In 1889, the Victorian Parliament allocated £233,000 to establish creameries, cheese and butter factories in the Colony and to aid other primary industries (1). By 1895 there were 174 factories and 284 creameries in Victoria, including a number in the Koo Wee Rup Swamp area. Up until the 1930s the area could sustain several factories for a number of reasons. Firstly, dairy cattle numbers were at their peak in the 1920s. It is estimated that the Parishes of Koo Wee Rup, Koo Wee Rup East and Yallock (essentially the area of the Koo Wee Rup Swamp) had 12,000 dairy cattle in early 1920s (2) Secondly, most farmers were still using horse and cart for transport, so local factories were necessary. Lastly, the factories had slightly different purposes. For instance, whole milk was received at Iona and Cora Lynn, whilst farms with a separator could deposit cream at Drouin, Lang Lang or Bayles.
At Iona, a Creamery run by the Fresh Food and Frozen Storage Company, was opened in 1897 and by 1900 it had 50 suppliers. The Creamery operated until around 1907. In 1906, the Drouin Co-Operative Butter Factory established a factory in Iona on the corner of Little Road and the Main Drain. It closed in October 1928 and was demolished in 1930 (3). Another butter factory, owned by Holdenson and Neilson, operated in Iona from 1912 or 1917 (depending on sources). It closed in 1921 (4). At one stage the Fresh Food and Frozen Storage Company operated 70 butteries and creameries in Victoria (5). Holdenson and Nielson operated at least 20 and in the early 1890s they produced over 2 million pounds of butter, most of it being exported (6). The two companies amalgamated in 1908 to become Holdenson and Nielson Fresh Foods P/L.(7).
The Drouin Co-Operative Butter Factory was established in 1904 (8) and expanded under the leadership of their aptly named General Manager, Bill Kraft. This Company should not be confused with the Drouin Co-Operative Creamery, which was established in 1891, went into liquidation in 1895, and was taken over by the Victorian Creamery and Butter Company, who were another big player in the dairy industry, at this time.
The Drouin Co-Operative Butter Factory began the work of establishing a factory at Cora Lynn in 1910, and it opened in November 1911. The factory was remodelled and extended in 1932, partially to compensate for Iona closing down; in that year the factory had around 500 regular suppliers. It was closed in the late 1940s/early 1950s (9). The building is still standing at Cora Lynn and was restored a few years ago. Drouin Co-Operative Butter Factory took over the Bayles Butter Factory in 1944, which had been established in 1922. It was re-built and enlarged in 1966 and operated until January 1980. This gave Drouin access to the Melbourne market as Bayles had a City distribution license. It was for this same reason that Drouin had obtained shares in the Cranbourne and Croftbank Dairies in Cranbourne in the 1930s (10).
Yallock Southern Creamery, which was situated on the corner of the Yallock Creek and the No.5 Yallock Drain Road (which was thus also known as Creamery Road) opened in 1897 as a Co-Operative, closed in 1898, re-opened 1899 and eventually sold to the owners of the Lang Lang Butter Factory (11). A butter factory had operated in Lang Lang for a few years before it closed in February 1893. It re-opened around 1895 with Charles Wood (or his company Wood & Co) being listed as the owners until 1926, when it was sold to Southern State Produce.
In 1928 it was purchased by Ivan Stedman, a butter merchant. The Factory was a major employer in Lang Lang. Part of the original factory was destroyed by a wind storm in August 1930 (12). In 1934 it was reported that Extensive additions and alterations are to be made to the Lang Lang butter factory, at a cost of £2000. It is proposed to build a brick milk factory adjoining the present butter factory, a commodious modern garage to hold six trucks, a fodder room, and greatly extend the present can rack (13). Not sure if this ever came to fruition as this photo from the Weekly Times of June 1932, looks very much like the later photo, shown below it.
Yannathan, Catani and Bayles dairy farmers could also send their milk to Melbourne on the train, after the Strzelecki Railway line opened in 1922, and in 1923 the milk train carried over 1000 gallons of milk per day from those stations (18). Read about this Railway line, here.
Incidentally, Ivan Stedman (1895-1979) was a champion swimmer and led the Australian team at the opening ceremony of the Antwerp Olympics in 1920. He won a silver medal in the 4x200 freestyle relay team at those Olympics and also competed in the 1924 Paris Olympics. This is an achievement, made even more remarkable, by the fact that Ivan spent over three years in the A.I.F. during the First World War and was wounded at Passchendaele (19).
Before we leave this subject there was a private cheese factory, constructed in 1892 by John Henry Smethurst on his property Glen Avis in Yannathan. Smethurst was a pioneer in the use of machines. His dairy had a four horse-power boiler and a three horse-power Tangye engine which worked a 90 gallon separator and 200lb butter churn. He milked 75 cows at Yannathan and also had another cheese factory on his other property Lang Lang Park, at Athlone, where he milked 260 cows (20).
(2) Gunson, Niel The Good Country: Cranbourne Shire (Cheshire, 1968), p. 195.
(3) Nest, Denise Call of the Bunyip: History of Bunyip, Iona and Tonimbuk 1847-1990 (Bunyip History Committee, 1990), p. 17
(4) Ibid.
(5) Godbold, op. cit., p. 58.
(6) Godbold, op. cit., p. 75.
(7) The Argus, June 26, 1908, see here.
(8) Godbold, op. cit., p. 142.
(9) Opening - https://kooweerupswamphistory.blogspot.com/2013/01/cora-lynn-cheese-factory.html; The Argus, September 29, 1932, see here.
(10) Godbold, op. cit., p. 144.
(11) Gunson, op. cit. p. 146.
(14) Protector's Plains: history of Lang Lang Primary School No.2899, 1888-1988 and district compiled by Barbara Coghlan (CBC Publishing, 1988), p. 12.
(18) Gunson, op. cit. p. 196.
(19) Australian Dictionary of Biography entry, written by Harry Gordon https://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/stedman-ivan-cuthbert-11754
A version of this blog post, which I wrote and researched, also appears on my work blog - Casey Cardinia Links to Our Past and has appeared in the Koo Wee Rup Township newsletter, The Blackfish.
