'Brunyarra' Santa Maria Del Monte

Photograph:  Courtesy of Strathfield Council 1986

In 1894, the Roman Catholic Dominican Sisters opened Santa Sabina Convent and School on The Boulevarde Strathfield.  Following a bequest to the Dominican Sisters of ‘Brunyarra’ (also known as ‘Del Monte’), Santa Sabina relocated their junior school to ‘Brunyarra’ and the new primary school of Santa Maria Del Monte was established in 1951. ‘Lauriston’, former home of Amy Vickery was later acquired by the Dominican Sisters from Trinity Grammar and with ‘Brunyarra’ has become part of Santa Maria Del Monte, the junior school of Santa Sabina.

This newsletter discusses the history of the ‘Brunyarra’ building.

‘Brunyarra’ is located on the corner of The Boulevarde and Carrington Avenue Strathfield.  The site is located on part of Lot 36 of the Redmire Estate, which was subdivided and offered for sale in 1867.  The original purchaser of Lot 36 was Richard Wynne, a slate merchant and first Mayor of Burwood Council [1874].  Wynne is best known for the Wynne Art Prize, established from a financial bequest after his death in 1895.

Lot 36 was not developed for nearly twenty years resulting in the vacant land being known locally as ‘Wynne’s Paddock’.  When the land was finally subdivided into residential lots in 1886, the estate was marketed as ‘Wynne’s Paddock’. 

John Spencer Brunton, of a prominent flour milling family, purchased Lots 1-4 of this subdivision in June 1886.  The land fronted The Boulevarde and Carrington Avenue.  The house ‘Brunyarra’, a two storey Victorian Italianate style building, was built in the same year the land was acquired.  The name of the house is obviously derived from owner’s surname ‘Brunton’ and the Aboriginal word ‘Yarra’ meaning ‘ever flowing’.

John Spencer Brunton (d.1937) was the son of Thomas Brunton [1831-1908].  Thomas Brunton established Brunton and Company as flour millers in 1868 in Victoria.  In 1882 Brunton visited American, English and Continental flour milling centres, returning with plans for a new roller mill. The new milling process, requiring porcelain and chilled iron rollers unobtainable locally, caused Brunton, a former president of the Essendon branch of the Victorian Protection League, to protest at the duty on patent machinery. His wish for an association of millers was fulfilled in 1884 with the founding of the Corn Trade Association. As its president in 1886 Brunton urged amalgamation with the Chamber of Commerce. He supported the appointment of a tribunal to settle trade disputes justly, for he had more faith in a tribunal of 'competent honest men' than in the law.  Thomas Brunton was also a prominent breeder of cattle and horses and President of the Royal Agricultural Society in 1895, Harbour Trust (Commissioner 1890-98 and Member of the Legislative Council for Southern Province [Victorian Parliament] 1890-1904’. 

Almost twenty years after the Victorian Mills were founded, in 1887 Brunton’s Sydney flourmills were established at Granville at the junction of the main Southern and Western lines.  The mills traded under the name of Australian Flour Mills and run almost independently from the Victorian mills. The Sydney office of the company was located at Clarence Street Sydney.  John Spencer Brunton, son of Thomas Brunton, was the senior partner in the company.  

Brunton was profiled after his election as an Alderman to Sydney City Council in the February 14 issue of Town & Country Journal.  The profile states:

“John Spencer Brunton, senior member of the well-known firm of Brunton and Company, Sydney, is now an alderman of the Sydney City Council, having in the by-election on January 31, to the vacancy caused by the resignation of Mr A A Cocks, MLA (late Lord Mayor), defeated Sir Allen Taylor.  The voting was: - Mr Brunton 721; Sir Allen Taylor, 596; informal, 35; majority for Brunton, 125.  Alderman Brunton is well known in commercial circles throughout New South Wales, and as the head member of the firm is well versed in all the conditions of labor, and the complexity it presents.  In 1900 Mr Brunton was elected president of the Sydney Chamber of Commerce, and in that capacity was instrumental in creating a desire for immediate municipal reform.  The result was that the Municipal Reform Association was formed, which succeeded bringing new blood into the Council, returning men like Sir James Graham, Mr Thomas Hughes, Mr Milner Stephen, Mr J Lane Mullins, and several others.

Mr Brunton was for 15 or 16 years with the New South Wales Lancer Regiment, and retired with the rank of major, after attaining the position of Brigade-Major of the First Brigade of the Australian Light Horse.  He is well known sportsman, and races his horses for the pleasure of the sport.  Mr Brunton is a member of the Royal Sydney Yacht Squadron, the Prince Alfred Yacht Club, the Royal Automobile Club, the Royal Sydney Golf Club, and other bodies. 

Mr Brunton being a man of such fine business ability will be a great acquisition to the City Council.  In returning thanks he said the election had been fought in the best spirit and without any bitterness.  Mr Brunton added: ‘If all elections were as pleasantly conducted as this one had been, many men who now hesitated about facing a contest would come forward and do their duty.”

Brunton eventually served on Sydney City Council until 1918 as an Alderman for Lang Ward.  He was member of the Finance Committee, 1914-1918 and the Electric Lighting Committee, 1914-1917.

John Spencer Brunton was an influential member of local Strathfield community.  He was a member of the prestigious and influential Strathfield Recreation Club and served as President in 1896.  Brunton also lent support to the early boulevarding and street planting programs in Strathfield Municipality, where street planting costs were shared between Strathfield Council and residents. Brunton personally posted reward for the capture of the person(s) responsible for stealing the newly planted street trees on The Boulevarde.

Brunton continued to own ‘Brunyarra’ until 1908, the property was tenanted from 1901 to 1903 by J. Kent and from 1904 to 1908 by Raymond Lhoest, a Belgian woolbroker. 

In 1908, Brunton sold ‘Brunyarra’ to Edward Scholes for £3,900.  At this time, the name of the house was changed to ‘Prestwich’.  Edward Scholes (1858-1933) was a prominent local identity of the Strathfield and Burwood areas.  He trained as a solicitor in Sydney (articled to Want, Johnson and Want, later called Minter Simpson & Co) but went to London to qualify for the Bar in 1886.  Upon his return to Sydney, Scholes was admitted to the colonial bar.  He had a successful career being junior counsel for the Railway Commissioner, counsel for the Water and Sewerage Board and on several occasions as Crown Prosecutor.  In August 1908, he was appointed Judge of the District Court and Chairman of the Quarter Sessions and later served Acting President of the New South Wales Industrial Court.  Scholes retired as a Judge at the age of seventy in 1928 but was then appointed as Royal Commissioner to investigate allegations of political corruption concerning payments to Labor Members of Parliament to induce them to vacate a seat in favour of E. G. (Ted) Theodore.  The Commission found that a financial benefit had been given, probably £5000 to W G Mahoney to resign his Sydney Federal Electorate of Dalley in 1927, where Theodore was elected in a by-election.  Scholes married Gertrude Keep in 1886, daughter of John Keep (‘Keep McPherson’ Hardware Merchants and a prominent local family).  Scholes died in 1933.

Scholes had long involvement in local government, serving as an Alderman on Burwood Council for twelve years, Mayor (1891) and member of the Committee of the Municipal Association of New South Wales.  In 1888, he took part in the formation of the New South Wales Federal Association, and he remained a member of the Council of that body until attainment of Australian Federation.  Scholes was the first Vice- President from 1891-199 and second President from 1900-06 of Western Suburbs Cottage Hospital. 

Scholes acquired the adjoining lot (Lot 5) located in Carrington Avenue and sold the property to Dr Arthur Edward Mills (1865-1940).  Mills was the owner of ‘Silwood’ [c.1902-06j, which is now the location of Strathfield Square and part of Strathfield Railway Station.

Arthur Edward Mills MB ChM was a graduate of University of Sydney.  He was a resident at Royal Prince Alfred Hospital in 1889, demonstrated in anatomy at the University of Sydney in 1890, entered general practice in 1892 at Picton, was appointed assistant physician at Prince Alfred in 1898, physician in 1910 and consultant in 1930 and set up as a consultant physician in Macquarie Street in 1910.  From 1901 Mills had lectured at the University in the diseases of children. He visited the Infants' Home, Ashfield, as honorary medical officer for thirty-five years and introduced a modified Truby King feeding schedule, which greatly reduced infant mortality from gastro-enteritis. In 1906 he visited medical schools in Berlin and was impressed with the importance given to teaching the physiological and biochemical principles underlying clinical medicine, and was one of the earliest to teach in this modern way in Sydney.

He became Lecturer in the principles and practice of medicine in 1910.  In 1915 he joined the Australian Imperial Force as major, served overseas at No.1 Australian Auxiliary Hospital, Harefield, and at administrative headquarters, London, and was recalled to the University in 1916.

From 1920 to 1930 he was Professor of the principles and practice of medicine, and dean in 1920-25. He was a Fellow of the Senate in 1920-25 and 1929-39, and Deputy Chancellor in 1936-38 at University of Sydney.  In 1926 Mills had accepted the offer of the post of chief medical officer for the Mutual Life & Citizens Assurance Co. Ltd, and was a foundation fellow of the Royal Australasian College of Physicians (1938). He died suddenly in Martin Place of coronary occlusion on 10 April 1940.

Under Mills ownership, the house name was changed to ‘Murrumbah’.  In 1913, Richard Henry Mears, Grazier, bought the property from Dr Mills for £1908.10.0 - £2000 less than Judge Scholes paid for it five years earlier.

Mears sold the property in 1918 to Isabel Grace, the wife of Albert Grace, who with his brother Joseph Neal Grace, founded Grace Brothers stores in 1885. ‘the two Grace Brothers, Joseph and Albert, migrated from England in the 1880’s and sold goods door-to-door. In 1885, they opened their first small shop in George St City and by 1906, they had opened a five story building at Broadway [now the site of the Broadway Shopping Cerarej6. In 1931, Joseph Neal Grace died and Albert Grace became Managing Director of Grace Bros Ltd. Prior to his death in 1938, Albert Grace planned suburban expansion of the Grace Bros stores from the City. The move to Sydney’s suburbs is often given as explanation of the survival of Grace Bros’s stores, when many of their contemporaries perished such as Anthony Horderns and Mark Foys. Isabel Grace died in 1970 at age of 86 years.  Myers acquired Grace Bros department stores in 1989, though the NSW and ACT stores continued to trade as Grace Brothers.  In 2004, the name ‘Grace Bros’ was discontinued by Myers and all stores in NSW and ACT were renamed Myers. 

Albert and Isabel Grace sold ‘Murrumbah’ to Mrs Mary Bailey, wife of Ernest Bailey, in 1928. Mrs Bailey changed the name of the house to ‘Del Monte’ and established a prominent function and wedding reception centre.  In her later years and with deteriorating health, Mrs Bailey lived in her private quarters and was attended by the Dominican Sisters. Mrs Bailey died in May 1950 leaving the property to the Dominican Sisters.

Emilsen in Dancing on St Dom’s Plot, p164, notes that negotiations, which transferred ownership of the property to the Sisters of St Dominic, appear to have commenced in December 1947, when the Sisters become mortgagees of Mrs Bailey’s property.  The ‘Last Will and Testament of Mary Bailey’ dated 14 September 1949 states: ‘I give and devise my property ‘Del Monte’, the Boulevarde Strathfield, subject to any encumbrances that maybe on it at the time of my death, for the use, purposes and benefit of the Sisters of St Dominic of New South Wales together with the large picture of the Sacred Heart, the cedar four poster bedstead given to my grandmother over a hundred years ago and all the chairs……And I declare it to be my wish and desire that the said Trustees of the Sisters of St Dominic –

a)      retain the property in perpetuity for such purposes;

b)      use some part of such property as a Chapel;

c)      refrain from ever holding a sale of the house and from leasing or parting with possession of the said house or land or any part thereof;

d)      hang in some part of the house the large picture of the Sacred Heart at present contained therein, such picture to hang in my memory’

With the increased numbers of primary aged enrolments and difficulties in accommodating students at Santa Sabina, in 1951 the Dominican Sisters opted to relocate the primary school to the ‘Del Monte’ property which is situated almost directly opposite Santa Sabina on The Boulevarde.  The new junior school was renamed ‘Santa Maria Del Monte’, maintaining Mrs Bailey’s ‘Del Monte’ as part of the new name of the school.

In 1998, the Dominican Sisters established the Mary Bailey Early Education Centre at Santa Maria Del Monte in remembrance of Mrs Bailey’s bequest. 

Heritage significance of Brunyarra

Brunyarra is built in the styling of the Victorian Italianate mode and exhibits a very solid and sedate façade. Characteristics contributing to this include attractive verandahs and balconies achieved by an agreeable blending of moulded balustrades, sturdy columns with large bases, ornate capitals and string brackets, round-headed windows in recessed arch surrounds; an obtrusive low pitched roof; and a six-panel entrance door flanked by sidelights and topped by a fanlight, each with art nouveau motifs. An annexe was later built on the northern side, as was the enclosure of the side balcony and some additions at the rear.

Brunyarra is a significant heritage property and representative of the grand homes of Strathfield built in late 19th century by prominent business and professional men along The Boulevarde. Other homes such as ‘Llandilo’; the home of Sir Phillip Sydney Jones and ‘Glen Luna’ home of prominent solicitor George Sly are examples of other grand homes built during the Victorian period. ‘Brunyarra’ is a heritage listed item on Strathfield Council’s Local Environmental Plan.

References

C. R. B. Blackburn, 'Mills, Arthur Edward (1865 - 1940)', Australian Dictionary of Biography, Volume 10, Melbourne University Press, 1986, p. 515.

‘New City Council Alderman’, Town & Country Journal, page 28, 4 February 1914.

Emilsen, Susan., ‘Dancing on St Dom’s Plot A History of Santa Sabina and Santa Maria Del Monte’, Santa Sabina College Limited, 1994

Fox & Associates, Strathfield Heritage Study, Strathfield Council, 1986.

J. Ann Hone, 'Brunton, Thomas (1831 - 1908)', Australian Dictionary of Biography, Volume 3, Melbourne University Press, 1969, p. 280.

H T E Holt, A Court Rises: Lives and Times of the Judges of the District Court of NSW (1859-1959), Law Foundation of NSW, 1976.

Jones, M., Oasis in the West, Allen and Unwin, 1985.

Kennedy, Reg., ‘Splendour of an epoch’, Strathfield District Historical Society Newsletter, vol. 12 no. 11, July 1990

Malcolm, CS., ‘Old homes of Strathfield’, Strathfield District Historical Society Newsletter, vol. 3 no. 14, 1981

Malcolm, CS., ‘Old Homes of Strathfield’, Strathfield District Historical Society Newsletter, Vol. 4 No. 4, Jan-Feb 1982

R Perdon, Sydney’s Aldermen: A Biographical Register of Sydney City Aldermen 1842-1992, Sydney City Council, 1997.

Pollon, Frances, ‘Shops and Shoppers’, Retail Traders Association of New South Wales, 1989.

Strathfield Council Valuation Books 1945 and 1948  

Sands Sydney Directory 

Strathfield Recreation Club Jubilee Guide 1950