The Crown Lands Alienation Acts (1861) must have made a tremendous difference to the development of this State. Representative government was still new and the Colonies of Victoria and Queensland had only just been separated from NSW which remained a colony till Federation. Robertson must have been quite a premier to get his Land Bills through the new parliament. I remember learning that originally there were all sorts of tricks that the squatters used to hold on to the best of their land. They selected key blocks keeping  access to water for themselves and they even had nominees acting as settlers to satisfy the residential requirements. There was also a shortage of surveyors so that a selection could be made before it was surveyed. But it was not long before the land was divided up into numbered portions with roadways giving access to every portion. Some of those roadways are still shown on modern maps but they were never developed. Others were totally impracticable and when it came to building proper roads, land had to be resumed.  Even the course of Dunoon Road itself underwent some early changes.
I used to think that by the time our locality was developed, the surveyors were well ahead of the game but the land in North Lismore around the Showground was being selected very early on. Archibald Currie (Duncan’s brother) selected the land beside the present showground in 1864. It seems he was interested not in the Dunoon Road frontage but in the access to the river at the eastern end of the block.  I am not a race goer so I have only just discovered Currie Park tucked away in there near the race course. The creek in Currie Park marked Archibald’s boundary and it must have given access to his very early trading store. I think he had relocated to Bridge Street before the Railway was even surveyed. Not only did Archibald select an adjacent block in 1866 but in 1871 he selected another block (#57) further north. On that same day in 1871, Duncan selected portion 56 where the Modanville Store now stands. A few months later In September 1871 there was a huge forest reserve declared of 48 sq miles starting near the Numulgi Hall and running due west as far as Terania Creek. It then stretched all the way to the Night Cap Range being bounded in the west by the creek and in the east by a straight line running north south (by magnetic compass). This reserve was revoked bit by bit to allow for further selection. But parts of it were still in place near the Channon as late as 1907.
Over a period of seventeen years Duncan Currie selected six more blocks near his original selection. He selected blocks in other places too. Only one of these blocks was in the parish of Dunoon which did not even have a name in 1878. Even that block would have been in North Lismore if the parish boundary were not so crazy. On the eastern side of the main road, the Parish of North Lismore reached as far as Numulgi Creek Road. Duncan’s neighbour across that road was James E. James.
A problem with the current parish map is that it shows the first owner of title to each portion. This is seldom the original selector or even the occupier who finally paid off the conditional purchase(CP), but an owner of a mortgage on the land. But on some earlier maps, land that was still subject to conditional purchase still carries the name of the occupier and the CP number which includes the year of selection. Also shown is the date on which the CP was confirmed. I have just stumbled on the Lands Department web site which shows some really old parish maps. The oldest of these for the parish of North Lismore shows that portion 93 was occupied by Duncan Currie adjacent to portion 56. Later maps show the name of McLeod. Others show the Bank of NSW. This has solved a problem for me.
I knew that Duncan Currie had built a house which he called “Dunoon” after his birthplace in Scotland. I knew that McLeod had renamed the house “Craiglea”. I assumed, wrongly, that “Dunoon House” had been built on the block where the Modanville Store now stands. I have just discovered that Currie had selected two adjacent blocks with frontages on the western side of the main road. Both properties have been subdivided in recent years. Funnell Drive gives access to the development on the land in Currie’s first selection (and his last). Craiglea Court gives access to the development on the land where Currie built the house from which the district took its name.  As the district became settled, the school was relocated twice. The name also moved north. The area originally called Dunoon is now called Modanville.
Denis Matthews