HERITAGE

HISTORY TO
UNCOVER

Hornsby Park is honouring what came before to inspire what comes next.

Step back in time at Hornsby Park. Open to the public after almost 200 years, this storied landscape is layered with a rich, interconnected heritage that spans thousands of years. From cultural to colonial, ecological to industrial — relive and reflect on where we began, as Hornsby Park creates new links in our community’s journey.

TRADITIONAL COUNTRY

GuriNgai and Dharug peoples

This valley is part of the traditional lands of the GuriNgai and Dharug peoples. For thousands of years, it was a place of ceremony, storytelling, and connection to Country.

WORKING THE LAND

Farming, orchards and logging

From the mid-19th century, Hornsby Park and Old Mans Valley became a centre for farming and orcharding.

Families such as the Higgins and Harringtons grew citrus, stone fruit and apples for Sydney markets, while small-scale mixed farming supported local households.

SHAPING THE VALLEY

Quarrying in Hornsby Park

Hornsby Park and Old Mans Valley are remembered not only for farming and orcharding, but also for their role in industrial development.

REMEMBERING THE PIONEERS

Old Mans Valley Cemetery resting place of the Higgins family

Old Mans Valley Cemetery is one of Hornsby Shire’s earliest European burial grounds and a reminder of the families who once lived and farmed on the land.

LISTENING TO THE UNIVERSE

Radio astronomy

Between 1947 and 1955, Hornsby Park and Old Mans Valley became an unlikely birthplace of modern science. In this quiet bushland, scientists carried out some of the world’s first radio astronomy experiments, using radio waves instead of light to study the universe.