NSWRail & telegraph
Lawson
A roadside inn gave a mountain railway stop its first name.
1867Blue Mountain railway halt opens
WHAT STARTED IT
Travellers on the Bathurst Road stopped at the Blue Mountain Inn, which was operating by 1847 and kept by Henry Wilson in 1851. When the Great Western Railway crossed the mountains in 1867, a halt about 400 metres from the inn took the name Blue Mountain.
WHAT SUSTAINED IT
In 1879 the station was renamed Lawson after the explorer William Lawson, one of several new names honouring the 1813 crossing. Line duplication in 1902 brought a new island platform and station building, and Lawson became a locomotive servicing point on the steepest part of the climb.
TURNING POINTS
1867A railway halt named Blue Mountain opens near the inn.
1879The new railway timetable replaces Blue Mountain with Lawson.
1902Line duplication brings an island platform and Federation-style station buildings.
WHAT IT DOES NOW
A mid-mountains town of about 2,700 people on the Great Western Highway. Its heritage-listed station group recalls the railway that made it.