The traditional owners and early settlement The Dhurug people are the traditional owners of the local land. The area now known as Doonside was named 'Bungarribee' (Bung meaning the 'creek' and garribee meaning 'cockatoo'). In 1802, Governor
Philip Gidley King reserved a large proportion of land for a Government Stock Reserve. For the next twenty years the land was used as grazing land for cattle and sheep by convict herdsmen. In 1822 part of the Government stock run was granted by Governor
Thomas Brisbane to Scottish immigrant, Robert Crawford. Robert first named his Milton before renaming it "Hill End". In 1826, John Crawford purchased land adjacent Hill End fronting Richmond Road which he named
Doonside. The region had various names, before officially becoming Doonside. Robert James Crawford (1799–1848) had four children with Mary Campbell (d. 1832): Mary Crawford (b. 1826), Robert Crawford (1827–1906), George Canning Crawford (b. 1828), and Agnes C. Crawford (b. 1831). (Robert Crawford's four children's names are used today at Crawford Public School as sporting house teams). The elder Robert Crawford married Miss Jones of Bligh Street, Sydney, in 1832. Robert Crawford (1827–1906) married Victoria Margaret Smyth in 1868. Their son, Robert (1868–1930), born in the same year became a published poet.
Bungarribee House In 1822, the area south of Hill End (Doonside) was granted to a Scottish-born settler named John Campbell (1771–1827). The property and house had a series of owners and tenants in the 19th and 20th centuries until acquired by the Commonwealth Overseas Telecommunications Commission (O.T.C.) in 1949. The newly formed National Trust had been trying to secure a lease from O.T.C. but could not agree, citing unworkable lease conditions. A Local Historian, John Lawson, offered to restore the house but was rejected by O.T.C. The house was demolished in 1958.
Doonside Railway and Station The
Main Western railway line arrived with a single line to Rooty Hill opening on 23 December 1861, there was no station official but the rail siding was known as Crawford siding.
Doonside railway station was officially opened on 27 September 1880. Electric trains arrived at Doonside station in 1955. Edith Crawford, from the founding family and the oldest inhabitant, was privileged to 'cut the ribbon.' Her death was in 1956. In 1913, Doonside's dark platforms were illuminated only by the train guard's lamp. Intending passengers had to signal the driver if they wanted the train to stop so they could board. Toilets were erected on the platform in 1922. The present station was upgraded in 1955, replacing the original buildings. The design of the station buildings applied the railway Stripped Functionalist style, as was done at other stations between Lidcombe and St. Mary's. During World War II, the station was one part of a much larger scheme to increase the tracks to four main lines between Lidcombe and St. Mary's to provide maximum track capacity to the American ammunition and general store built at Ropes Creek. Quadruplication was completed in 1981. A signal box was incorporated into the 1955 building but closed in 1963 when automatic boom gates were provided at an adjacent level crossing, which was removed in 1980. The signal box equipment has been removed. The pedestrian bridge that provides access to the platforms was built in 1958. Its twin beam construction is typical of 1940s footbridges on the Western line quadruplication. Since 1990, every bridge component, except the steel structure, has been replaced.
Wolkara The Doonside name was changed briefly in 1921 to an
Aboriginal name
Wolkara, when the new railway station was being constructed, at Crawford rail siding. Wolkara was also the name of the post office that opened here in 1921, but in April 1929 it was changed back to
Doonside, after local residents protested at the name change.
At the time of World War I Prior to 1916, the only development at Doonside was confined to the Crawford family. The Crawford homestead and acreage block was on the south side of the railway line facing Doonside Road. Kelburn Crawford's daughter's house was between the homestead and Bungarribee. North of the line on the corner of Hillend Road and Doonside Crescent, was a brick cottage owned by the Italian family, Luparno. Opposite was a small gatekeeper's cottage. A brick home, owned by another Crawford daughter, was in Doonside Crescent. Properties fronted Hillend Road and were owned by Crawford children. Another cottage in Hillend Road was owned by the family named Harrison, in-laws to the Crawford children. A workman's timber cottage was on the hill towards the tileworks' site. The only road into Doonside was Doonside Road, running from Western Highway. Hillend Road only went as far as Power Street after which there was a track to Richmond Road ending in a gate. Power Street went to
Plumpton with the crossing over Eastern Creek being rough and dangerous in wet weather. After the war (1914–1918), the company of Porter and Galbraith bought property from Crawford and erected a tileworks (PGH) in an area which is now the suburb of
Woodcroft. A soldier's settlement of about twenty poultry farms was established between the railway line and Bungarribee Road. Part of this land, during the 1930s depression, became a woman's settlement.
Early Doonside There was no electricity until 1929 and water was drawn from wells. Horse-drawn carts would deliver bread and meat.
Blacktown was accessed by train as there were not any buses or schools.
Parramatta and
Penrith, were the nearest high schools. A store and post office were opened unofficially in 1926 by Bill Francis on the corner of Hillend Road and Cross Street. For some years his nephew Jack Francis operated the post office on the other side of the railway line but once it was made official it returned to its original site until 1987.
Suburb development In 1912, twelve hundred acres of the Bungarribee estate were carved into eight to twenty-acre lots. In 1919 Directly south of the station was set aside for returning soldiers. 1923 was the first of many major subdivisions, the Doonside Station Estate subdivision [Hill End Estate] was advertised for those who wished to secure a home or business site. The Subdivision extended from the Station north to Power street. 1931 the Crawford Estate was subdivided from Power Street up to Richmond Road, and again in the 1970s. After the PGH was closed the Suburb of Woodcroft was built on the site in the early 1990s. The suburb of Bungarribee was developed in the 2000s. == Heritage listings ==