A centre for the agricultural activities of the area, Mansfield has become a popular inland holiday resort because of its closeness to the Victorian high country and Lake Eildon, Lake Nillahcootie, Mount Stirling and the Mt. Buller ski resorts. Many scenes in the film The Man from Snowy River were shot in and around Mansfield.
Brief history: The area was first settled by farmers in the 1850s. It developed into a district which produces wool, beef, dairy produce and timber. Alfred Chenery built a blacksmith's forge near the intersecting boundaries of four pastoral stations at Fords Creek. It became a convenient stopping place, and the following year land was set aside there for a surveyed township.
Mansfield, first known as Mount Battery, was at the boundary of a number of pastoral runs (very large farms). A township was surveyed in 1851 and named after Mansfield in Nottinghamshire, England. People came to live in the town after the discovery of gold nearby.
Location: 198 km by road from Melbourne at the junction of the Midland and Maroondah Highways. Map
Points of Interest: Goulburn River; Jamieson River; Broken River; Lake Nillalhcootie; Mt. Samaria State Park; Wabonga Plateau State Park; Powers Lookout Reserve. In the main street is an obelisk (above) honouring the memory of three police officers slain when they tried to take Ned Kelly at Stringybark Creek in 1878. The graves of the slain constables - Michael Kennedy, Thomas Lonigan and Michael Scanlon - are in the nearby cemetery.
The view from Powers Lookout. Bushranger Harry Powers used the location as a hideout