Built of prefabricated corrugated iron and imported from England, it had been erected in 1857 to replace the bark and slab huts which had been home to the Oxleys since 1825.

'Wingecarribbee', now a private home and no longer in Oxley hands, still stands.

The land on which most of Bowral is built today is the eastern portion of a grant of 2400 acres made to John Oxley by the Governor in 1823 in recognition of his services. With later purchases (converted to an outright grant to his sons in 1829) Oxley's holding comprised 5000 acres.

It extended from Mt. Gibraltar in the north and from the Old South Road in the east, to the new line of road between Mittagong and Berrima in the west (today, the Old Hume Highway at Bendooley Hill), and south to the Wingecarribee River at Burradoo - about 5km from Bowral today towards Moss Vale.

John Oxley himself never lived in the area, sending his sons with herds of cattle to graze on the land after it was granted.

This sleepy hollow, nestled at the foot of Mt. Gibraltar (the name Bowral is said to be derived from an aboriginal word meaning 'high place'), began to stir - like many other areas of the Highlands - when the new Southern railway began to approach it from Sydney. The railway not only opened the way to settlement in the south, but provided an opportunity for landowners to cash in on the subsequent development.

One hundred years later, houses were being 'turned over' at intervals of every few years, at quantum leaps in prices, making Bowral one of the most expensive places to purchase land outside the city.

However, to the 133 hardy souls who lived there in 1871 this would have been a dream.

A church school (1861) was built on 43 acres set aside by J. Oxley as a glebe (extending approximately three blocks east from St.Jude's church to Glebe Park, where the Bradman Museum is today).

A glebe was an area of land attached to a church and clergy house and intended to be a garden or farm large enough to support the clergyman.

The school soon had over 100 enrolments - mostly children of the railway workers, and a permanent stone building was erected for it (1863 - demolished 1899).

In the 1880s a tannery operated at the corner of Bong Bong and Wingecarribee Streets, behind where the Comonwealth Bank stands today.

In 1867 a small station was built at Bowral when the railway line from Mittagong to Moss Vale was opened.

The station was originally called Burradoo, but later changed to Bowrall (a name first used by the post office at the station); the modern spelling was adopted in 1888.

Although the railway workers moved on, ten years later the population of Bowral had tripled and its people were displaying a strong civic presence.

A School of Arts (a combination of social and adult education centre) was held from 1873 behind where the Grand Hotel was later built (1888), until moved to a permanent home in Bendooley Street (1884); a second storey was added in 1913.

The building for many years housed a library, and was used for theatre performances (eistedffods and musical recitals being popular up to the middle of the present century.)It has recently received a face lift.

In 1874 the first Church of St. Simon and St. Jude was completed, to a design by Edmund Blackett, the famous architect. It housed 140 people.

Unfortunately it was deemed too small for the growing town, and was demolished in 1887, only the bell tower and an angle of the original building remaining and incorporated into the new church.

A hall and schoolroom was also built next to it (1886, extended 1924).

Thus was lost an important piece of Victorian colonial architectural heritage.

Although built at a time (like many new parishes and dioceses in the inland) after the Oxford Movement, St. Jude's - as it is commonly known - reflects none of those elements of the catholic revival in the Church of England, remaining in the dour Sydney evangelical tradition. (Compare the Cathedral at Goulburn, the next diocese to the west.)

Its very Englishness reflects the atmosphere Bowral has cultivated for over a century.

The glebe itself, also an English tradition, lasted until 1921 when it was subdivided for housing and Glebe Park (1909 - now the home of Bradman Oval and Museum) was handed over to the community.

(This explains the anomaly of Church Street, opposite the museum, which has no church in it.)

The church school was transferred to the NSW Council of Education in 1868, apparently when the newly appointed teacher refused to take up his post unless this was done.

This was in consequence of the Public Education Act, whereby the State undertook secular responsibility for education.

Bowral High was the only school between Picton and Goulburn preparing students for the Leaving Certificate (matriculation) until Moss Vale Central School was upgraded to a high school in 1964.

Primitive Methodists and Wesleyans (denominations also exported from England) were amongst the earliest settlers. Services were held in private buildings from the earliest days, the Primitive Methodists buying a building in Bong Bong Street for worship until a wooden building was erected for the purpose in 1885.

The Wesleyans meanwhile had built a chapel in Bendooley Street ((1864), and built a new church in 1881. Both branches amalgamated in 1903, and the present building (corner Bendooley and Boolwey Street) was opened in 1926 (now the Uniting Church of Australia).

The Roman Catholic Church was banned in the earliest days of the Sydney colony, and although Catholic Churches had previously been established in Berrima and Sutton Forest, the first church in Bowral was only built in 1891 (Banyette Street and Argyle Lane - now owned by an evangelical church).

It was customary to build Catholic churches on the highest location within a town, yet this is the lowest in the subdivision.

The existence of a number of 'masonic' and other lodges since the earliest days (foundation dates 1863, 1882, 1887, and 1904) attests partly to the fact that Bowral was a 'protestant' town.

By the 1880s Bowral had become a fashionable retreat for the Sydney 'gentry'.

The Governor had been in the habit of visiting the Highlands as a summer retreat for some years, and an estate (Hillview) in Sutton Forest was purchased for his use in 1882.

Many of Sydney's elite flocked to the Highlands in his wake and many of the great estates of Bowral were established during this time.

Bowral itself flourished during the 80s with new buildings being erected in the main street, and new subdivisions being sold off almost every year - train loads of prospective buyers being brought from the city to attend the auctions.

In 1886 there were 2 hotels and 20 boarding houses to cater for the burgeoning tourist trade.

Today there are 4 hotels, several registered clubs, and a large number of resorts, guesthouses, and smaller B&B accommodation houses.

Tourism today attracts more visitors than even in Bowral's early hey days.

As a mark of the importance of the town, one Jacob Ward, doctor, established a presence as early as 1863.

His timber slab and bark home served as a surgery and hospital for many years.

In 1889, with local subscriptions, the Berrima District Cottage Hospital was opened - the only hospital at the time between Sydney and Goulburn.

Over the years Bendooley Street, although not planned so, has become the civic centre of Bowral.

A Police Station was built in Wingecarribee Street in 1887, and a court house (of local trachyte stone) on the corner in 1896.

The Town Hall was built in Bendooley Street in 1890, in the grandiose facade style of municipal buildings of the Victorian period.

The School of Arts (as mentioned) was built in 1884.

These were of course European deciduous trees, to make Bowral look more like England; the oaks in Station Street at the entrance to the main street today date from this time.

In 1883 a park was set aside for public use in Centennial Road, purchased by the local people. 24 acres of the glebe were leased and opened as a public park in 1909 (now Glebe Park, home of the Bradman Museum).

In 1911, Corbett Gardens (home of the famous Tulip Time Festival of later years) was purchased; it was named after Mrs. Ada Corbett, who was largely instrumental in organising the purchase.

Although central to the town, and faced by its public buildings, Corbett Gardens today fails to be the architectural focus of the town.

However, it attracted local people on weekends, a band rotunda being a feature of the park when it opened. This was dismantled in the 1950s, but a replica rebuilt in the 1990s and gifted to the town by Mr. Ted Springett, long an active citizen and benefactor of Bowral.

In 1919 an area of 60 acres on Mt. Gibraltar was purchased, and after many years of dificulties, declared a park after a road was driven into it (1937, renamed Oxley Drive 1951.)

Despite residential development on the Mittagong side of Mt. Gibraltar, it largely remains as it used to be before European settlement, and affords spectacular views of the surrounding countryside.

The Bowral Municipal Council (in which the large local landowners were strongly represented in the early years) soon set itself to improving the local amenities.

This job was made easier by the small area over which it had jurisdiction - some 1600 acres in 1886 and population of 1000 people.

With lesser responsibility, the Bowral Municipality was able to prosper. Bowral was lit by gas street lamps in 1889 (previously kerosene).

A private gasworks was opened in 1890 (purchased by the Council in1892) - the only one in the Highlands).

A reticulated water supply was established in 1922, and electricity brought in from Port Kembla in 1925, and main streets illuminated.

Bowral Municipality also spent its money on paving its streets, macadamised surfaces being laid down in the main streets early in this century, and the first 'hot mix' bitumen in the area over 50 years later.

Despite being off the main highway, Bowral prospered during the motoring age and became the retail and service industry centre of the Highlands.

But that is another story.