Tallong is in the traditional lands of the Gundungurra people. It is a village east of the Great Dividing Range and is located in the Southern Highlands region of New South Wales, Australia, in Goulburn-Mulwaree Council. At the , the village had a population of 914.

Etymology

The original settlement was named Barber's Creek after the watercourse that runs through the town. In the early twentieth century the town was renamed "Tallong" after an Aboriginal word meaning either "tongue" or "spring of water".

History

Colonial era

The first European settler in the area was George Barber, a cattle farmer. In 1814 Barber established a cattle station along what became known as Barber's Creek. In 1821 he received a grant of covering the general Tallong-Marulan district, to be converted from cedar brush to farmland. Before his death in a riding accident in 1844, Barber had extended his local landholdings to , which he named "Glenrock". Convict labour was used to clear the grazing land and prepare a route for the Main South railway line to Goulburn. Tallong was selected as the location for a railway refuelling point, and the town's initial population consisted of convicts, woodcutters, railway workers and their families.

The opening of the railway in 1869 brought shops, a school, hotels and a post office to the town.

Post-Federation

By 1900, cattle grazing was slowly giving way to a thriving fruit industry, known particularly for apples and pears.

Attractions

The village is also home to one of the oldest surviving single-teacher schoolhouses in Australia at Tallong Public School. Moreover, it is home to the country campus of Santa Sabina College.

Furthermore, the village is home to two lookouts on the plateau that makes up the Shoalhaven Gorge (a which looks over the drop to the Shoalhaven River) and Morton National Park. The lookouts are known as Badgerys Lookout and Longpoint Lookout.

Tallong is home to the big apple and host to the award-winning annual "Apple Day" festival although the festival was cancelled for 2024.

There is also an annual Tallong Trail Ride in support of the Rural Fire Service.

See also

  • Wingello Parish, Camden
  • Tallong Public School
  • Tallong railway station, New South Wales

References

Further reading

  • The Tallong Public School, Peter Westren, ed., privately published, Tallong: 1990.
  • Southern Village View Magazine, Published Quarterly by the Southern Village View Association Inc. Wingello, NSW.
  • An article on the history and description of Tallong