Victoria: Buildings and Builders—Geelong & District

Victoria: Buildings and Builders—Geelong and District looks back through the history of Geelong. Together, the maps and plans in this exhibition function as a valuable metaphor for a young society's beliefs, telling of the lives of ordinary people. This information is particularly significant in the case of Geelong, as many nineteenth-century buildings have disappeared from its landscape and, with them, the visual reminder of a past community.

The buildings chosen for this exhibition give a sense of Geelong's prosperous past: its thriving wool and wine industries; its value as a major colonial port despite the sand-bar at Point Henry; and its role as a regional centre for the landowners and farmers of the area. Geelong provided a focus for the smaller rural communities—a place for people to shop, to export their produce, to import goods for sale and to educate their children.

The material for this exhibition was largely drawn from the Public Works Department, the Government's builder since colonial times. The Public Record Office Victoria is now the custodian of these and other fascinating records, plans and maps.