Woodford is one of those sleepy little towns on the Great Western Highway about mid-way across the Blue Mountains range. Originally the village was called “20 Mile Hollow”, the nomenclature had a pattern to it, Bull’s Camp☸ just on the eastern side of Woodford was known as “19 Mile Hollow” and modern day Linden, further east was originally “18 Mile Hollow”, and so on.
Woodford’s main claim to fame is the historical landmark Woodford Academy, a property with a varied multi-functional past. Traditionally the custodians of this land are Darug and Gundungurra peoples, but after William Cox’ s convict labour built the Bathurst Road over the mountains, the first known European activity dates to the late 1820s/early 1830s when a convict and illegal squatter on the Woodford site, William James, operated a sly-grog shop.
The first significant structure here started off as an inn circa 1833-1834 on 20 hectares of land granted to Irish-born emancipist Thomas Michael Pembroke (the building of weatherboard construction was called the “Woodman’s Inn”☯). Licensee Pembroke’s facilities included nine rooms, stables for six horses, a store and stock and sheep yards. Woodman’s Inn provided food and lodgings for traveller, including soldiers and colonial officials, between Sydney and Bathurst. Pembroke however suffered some financial setbacks and was forced to sell the inn to Michael Hogan in 1839.
Under Hogan’s ownership the weatherboard structure was replaced by a stone building in 1843. The inn licence for the now named “The King’s Arms Hotel” changed hands over the ensuing years – James Nairn, William Barton, Josiah Workman, John Cobcroft and Thomas James were some of the resident publicans. The 1851 discovery of gold put an end to the isolation of Woodford. In 1855 Hogan sold the inn to William Buss of Cowra for £1,040 and the hotel became better known as “Buss’ Inn”. The inn flourished with plentiful trade from passing gold diggers heading for Bathurst and soldiers. But in the mid 1860s business declined and Buss’s widow in turn sold the establishment to Alfred Fairfax (described at the time as a “wholesale grocer of Sydney) in 1868 for £450. Fairfax had an incentive to buy when he did…in 1867 a western rail line was constructed from Penrith to Weatherboard (later “Wentworth Falls”). In 1869 a railway platform (“Buss’ Platform”) was established at what was now called “Woodford House”, advertised as a “gentleman’s country guest house” and “mountain retreat”. At this time the Blue Mountains was becoming a fashionable spot to be…valued for its “fresh, healthy, cool mountain air, waterfalls and broad vistas”.
Fairfax acquired extra acreage on the site, consolidated into a 26-hectare estate, using much of it for commercial orchard planting. He also created a network of walking tracks around the property, one of which was called the “Transit of Venus” track. Fairfax was something of an amateur astronomer, possessing a 4.75-inch Schroder telescope and had allowed Woodford House to be utilised for observing the 1874 Transit of Venus✴. Alas for Fairfax the orchard failed and finding himself in financial difficulties he was forced to mortgage Woodford House in 1877.
In the 1880s, under manager John Robert Place, the renovated and expanded Woodford House was being touted as providing “superior accommodation”, “a change of air and mountain scenery” and “a capital tennis court on the grounds”. The guest house was not a cheap stay, two weeks’ board was £4/4 (December 1890), equivalent to a fortnight’s pay for a skilled worker.
In 1897 Fairfax sold the Woodford House estate to David Flannery who increased his holdings by 90 acres. At this time the property was being described as a ‘sanatorium’ (cf. the Hydro Majestic at Medlow Bath, see the 31 April 2015 blog: Medlow Majestic in the Wilderness: Transforming a White Elephant into a White Palace?).
In 1907 Woodford House entered a new phase of utilisation when poet-cum-rector John Fraser McManamey initially leased the property৳ from Mary Jane Waterhouse (the new owner) and converted it into Woodford Academy, a small, exclusive school for boys of all ages✧. In the early 20th century a trend emerged where parents who could afford to were sending their children to small private boarding schools in the Blue Mountains which like Woodford Academy were converted grand estates. The appeal was the promise of “fresh mountain air and bracing climate” thought “beneficially to both children’s constitutions and academic performance”❂.
From 1907 to 1925 when the school closed for four years—before reopening as a day school for girls and boys—over 300 students had been educated there. Woodford Academy closed for good in 1936, but McManamey stayed on tutoring private students. When he died, killed in a car accident outside Woodford Academy in 1946, the property was subdivided, some of the land was sold to the Department of Education and a portion of it donated to the Presbyterian Church. McManamey’s daughters took in long-term boarders, in 1979 the surviving daughter Gertrude bequeathed the house and grounds to the National Trust, continuing to live there until her death in 1988. After 1979 the National Trust undertook extensive repairs and improvements.
Today Woodford Academy is a museum of Blue Mountains colonial life, conducting educational tours and “ghost tours”. The 1870s dining room can be hired for dinners and the Academy hosts community events like the Mid-Mountains’ annual Harvest Festival. 
Footnote: after establishing the Academy McManamey immersed himself into local community activities – Woodford Bush Fire Brigade, Woodford Progress Association, (president of) Woodford Tennis Club, as well as serving as a Blue Mountains shire councillor.
Woodford Academy, 90-92 Great Western Highway, Woodford 2778 NSW
𓂷𓂷𓂷𓂷𓂷𓂷𓂷𓂷𓂷𓂷𓂷𓂷𓂷
☸ a camp for convict road gangs working for magistrate and assistant engineer Captain John Bull
☯ it was also possibly known at times as “The Sign of the Woodman”
✴ chosen as a site for its “clear and steady atmosphere“, (Fairfax’s house was) “a most promising station”
৳ in 1914 McManamey purchased 5.06 hectares of the Woodford estate including the house
✧ McManamey prior to Woodford was headmaster at Cooerwull Academy in Bowenfels (Lithgow area)
❂ English, History, Mathematics, Science, Latin plus one modern language
⫷⫸ ⫷⫸ ⫷⫸
Bibliography
‘Woodford Academy – History’, Blue Mountains Australia (BMPH), http://infobluemountains.net.au
‘Seriously “Old School” – Woodford Academy’, National Trust, www.nationaltrust.org.au
Goodlet, Ken, ‘Woodford Academy’, Dictionary of Sydney, 2015, http://dictionaryofsydney.org/entry/woodford_academy, viewed 20 May 2021 ‘Woodford Academy’,
A Rare Treasure’, Ken Goodlet, Blue Mountains History Journal, Issue 6, 2015, www.bluemountainsheritage.com.au
‘Woodford’s vital role in the 1874 Transit of Venus’, Robyne Ridge, Blue Mountains Gazette, 13-Jun-2018, www.bluemountainsgazette.com.au