Pioneers of StrathalbynPrint Page

The monument commemorates the pioneers of Strathalbyn.

The town of Strathalbyn was laid out by Dr John Rankine who arrived in South Australia on the "Fairfield" on 4 May 1839 after 159 sailing days from Liverpool, England.  Among the ship`s 105 passengers were ten members of the Rankine family and a substantial number of other families who followed Rankine and also settled at Strathalbyn.

Andrew Rankine, son of William Rankine was the first child born in Strathalbyn in 1841. By the end of the 1840s the Rankines had acquired large landholdings and built impressive homes on it. Dr John Rankine became a Justice of the Peace and in 1849 and later a member of the South Australian Parliament. With almost all of the early settlers being from Scotland and staunch Presbyterians, matters of the mind and soul were considered very important.

Before they could built a church, services were held in some of the larger Rankine homes. Life was hard for most of them and supplies, which had to come from Adelaide, were few and very expensive. Pork, damper and tea were the order of the day. Many of the huts were neither wind nor watertight. By mid 1843 matters had improved and many of the settlers had cattle, sown a crop and found time, money and labour to built substantial houses.

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