Guildford is a suburb of

Perth Perth is the capital and largest city of the Australian state of Western Australia. It is the fourth most populous city in Australia and Oceania, with a population of 2.1 million (80% of the state) living in Greater Perth in 2020. Perth is ...

, Western Australia, 12 km northeast of the city centre within the

City of Swan The City of Swan is a local government area of Western Australia. It is in the eastern metropolitan region of Perth and includes the Swan Valley and 42 suburbs. It is centred approximately 20 km north-east of the Perth central business d ...

. Guildford was founded in 1829 as one of the earliest settlements of the

Swan River Colony The Swan River Colony, also known as the Swan River Settlement, or just Swan River, was a British colony established in 1829 on the Swan River, in Western Australia. This initial settlement place on the Swan River was soon named Perth, and it ...

. It is one of only three towns in the metropolitan area listed on the Register of the National Trust.

History

Guildford was established in 1829 at the confluence of the

Helena River The Helena River is a tributary of the Swan River in Western Australia. The river rises in country east of Mount Dale and flows north-west to Mundaring Weir, where it is dammed. It then flows west until it reaches the Darling Scarp. It passes ...

and Swan River, being sited near a permanent fresh water supply. During Captain Stirling's exploration for a suitable site to establish a colony on the western side of the Australian continent in the late 1820s, the exploration party of boats found a fresh water stream across the river from the site of Guildford which they called

Success Hill Success is the state or condition of meeting a defined range of expectations. It may be viewed as the opposite of failure. The criteria for success depend on context, and may be relative to a particular observer or belief system. One person migh ...

. Guildford was originally the centre of the

before

succeeded in being the dominant location on the

Swan Coastal Plain The Swan Coastal Plain in Western Australia is the geographic feature which contains the Swan River as it travels west to the Indian Ocean. The coastal plain continues well beyond the boundaries of the Swan River and its tributaries, as a geol ...

. A Guildford Town Trust was established in 1838, but ceased to function within a couple of years. It was reconstituted in 1863, and became the

Municipality of Guildford The Municipality of Guildford was a local government area of Western Australia. It first came into existence in 1838 as the Guildford Town Trust, before ceasing to function several years later. It was reconstituted in 1863, and became a Municipali ...

in 1871. Guildford was originally the political centre of what is now called the

. The original council chambers have been converted to a library. Alongside the library stands the town hall; behind this is the stables built for the councillors while attending meetings and as a depot for council equipment. These stables have been converted and are now the home of the

Garrick Theatre The Garrick Theatre is a West End theatre, located in Charing Cross Road, in the City of Westminster, named after the stage actor David Garrick. It opened in 1889 with ''The Profligate'', a play by Arthur Wing Pinero, and another Pinero play ...

, which is the oldest operating theatre group in Western Australia. The original structure is still visible. The roof still has its original

shingles Shingles, also known as zoster or herpes zoster, is a viral disease characterized by a painful skin rash with blisters in a localized area. Typically the rash occurs in a single, wide mark either on the left or right side of the body or face. ...

in place, though from the outside they have been covered by

corrugated galvanised iron Corrugated galvanised iron or steel, colloquially corrugated iron (near universal), wriggly tin (taken from UK military slang), pailing (in Caribbean English), corrugated sheet metal (in North America) and occasionally abbreviated CGI is a bu ...

. It also houses the oldest government funded primary school in Western Australia: Guildford Grammar School.

Notable residents

George Cyril Abdullah George Cyril Abdullah (9 August 1919 – 6 August 1984) was an Aboriginal community leader who promoted Indigenous rights by participating in a number of organisations and committees in Perth, Western Australia. Early life life Abdullah was ...

(1919-1984) was a prominent Aboriginal community leader who was born in Guildford to a Bengali labourer father and Indigenous mother. * Charles Walter Harper (1880-1956) was an orchardist and co-operator. *

Malvina Evalyn Wood Malvina Evalyn Wood (1893-1976), university librarian and college warden, was born in Guildford, Western Australia, daughter of a railway porter. Genealogy records show that the family's name was initially Shell, but was changed to Wood for un ...

(1893-1976), librarian and college warden. Alfreds_Kitchen_Guildford_9387

Notes

References

* Bourke, M. J. (Michael Joseph), (1971) Old buildings at Guildford icroform ( Microfilm copy of typescript (

40, 190 4 (four) is a number, numeral and digit. It is the natural number following 3 and preceding 5. It is the smallest semiprime and composite number, and is considered unlucky in many East Asian cultures. In mathematics Four is the smallest c ...

leaves) and illustrations prepared for University of Western Australia, Faculty of Architecture, 1971.) {{City of Swan suburbs Suburbs of Perth, Western Australia Suburbs and localities in the City of Swan

History

Notable residents

See also

Notes

References