Duntroon Dairy Open Day
Enjoy a day of activities at one of Canberra's oldest European buildings and an important part of our local heritage! There will be tours and talks about Duntroon Dairy, entertainment, refreshments, classic cars, stalls and things to do for the whole family.
Duntroon Dairy is a remarkable survivor of farming days. Many families lived and worked in simple stone or timber buildings near the Molonglo River, but Canberra’s construction destroyed most of them. The dairy is the oldest building on Duntroon Estate and Canberra’s oldest European building. Around 1832, soon after Robert Campbell settled Duntroon, the dairy was built above the fertile floodplain to provide milk and butter for the many people living on his estate.
The property became home to several generations of many families who worked for Campbell. For example, Ambrose Austen, who became dairyman in 1865, extended the stone dairy in brick and built a family cottage. His daughters, Alice Warwick and Elizabeth Mayo, continued living at Duntroon Dairy. Even after Duntroon was resumed in 1911, Elizabeth’s daughter Jennet and son-in-law Charles Edlington leased back the land and continued dairying into the 1960s.
The building will be open for visitors.