John Anderson and the Smeaton Flour-Mill John Anderson was born at Loudon, Ayrshire Scotland in 1822. As a young man he was trained in the milling business, but was attracted by the prospects of the new country being opened up in Australia. With his brothers - William, Robert, James and David - he landed in Adelaide in 1851. When gold was discovered the brothers moved to Victoria and tried their luck at the Castlemaine, Bendigo and Mt Korong diggings. After successfully digging for gold, they retired to Melbourne and set up as building contractors. In 1855 the brothers commenced sawmilling at Bullarook, and in 1859 a further mill was established at Dean. In 1860 a journalist wrote that the Bullarook Mill was situated in: "a dense forest, where nothing but the wombat, laughing jackass, kangaroo, or other indigenous wild animals are expected to be met with. A stranger on approaching is suddenly surprised, first by the puffing of the engine; and as he draws nearer by the mixed undescribable sounds of steam machinery, sawing and the commotion of fifty men engaged in their various avocations, and the teamsters and bullock drivers who are relieving them of their vast production, for distribution hither and thither within a radius of some sixty miles." The journalist was impressed with the massive machinery at the mill: there was/fly wheel thirty nine feet in circumference, with a breadth of two foot, and two tramways extended three miles into the forest. In 1856 land auctions were held in the Smeaton district, and among the first purchasers were two Anderson brothers, William and David. Within six years Smeaton had become a prosperous agricultural district. Those who could not afford to purchase freehold land at auction had the option of working as tenants on the estate of Captain Hepburn. By 1860 the Smeaton, Spring Hill and Bullarook Agricultural Society reported that their neighborhood produced 100,000 bushells of wheat, 111,000 bushells of oats and 1900 tons of potatoes. Dairying was also an important industry, and 111,850 gallons of milk and 26,000 lbs of butter were dispatched to local mining communities. Together these farmers owned 684 horses, 2002 cattle, 818 milk cows, 1100 pigs and 19000 sheep. In the 1850's a flour mill was erected on the Hepburn Estate, but when Captain Hepburn died his executors let it out to Messrs Baird and Brown of Ballarat. Within a month Smeaton farmers were angered by the low price offered by the new millers and their reluctance to purchase local grain. In February 1862, at a public meeting, in which John Anderson took a prominent part, the Smeaton farmers agreed to float a 'Farmers Joint Stock Flour Mill'. When plans for this mill fell through, the Anderson brothers announced, in June 1861, that they would build their own flour and oat mill. They secured a site, with a 25 foot drop for water power, and work was rapidly commenced to have the mill ready for the 1861/2 harvest. In the same month plans were announced to erect a third mill opposite the Stag Hotel, Kingston. At the end of the 1861/2 harvest, a journalist from the Creswick Advertiser inspected the new mill. He reported that the three storey building was full of wheat and flour and that the whole works, although only recently completed, presented already a "very business like and busy appearance". The large water wheel, erected at a cost of 1500 pounds, also worked well. Less than a month later the Advertiser had to report that work had stopped for want of water. However the Anderson brothers had obtained a portable engine to avoid this problem in the future. The prosperity of the Smeaton mill was short lived. In 1860 popular protests to  'unlock the lands' resulted in the passing of the first Land Selection Act. During the first decade of selection, settlement was generally confined to the western district, and to areas around the gold f fields. The 1869 Land Act opened up the Wimmera and northern plains to would be farmers. The drier districts proved more propitious for wheat growing and the centre of wheat growing moved north. In the Smeaton district small landowners and tenants seized the opportunity of acquiring larger estates and migrated to the newly opened wheat belt. Furthermore, as the Smeaton deep lead mines were developed, other tenant farmers abandoned agriculture for mining. This migration to the north enabled the Andersons to consolidate their own holdings, and by 1881 the family controlled almost 7000 acres. However, along with this consolidation of holdings there was also a greater emphasis on pastoral activities. Between 1871 and 1881 the area given over to wheat crops in the Shire of Creswick fell by over eighty percent. Similarly the number of flour mills declined from three is the 1860's to only one in 1882. The Anderson brothers in these years gained possession of the Hepburn Mill which they closed in favour of their Smeaton establishment. Technological factors also undermined the prosperity of the mill. The Australian climate produced a harder wheat grain than the fields of England. In 1870's millers in Hungary and the United States, where similar grains were grown, changed from traditional stone mill wheels to iron roller mills. Although Victoria's conservative millers initially resisted this technology, Daniel Gibson of Carlton introduced roller milling in the early 1880's, and consumers quickly turned to the lighter white bread this technology produced. By 1891 the colony of Victoria boasted 456 roller plants, concentrated in Flemington and Kensington, and in the country towns of Echuca, Bendigo, Wangaratta and St Arnaud. The development of railway lines, radiating from Melbourne, also concentrated the milling industry in the metropolis, and from the late 1880's family mills were floated as highly capitalized public companies. Finally, wide annual variations in wheat production made it difficult for small scale, local millers to obtain regular supplies of wheat. By the late 1880's the ubiquitous grain miller, scattered in most country towns and in the bush, was a member of a dying race. The Anderson family tried to resist this relentless development by installing roller plant in 1895. However outside the main wheat producing centres, and with no direct railway link, this attempt was in vain. The mill survived for a further sixty years, but rather than wheaten flour the Andersons concentrated on the milling of oaten meal. In addition to investments in sawmilling, flour milling and agricultural land, John Anderson invested unsuccessfully in the local mining industry, and he was chairman of the Hepburn Nos. 1 and 2 mines. He also took an active part in local affairs, and he helped to found the local agricultural society, the local turf club and the Smeaton primary school. For thirty five years John Anderson was a member of the Creswick Shire Council, and he was several times president. In recognition of his services, the Shire Council commissioned his portrait from the prominent painter Sir John Longstaff. John Anderson died in 1895, his funeral was reputed to be one of the largest ever witnessed in the district. The portrait by Longstaff now hangs in the Creswick Museum.