NSWFarming
Martinsville
A timber-getters’ valley under the Watagans that took its name from its first family.
1860sTimber-getter William Martin settles
WHAT STARTED IT
William and Sarah Martin, Irish timber-getters, settled in this valley at the foot of the Watagan Mountains in the 1860s and bought timbered Crown land. Bullock teams hauled logs from here to the big sawmills at Cooranbong.
WHAT SUSTAINED IT
Small mills worked on Mount Falk and along the creeks, and a school opened on Sydney Dodds’s land in 1878. Local residents adopted the Martins’ name in the early 1890s, and farming, dairying and citrus later replaced timber.
TURNING POINTS
1860sWilliam and Sarah Martin settle in the valley, between 1861 and 1866.
1878Sydney Dodds opens Deep Creek Provisional School on part of his land.
1889A post office opens under the name Dora Creek.
1894The post office is renamed Martinsville on 1 January, after a brief period as Brush.
1965The Martinsville post office closes.
WHAT IT DOES NOW
A small rural locality of under 400 people west of Cooranbong. Its post office closed in 1965 and its school in the 1970s.