STANLEY ~ HERiTAGE WALK ~ TASMANiA

#heritagewalk #Tasmaniantowns #historicalplaces

‪@StanleyAuTasmania‬

Stanley is a town on the north-west coast of Tasmania, Australia. It is the second-last major township on the north-west coast when travelling west, Smithton being the larger township in the Circular Head municipality. According to the 2021 census, Stanley had a population of 595.

In 1798, Matthew Flinders and George Bass circumnavigated Tasmania, having suspected that the land mass was an island. On this journey they sited the cliffy, round lump, in form much resembling a Christmas cake. They called it ‘Circular Head’ and it wasn't until the 1850s that it started to be called The Nut. Circular Head has since been used to describe the whole area.

In 1827 a port was opened below The Nut to facilitate the landing of stud livestock, implements, craftsmen, labourers and assigned convicts. Soon afterwards Edward Curr, chief agent of the VDL Co. had the area explored, surveyed and developed. Company employed surveyors deemed the area to be ideal for raising merino sheep. This wasn’t exactly true. The VDL Co. was a failure as a major wool supplier. Other ventures such as breeding of stud horses, cattle grazing, and a deer park did little to alleviate the financial problems experienced by the company.

John Lee Archer designed the town in 1842. Stanley as we know it started with the first gazetted street plan of Stanley drawn up by John Lee Archer, renowned architect and civil engineer and recently appointed police magistrate, in August 1843. John Lee Archer prepared a second town plan in 1848 when the population of Stanley was listed as 127 men, 41 women and 65 children. At that time Stanley had 20 shops and stores, an Anglican Church, parsonage, school and police office.

It was named Stanley after Lord Stanley, British Secretary of State for the Colonies in the 1840s. Leasing blocks of land by the VDL Company began as soon as Archer had finished his survey but it was not until 1851 that the first blocks of land were sold to independent settlers.

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