Blundells Cottage

Story

Blundells Cottage is a six-roomed stone cottage located on the northern shore of Lake Burley Griffin, in Canberra, Australia. When it was built this was the Molonglo River floodplain.HistoryIt was built by George P. Campbell in about 1858 for his ploughman William Ginn. Ginn lived there with his family until 1874 and then Flora and George Blundell moved in and remained there until about 1933. Flora was a midwife and George a bullock driver for Campbell. In 1913 the Duntroon estate was acquired by the Commonwealth to form part of the new Federal Capital Territory, although the Blundells continued to live there. Then Harry and Alice Oldfield moved to the cottage in 1933.PreservationAfter Alice Oldfield left the cottage in 1958, the cottage was planned to be demolished. However Sir William Holford proposed that the cottage be kept as a museum. The National Capital Development Commission renovated the cottage and it was managed as a museum by the Canberra and District Historic Society until 1990. The National Capital Authority manages Blundells Cottage as a museum open to the public.Blundells Cottage is significant, being one of the few stone buildings of its type to have survived intact in the Australian Capital Territory. It is important for the way it reflects a way of life on a nineteenth-century agricultural estate.