Mount Wilson, New South Wales
Encyclopedia
Mount Wilson is a village in the state of New South Wales
and in the Blue Mountains. It is approximately fourteen kilometres east of the township of Bell
, and approximately one hundred kilometres west of Sydney
. At the 2006 census
, Mount Wilson had a population of 218 people.
, a World Heritage Area. It has been partly developed as a residential area, with elaborate gardens that have become a tourist attraction. The area is particularly popular in the autumn, when the red and orange leaves give it extra colour. According to some, the "well organised locals have managed to resist the tidal wave of development which swept through the other mountain towns."
soil. Historical features that can still be seen include St George's Church, which was built by the children of Henry Marcus Clark and consecrated in 1916; and the house Withycombe, in The Avenue, which was built by George Henry Cox, a grandson of William Cox, who built the first road over the Blue Mountains.
The novelist Patrick White
spent some of his youth there, writing about the place in his 1981 memoir Flaws in the Glass; his parents had lived in Mount Wilson between 1912 and 1937. In Flaws in the Glass, he referred to "one of those tedious Australian, would-be tourists attractions called Chinaman's Hat," a reference to a local rock formation.
New South Wales
New South Wales is a state of :Australia, located in the east of the country. It is bordered by Queensland, Victoria and South Australia to the north, south and west respectively. To the east, the state is bordered by the Tasman Sea, which forms part of the Pacific Ocean. New South Wales...
and in the Blue Mountains. It is approximately fourteen kilometres east of the township of Bell
Bell, New South Wales
Bell is a small rural/residential village in the Blue Mountains with an elevation of approximately 1100 metres above sea level. Bell is approximately 125 km west of Sydney, Australia by road or 137 km by rail, some 20 km east of Lithgow and 10 km north of Mount Victoria. It is a...
, and approximately one hundred kilometres west of Sydney
Sydney
Sydney is the most populous city in Australia and the state capital of New South Wales. Sydney is located on Australia's south-east coast of the Tasman Sea. As of June 2010, the greater metropolitan area had an approximate population of 4.6 million people...
. At the 2006 census
Census in Australia
The Australian census is administered once every five years by the Australian Bureau of Statistics. The most recent census was conducted on 9 August 2011; the next will be conducted in 2016. Prior to the introduction of regular censuses in 1961, they had also been run in 1901, 1911, 1921, 1933,...
, Mount Wilson had a population of 218 people.
Description
Mount Wilson is a long, low mountain formation that sprawls for five kilometres in the northern Blue Mountains area. It is completely surrounded by the Blue Mountains National ParkBlue Mountains National Park
The Blue Mountains National Park is a national park in New South Wales, Australia, 81 km west of Sydney, and located in the Blue Mountains region of the Great Dividing Range. The park covers 268,987 hectares. The boundary of the park is quite irregular as it is broken up by roads, urban areas...
, a World Heritage Area. It has been partly developed as a residential area, with elaborate gardens that have become a tourist attraction. The area is particularly popular in the autumn, when the red and orange leaves give it extra colour. According to some, the "well organised locals have managed to resist the tidal wave of development which swept through the other mountain towns."
History
The Mount Wilson area was surveyed in 1868 by Edward Wyndham. It was subsequently named after John Bowie Wilson, the then member of the Legislative Assembly in New South Wales and the Secretary for Lands. The new township became popular as a summer retreat for the wealthy in the latter part of the 19th century. Extensive gardens were planted around the houses there, taking advantage of the rich basaltBasalt
Basalt is a common extrusive volcanic rock. It is usually grey to black and fine-grained due to rapid cooling of lava at the surface of a planet. It may be porphyritic containing larger crystals in a fine matrix, or vesicular, or frothy scoria. Unweathered basalt is black or grey...
soil. Historical features that can still be seen include St George's Church, which was built by the children of Henry Marcus Clark and consecrated in 1916; and the house Withycombe, in The Avenue, which was built by George Henry Cox, a grandson of William Cox, who built the first road over the Blue Mountains.
The novelist Patrick White
Patrick White
Patrick Victor Martindale White , an Australian author, is widely regarded as an important English-language novelist of the 20th century. From 1935 until his death, he published 12 novels, two short-story collections and eight plays.White's fiction employs humour, florid prose, shifting narrative...
spent some of his youth there, writing about the place in his 1981 memoir Flaws in the Glass; his parents had lived in Mount Wilson between 1912 and 1937. In Flaws in the Glass, he referred to "one of those tedious Australian, would-be tourists attractions called Chinaman's Hat," a reference to a local rock formation.