Woodville

In 1886 Samuel Dart purchased 2 acres, 35 and 5/10 perches in Indooroopilly. Samuel Dart was born in Blenheim, Queensland in 1860. His early years were spent on his father’s farm at what is now St. Lucia and the University of Queensland site. By 1867 William Dart had purchased land at Chelmer and established a farm. Samuel was recorded as one of the original students that attended the West Oxley State School (now known as Sherwood State School) when it opened in 1867. In 1880 Samuel married Eliza Brimblecombe, daughter of James Brimblecombe, Brookfield pioneer. Samuel Dart was first listed at Indooroopilly 1889, suggesting the residence was built between 1886 and 1889. 

The Dart family continued to reside at Woodville until 1900 when they moved to a dairy farm at Blenheim near Laidley. Samuel Dart was listed as living at Blenheim for the next nineteen years. Throughout this period Woodville remained in the ownership of Samuel Dart and was rented out to various tenants over the period. In 1921, however, Samuel moved back to Woodville, being listed at the address in 1921. The same year he was entered in the Electoral Rolls at Woodville, Indooroopilly as a farmer.   

In 1893 Eliza Dart gave birth to Raymond Arthur Dart, the fifth of nine children in the family. Raymond was an extremely important and controversial scientific figure in the first half of the twentieth century. His early life was spent at Woodville until he was school age. In 1900 he moved with his family to Blenheim. After serving in the Australian Medical Corp in the First World War he took a post as senior demonstrator in anatomy at the University College London, eventually moving to South Africa. As an academic with the medical faculty at the University of Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, he was instrumental in proving the so called ‘missing link’ in the theory of human evolution. In 1924 whilst studying a recently found fossil of a child’s skull, from Taungs (a remote area in South Africa) Dart believed he had discovered evidence of this ‘missing link’. The skull exhibited both hominoid and apish traits. Dart named the species Australopithecus africanus. In 1925 he published his findings in the International journal Nature. For the next twenty years this theory proved to be extremely controversial within the scientific community, however as more discoveries of similar hominid fossils were made Dart’s theory was accepted. Robert Broom, a leading palaeontologist stated that Dart’s discovery was “one of the greatest discoveries in the world’s history’. Raymond Dart continued to be an influential figure in the scientific world for the next three decades. 

Samuel Dart continued to live at Woodville until his death 1932. The property remained in the Dart family until 2002. 

Prior to the subdivision and building work that has occurred on the property, ‘Woodville’ made an important contribution to the Moggill Road streetscape between Rylatt and Woodville Street. The large front yard sloped down to Moggill Road from the house and created an idyllic setting. “Woodville” is an important reminder of Indooroopilly’s past as a semi-rural Brisbane suburb in the nineteenth century.

1. History Papers and History Notes 2002-2003, ed. Robin Trotter, Indooroopilly and District Historical Society, Indooroopilly, 2005

2. Donald Watson and Judith McKay, Queensland Architects of the Nineteenth Century, South Brisbane: Queensland Museum, 1994

3. Judy Gale Rechner, Brisbane House Styles 1880 to 1940: a guide to the affordable house, Brisbane: Brisbane History Group Studies No. 2, 1998

4. Historic Titles, Department of Natural Resources and Water

5. Queensland Post Office Directories

6. Metropolitan Water and Sewage Survey Maps, 1949

7. Australian Dictionary of Biography, Online Edition, “Raymond Arthur Dart”

8. Queensland Electoral Rolls

9. Dart, Raymond Arthur, “Australopithecus africanus: The Man-ape of South Africa”, Nature, February 7, 1925