelaide rail system. He got SA to move away from isolated rural lines that went from ports into the agricultural hinterlands.

•Aborigines. Goyder was interested in the Aboriginal use of the land and its resources. He noted from early pastoralists ( like W Hughes of Booyoolie) that indigenous people saw their lands being cleared for pastoralism and then over stocked with sheep which meant that when droughts came there were no kangaroos or meat supplies for them. George Goyder was involved in George Taplin’s selection of the site of Point McLeay for an Aboriginal mission. He believed all access to Lakes Alexandrina and Albert should be through government reserves for the Ngarrindjeri so that they could use the lakes for fishing, bird catching etc.

 

Goyder’s Line and its relevance.

The amazing George Goyder began work as the Surveyor General in 1861. Within a short time of two years he rode an estimated 3,000 miles on a horse around the state to all the leasehold properties and runs to gather rainfall and climate records and to assess the properties for annual rental rates. He inspected fences, wells, the land, woolsheds, homesteads, windmills and other improvements to the land and he assessed the capacity of the land to carry stock. From these records and assessments he valued the annual leases. He was not popular with the pastoralists because many suddenly had their annual rents rise from say £488 a year to say a £3,472 a year as was the case with Dutton’s Anlaby run in 1864. Other significant increases were for the Booyoolie run £502 to £2,716, the Hummocks run from £491 to £4,063, Crystal Brook run from £514 to £3,420 , Booborowie run from £80 to £812, but Kanyaka in the dry north near Quorn went down from £72 to £25. But the most significant outcome of this epic journey around the state was the development of Goyder’s Line in 1865. He produced it in that year because of the devastating drought that hit SA then. It was a line to separate pastoral areas from farming areas. It is now considered to be one of the great lines of the world along with Wallace’s Line (1859) that divides Asia and Australia in eco-geographical terms. The 150 year old line has survived George Goyder by 120 years and is still basically applicable to SA today. It is a sophisticated line based on a number of factors not just rainfall as many of us were taught at school. It roughly follows the 12 inch or 300 mms of annual rainfall. But Goyder’s Line is about RELIABLE rainfall. It was because the SA government was hungry for agricultural expansion that they allowed and encouraged farming to extend beyond Goyder’s Line in the late 1870s when farmers saw good average rainfall for a couple of years without considering the reliability of the rainfall. When the annual rainfall returned to its usual low level the farmers were left in an untenable situation and many had to walk off their land and leave their homes and improvements behind. For grain growers in SA reliable rainfall is that rain which falls between April and October which is the growing season for their crops. Goyder was well aware from pastoral station rainfall records that in areas beyond his line stations often received their greatest rainfall in summer when sudden thunderstorms resulted in a deluge. He knew that this rainfall was not useful for grain growing in winter. Apart from total rainfall and the reliability of rainfall his Line was based on:

•vegetation – the appearance of saltbush was a special sign that farming was not viable and changes in vegetation types from Mallee to open eucalyptus woodland was another sign to Goyder.

•soil type - Goyder always examined soils and knew that some soils retained moisture better than others and that some soils were nutritionally poor and unsuitable for farming.

•topography – grain growers need gentle sloping land not mountainous regions.

 

When in the 1870s people in the street, the government and the press argued that rain followed the plough Goyder refuted that but his warnings were ignored. His line was in fact refuted in legislation by the government in 1874 which allowed the surveying of hundreds beyond Goyder’s Line. Goyder also refuted the argument that the planting of trees increased rainfall. This view was argued by no less than the John Ednie Brown who began working with Goyder in 1879 before he was appointed as Conservator of Forests in SA. Goyder just pointed out that large areas of SA were covered with Mallee trees but they did not increase rainfall. Large eucalypts grew all along the Murray River in outback areas but they had not increased rainfall in the SA Riverland. Despite these sound arguments the views of Goyder were ignored by Brown and the government. Forests never increased rainfall anywhere in SA. After the droughts of the early 1880s and the retreat from the outback for farming it became common place for farms when they were advertised for sale to be noted as being within or outside of Goyder’s Line. After this disastrous period of expansion into unsuitable agricultural areas the SA government was wary of expansion beyond the line. But there was expansion in the 20th century into the Murray Mallee above the line but below Waikerie, Loxton and the River Murray. There was similar expansion into the upper regions of Eyre Peninsula, the areas around Port Broughton above Yorke Peninsula and even areas between Wilmington and Hawker in the Flinders Ranges. But like the Murray Mallee, expansion in these areas beyond his line was possible in the 20th century because new varieties of wheat and grain had been developed to thrive on poor sandy soils with quite low rainfall.

 

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