Blackwood
Postcode: 3458
Blackwood is a town in Victoria, Australia. The town is located on the Lerderderg River, 89 kilometres north west of the state capital, Melbourne. The town is part of the Moorabool Shire Local Government Area and had a population of 300 at the 2001 census.
The town was founded in 1855 during the Victorian gold rush and at one stage had a population of around 13,000 prospectors. Attractions include the Wombat State Forest, a mineral spring and Mount Blackwood, an extinct volcano offering panoramic views of the surrounding area.
Four years after gold was first discovered in Ballarat, Edward Hill struck it lucky at nearby Golden Point. By the end of that year, the gold-mining village of Blackwood, 85 km north-west of Melbourne, had 13 000 prospectors panning the creeks and sluicing the river banks and hillsides. While there is little or no remaining gold, some of the rich quartz-reefs, initially discovered by James Simmons to the west of the town, are still being mined.
Blackwood, with its timber cottages, is situated amidst the eucalyptus-covered hills which attracted the earliest settlers with their promise of instant riches. Today it is now little more than a memory of the thriving settlement which existed, albeit briefly, in the late 1850s.