Great Properties of the Riverina and Upper Murray

Great Properties of the Riverina and Upper Murray follows on from the bestselling Great Properties of Country Victoria and Great Properties of Tasmania, and tells the story of sixteen significant properties in the region. Illustrated throughout with sumptuous photographs, it showcases estates from the rolling green hills of the upper Murray, where campfire tales are still told about the exploits of the Man from Snowy River, to the vast plains of the Riverina region to the west.

Many readers will recognise landmark properties along the Murray (Tom Groggin, Tintaldra, Tooma Station and Khacoban Station), south of Holbrook (Upper Wantagong and Woomargama Station), the region around Corowa (Quat Quatta, Moroco West and Collendina) and the northern Riverina (Nap Nap, Tupra, Burrabogie and Boonoke). Some have stood since the middle of the nineteenth century, when fortunes were made and lost as farmers tried to make a fist of the capricious grazing land west of the Great Dividing Range. 

Great Properties of the Riverina and Upper Murray details the extraordinary origins of these places and their many transformations as generations of inhabitants battled drought, flood, pestilence and market collapse, as farmers tried different crops and breeds of sheep and cattle. It was the development of the Merino at Wanganella in the Riverina that opened up worldwide markets for wool. Little wonder that, for three decades, the face of a famous ram at Uardry adorned the Australian one-shilling coin.
 
Great Properties of the Riverina and Upper Murray brings these estates to life in all their grandeur to tell stories of adaptation and change, and reveal their owners’ and occupants’ ambitions and dreams.

About the Authors

Richard Allen has been a writer for more than thirty-five years, covering a wide variety of subjects for The Australian Financial Review, The Age, The Sydney Morning Herald, Good Weekend, The Sunday Telegraph (UK), BRW and The Far Eastern Economic Review. He has written eleven books.

Kimbal Baker is a freelance photographer with more than forty years’ experience. His images have been published in numerous journals and magazines, and he has worked as a staff photographer for ACP Publications and Agence France-Presse. His images have also been acquired by the National Library of Australia and a number have been issued by Australia Post as First Day Covers and a postage stamp series.

The pair have travelled in Australia for many years writing books on, among other things, great trees, great rural properties and great wine families. Together they have published six titles with Melbourne University Publishing.