THEY were looking for cheap land to graze their sheep on and founded what would become the world’s most livable city.
It might seem ironic given current property prices, but Launceston had become too expensive, so the graziers climbed aboard the schooner Enterprize and headed across the Bass Strait.
Near where Enterprize Park now stands — on Flinders St between King St and William St — a waterfall prevented them from going any further up the river.
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They climbed from the boats and became Melbourne’s first settlers. It was August 30 1835.
Saturday — Melbourne Day — marks Melbourne’s 179th birthday.
The world’s friendliest and most liveable city will celebrate with a free concert, tours of the city and of course great food and drink.
Melbourne’s original 12 residents included: master mariner John Lancey; the Enterprize’s captain, Peter Hunter; blacksmith James Gilbert and his pregnant wife Mary; and Mary’s cat, the Melbourne Day website says.
After disembarking the group began to build a shelter and a store and cleared land to grow food.
The world’s most liveable city was underway.
The two men most closely linked to the settlement of Melbourne, John Pascoe Fawkner and John Batman, arrived in the new city some months later.
Melbourne’s original names included Batmania, Barebrass, Bearport, Dutergalla, Bareheep and the very boring, but most popular name “the Settlement”.
In March 1837 it was named Melbourne — after the then British Prime Minister William Lamb, the 2nd Viscount Melbourne, who resided in the village of Melbourne in England.
A year later one of Melbourne’s most famous institutions — the Melbourne Cricket Club was established.
In 1853 the club chose the current site of the Melbourne Cricket Ground as their home.
Football was first played at the ground in 1869 and eight years later Australia took on the Poms in the first ever cricket Test Match.
The first Melbourne Cup was held in 1861 and won by Archer.
There was a railway station at Flinders St from 1854, but it wasn’t until 1909 that the famous front entrance was completed.
The world first saw what a great city Melbourne was in 1880 when it hosted the World’s Fair at the newly built Royal Exhibition Building, in Carlton.
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But it wasn’t until the 1950s that our famous cafe culture first emerged with The Legend and Pellegrinis, both on Bourke St, among the first places to enjoy a coffee in Melbourne.
There’s a lot to celebrate on Saturday.
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