Historic Walking Trail
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Learn about Lyonville’s history whilst enjoying its modern-day beauty.
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Radio Springs Hotel
Built in 1928 by an Irishman named Mickey O'Sullivan, the hotel has been a central part of the Lyonville community ever since. One of Lyonville's main claims to fame was that the water was radioactive - a claim based on astonishingly high levels of radon gas. It is now clear that the connection between radon gas and radioactivity is dubious, however it did not stop Mickey seizing the opportunity to promote his new hotel, with claims that the water would relieve indigestion, anemia, lung complaints, malnutrition and even 'as a general pick me up'. The venue sat closed for 15 years and fell into disrepair before being purchased in 1997 by Ken Parfrey and Jackie Airey, who spent 11 years renovating it, reopening on Good Friday in 2009. Due to staffing shortages, the owners announced in January 2025 that the kitchen would close, ending 16 years of operation by the couple.
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Wesleyan Church
A Wesleyan Chapel once stood here, built in 1887 from tin and weatherboard. It was later removed to the paddock of a local resident where the congregation dwindled and the building fell into disuse.
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Magilton's Bakehouse
Thomas Magilton, an immigrant from Belfast in the early 1900's, brought all his recipes from the mother country, where they were well received by his Irish countrymen along with those from Cornwall, Germany and England. Favorites included Yorkshire Pudding, Plain Plum Cake and Ginger Bread all labelled with the important rider "Guaranteed free from Alum and other adulterations'. The baker's horse and cart and its regular round were a common daily sight in Lyonville, delivering bread, cakes, pastries and flour. The bakehouse served the community for almost 50 years before being lost to fire in 1948.
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Miller's General Store
The Lyonville General Store opened in the mid-1880s to service the burgeoning woodcutter industry. It was first operated by the Duffy family and later purchased by the Millers. The original store was basic, constructed from timber with bark walls and an earthen floor. The store stocked essential items such as meat, flour, sugar, tools, provided postal services and later acted as the local telephone exchange. Each week, August Miller made the difficult journey to Kyneton to purchase stock, following rough boggy trails through the forest, along with the constant threat of robbery.
One night in 1948, the store burnt to the ground, Charlie Miller and his wife Elton losing everything. Incredibly, the team at Frith’s Mill rebuilt the store within a week, later adding an adjoining house. From the early 1980s, the shop sold petrol, and the bowser remains there today. Charlie operated the shop until its closure in 1994 and the building is now a private residence.
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Roman Catholic Church
The earliest place of worship in Lyonville was the Catholic Church where a small timber chapel was built in 1893. However, it wasn't until 1894 that the land on which it stood was formally given over to the Trustees. Such a long delay was not uncommon in those days. The current building was constructed in 1927 after the original chapel was destroyed by fire, and the Church at Lyonville is now a treasured historic building renovated into a delightful 3-bedroom short term holiday accommodation.
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State school
The State School grounds provide a portal into the history of Lyonville. The picturesque ruins include a schoolhouse, commencing in 1881 and officially closing in 1968.
By 1898 enrolments were at 85 with an average attendance of 72 and since the original building was intended to cater for only 60 students, it was decided to extend the length of the schoolroom by an extra 10 feet to accommodate all the pupils. Despite continuing strong attendance throughout the early 20th century, by 1964 student numbers had dropped to only 12, a reflection of the trend towards larger schools. For some years after, the schoolhouse and its collection of WWII Nissen Huts were the scene of school camps. Click below for more information.
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School Superintendent's residence
Common in country towns at the turn of the 20th century was the provision of accommodation for teachers and superintendents. Without it, attracting staff to towns such as Lyonville was near impossible. And so it was on 12 May 1917, nearly 25 years after the school first opened, the former Tylen Police Station was moved by bullock and dray and re-erected in its current site. From then until the school’s closure in 1968, the building housed the School’s Superintendent, at times the sole teacher.
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J.P. Gleeson Park
The Gleeson family has been at the centre of Lyonville’s development and growth from the very start. John Patrick Gleeson arrived in the town in the early-1880’s and was a key driver in the efforts to establish a foresty agricultural college here, which unfortunately lost out to Creswick.
Lyonville’s only park commemorates John’s pioneering work, along with the tremendous contribution of the whole Gleeson family over many generations. It is at this site each year that axemen and nail-driving women meet under the banner of J.P. Gleeson.
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Woodchop Competition site
The second weekend in February, give or take postponement for bad weather, has for more than 140 years been the site of the Lyonville Woodchop. This annual event remains the most enduring success in the town's social history, preserving the community’s connection back to its origins as a timber cutting settlement. In the early years of the event, axemen were formally attired in waist coats and wing collars; a far cry from today’s cricket pants, singlets and white lace-up volley shoes. Years of competition in the Lyonville Woodchop have nurtured many a champion axeman. It wasn’t unusual in the heyday of its popularity between the wars to find an entry in the local paper, such as that in the Trentham Gazette of December 1937, stating that a Lyonville axeman had won ‘twenty pounds and a gold medal in Melbourne’. Whilst the spectacle of the flying axes is the main event, the townsfolk don’t miss the opportunity to put on a magnificent display of drinks, baked goods, plants, books, a BBQ, and in times past, even a steam engine display. More recently, the introduction of the women’s nail drive has witnessed fierce competition, with the axemen purportedly concerned that the crowd’s attention is focused elsewhere!
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Lyonville Hall
In 1880 local sawmiller Horatio Weatherhead organised the construction of the hall from donated timber on a crown land block in the heart of the township. The Lyonville Hall, previously known as the Lyonville Mechanics Institute and Free Library, has been the meeting place for townsfolk for more than a century.
Celebrated annual events at the hall included Boxing Day, Easter and Saint Patrick's Day, or seasonal events like the Harvest Dance at the end of potato picking, with the most popular by far being the supper-dances held on Saturday nights.
The band was always ‘local boys’- a bloke on piano, an accordion and a fiddle. The local kids would spend all day dragging each other around the dance floor on sugar bags, buffing it up with candle grease and sawdust to make it ‘as slippery as possible’.
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G.A. Schule Blacksmith
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Elliott's Hotel
Elliot’s hotel resplendent with its own corner shop, butcher and several rooms of accommodation often drew the largest crowd in Lyonville. The Daylesford Advocate reported in January 1914 that “visitors to Lyonville should not fail to call at Elliott’s Hotel where they will obtain every comfort and accommodation along with the fullest information to the various spots of interest in the district.” In the early days, unlicensed pubs proliferated, some no more than sheds with a long bench inside and a barrel at one end. Sometimes they burned down and sometimes they simply fell down. And that unfortunately was the fate of Albert Elliott’s pub, which burned to the ground ‘in a matter of minutes.’
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Weighbridge
The 10 ton cart weighbridge in the former Lyonville station goods yard was erected in the1890's by the Victorian Railways using plans and parts from E & T Fairbanks Company in the USA and locally available timber and bricks. The weighbridge showcased pre-1900 cart weighbridge technology, designed specifically for horse drawn vehicles with evenly distributed loads. For nearly 80 years it played an important role in the commercial life of the Lyonville area, weighing locally produced items such as hay, timber, wool and potatoes. Pictured here is an almost identical weighbridge in nearby Musk, as no original photo of the Lyonville installation is available.
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Railway station
The Lyonville railway station opened in 1880, transporting passengers, timber and supplies on the Carlsruhe/Daylesford line. The railway line from Carlsruhe to Daylesford traversed the Great Dividing Range and was the second highest railway in Victoria, reaching 747 metres above sea level at neighbouring Bullarto Station. Lyonville and Bullarto became prominent railway towns, supplying timber for the building and mining industries across Victoria from the 1870s to 1930s. The trains ceased operation and the station closed in 1978. The original railway station building stands empty today. The Daylesford Spa Country Tourist Railway is planning extensions of the railway track from Bullarto on to Lyonville in the future.
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Gleeson's Hotel
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Streckfuss' Hotel
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Church of England
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Kia Ora Guest House
The Kia Ora Guesthouse being only a short buggy ride from the railway station made it a popular destination for Melbourne tourists coming to 'take the waters' at the Lyonville Springs.
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Frith's Mill
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Railway Trestle bridge
The Lyonville Trestle Bridge is less than half a kilometre from Lyonville on the Domino Rail Trail. The 30m long bridge over the Coliban River, utilises a six-span construction. Completed in 1880, it originally traversed a corduroy-log road which ran alongside the river, and was used by the timber millers for transport, the mainstay of the district. The bridge is now unsafe and as such, there is a signposted detour around the bridge, from which the bridge can be seen through the trees. Visitors can walk through the bush to the bridge, but the riverbed/ground may be wet depending on the season.
The Domino Rail Trail joins Lyonville with Trentham over 6 kilometres, and is popular with walkers, runners, cyclists and horse riders. The trail is laid over the old railway line and careful observers will spot railway sleepers and disused railway tracks along the trail along with the 65-mile distance marker denoting the distance to Melbourne near the Lyonville end.
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Sutton's Residence
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Football Oval
Lyonville fielded an Aussie Rules football team called Loddon Valley for several decades before and after World War II. Players wore the black and white guernsey akin to Collingwood Football Club. The team enjoyed a strong and vocal following from locals, and away games in Daylesford required extra train services where passengers had to get off and push the train over the hill at Musk. The team usually played at the recreation reserve on Leishman’s Lane, but when this was underwater, they would play on any available field with flat ground.
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D. Scala Blacksmith
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Debernardi Charcoal Burners
The Debernardi family were well-known charcoal burners in Lyonville. The photograph shows Dominic tending his charcoal kiln in 1909. The Debernardi family ran charcoal burning operations on Leishman’s Lane from the early days of settlement. Charcoal was used to fuel early blacksmith forges which serviced the timber mills’ steam engines and in towns for repairing tools, farm machinery and making horse shoes. To make charcoal, timber was stacked skillfully in an open field near the forest and burned slowly at low even heat for several weeks.
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Leishman's Residence
The Leishman family emigrated from Scotland and settled in Lyonville in the mid 1800's. Their original home still stands as one of the last remaining examples of a wood-cutter's cottage in the area.
Built in 1860, the house and shingle roof were constructed using timber sourced from the local forest and not surprisingly, was quite small compared to today's standards. With only 4 rooms and no bathroom, the original house measured a mere 50 square metres, a 1/4 the size of a modern Australian home.
The long drop toilet and outhouse (laundry) were all sited at the rear of the garden, under the large chestnut tree believed to have been planted around 1850.
Water was sourced from a well onsite (beside the enormous Californian Redwood tree (also believed to have been planted in the mid 1800’s) which is still used for the garden.
The house was extended in the 1990’s, more than quadrupling its size and the cottage at the front has been restored to its former glory with many of the original features of the day retained.
The house is now a private residence.
24
Lyonville Mineral Springs
The Lyonville Mineral Springs have been a favoured picnic spot since the early 1900s.
The early settlers and timber cutters relied on the springs as a source of clean, healthy water. 'Taking the waters' had become a common ritual, and a regular trip out to the springs, for picnicking and filling up the 'empties' was part of everyday life.
In the late 1890's the Melbourne Argus stated that 'the air is pure and bracing, and the water is deliciously sweet and wholesome, as if nature intended this place for a sanitorium.'
The area now offers toilets, drinking water, free camping, wildlife viewing, walking tracks and is dog friendly. Take a cup or bottle, fill up from the mineral pumps and enjoy the health benefits of this unique local mineral water.
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Phoebe's Cottage
Phoebe’s Cottage is named after early Lyonville resident Phoebe Elliott (née Tibbets, 1852–1939), who lived there with her husband George Elliott and their children from the mid-1880s. Remarkably for that era, the property was registered in Phoebe’s own name, making her one of the few married women in the district to hold title to land. This rare record allowed her story to be traced and commemorated in the cottage’s name, highlighting a woman from a period when local histories often overlooked women’s lives.
Lyonville emerged as a sawmilling township after Charles Cowie recognised the area’s rich forests in 1868, and James Lyon later established a major timber mill and tramway network. The earliest part of the cottage, likely built around 1875, appears on an 1882 map owned by W. Ingles and intersected by Lyon’s tramway.
Phoebe and George settled in Lyonville around 1886 after time at Elphinstone and Blue Mount. They raised seven surviving children in the cottage, enduring the township’s harsh winters and economic swings. By 1909 the family had moved to Seville, where George and their sons became farmers, but the cottage remains a rare surviving link to Lyonville’s pioneering milling era and to Phoebe’s remarkable life.
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Tramway to Orde's and Ogden Bros' Mills
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Tyrell, Cann & Miller's Mill
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Lyon & Weatherhead's Mill
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James Lyon's Residence
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Water Reserve
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