It was Banjo Paterson’s birthplace, the site of Orange’s first racecourse and was a thriving community.
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Yet, historian Elizabeth Griffin says it has become our best kept secret.
Miss Griffin has called a public meeting at 2pm on Sunday to start the ball rolling toward toward turning the site of the famous poet’s memorial on Ophir Road into a major tourist precinct.
She has called for an archaeological dig to unearth the foundations of several key buildings on the site which would be illustrated with interpretative signs.
And she said visitors facilities should include toilets, a shelter shed, barbecues and picnic tables.
Miss Griffin said this year marked 70 years since Paterson’s widow Alice unveiled the monument on the site in 1947.
“I want to see it made more user-friendly,” she said.
“I want to get people enthusiastic about this.
“We’ve got a tremendous tourism facility out there and we should capitalise on it.”
Miss Griffin said she hoped Sunday’s meeting would lead to a group being formed that could work with council about finding funding to turn the two hectare site behind the roadside monument into a significant tourism facility in time for the 75th anniversary.
“The 75th anniversary will be in five years,” she said.
“I’m giving Orange City Council five years notice.”
Miss Griffin said she had already spoken to a council committee which had agreed to take the proposal to a full council meeting.
She said the Narrambla Vale area was once home to 33 families before it was split in two with the coming of the railway in 1877.
“It was a thriving little place out in the vale.”
Miss Griffin said the foundations of the old mill, stables, two wells, a manager’s house and a shed are still on the site and be opened for tourists.
She said Banjo Paterson was born in the house of his grandmother’s sister, Mrs Templer, which was just outside the proposed tourist precinct.
However, Miss Griffin said she was not calling for Emmaville cottage, which had been on the original Narrambla property and has links to Banjo Paterson, to be moved to the monument site from its current position at the Botanic Gardens.
“I don’t think the poor old house would stand it,” she said.
Miss Griffin said the site had also hosted Orange’s first horse races in the 1860s.
And she said it was used for ploughing exhibitions which became the forerunner to the Orange Agricultural Show.
Sunday’s meeting is scheduled to be on site at the Paterson monument.
However, if it is raining the meeting would be held at the Parkview Hotel.