There were two houses called Woollahra House built on the same site in Point Piper, Sydney, Australia. The first was built in 1856 by Sir Daniel Cooper (picture shown below) and the second by his son William Charles Cooper in 1883 (picture on the right). Both houses have been demolished, but two buildings still remain from the original structure. The gatekeeper's lodge from Sir Daniel Cooper's house, which was built in 1871, is now the Rose Bay Police Station, and the stables (picture at bottom) which are now Wyuna Court, a prestigious block of apartments. These buildings in the Municipality of Woollahra are of some historical interest.Sir Daniel CooperDaniel Cooper was born in 1821 in Lancashire, England. He was the second son of Thomas Cooper, a merchant and came to Australia as a child with his parents. He returned to England at the age of 14 to complete his education but came back to Australia in 1843 and became a commercial partner with James Holt. He later became a member of Parliament and was elected as Speaker of the New South Wales Legislative Assembly. In 1846 he married Elizabeth Hill, who was the third daughter of William Hill Esq of Sydney. The couple had two sons and five daughters over the next thirteen years while they lived in Sydney.In 1856 Cooper started building Woollahra House, and to mark the occasion he held a very large ceremony to lay the foundation stone, at which 400 guests were present. While the house was being built, the Coopers lived in the nearby residence called Rose Bay Lodge, which Daniel owned at that time. It is not certain when exactly the Cooper family moved into Woollahra House, but it was before 1860 as there is a birth notice for a son born at Rose Bay Lodge in July 1860 to the wife of Walter Lamb, who were known to be renting the Lodge at about this time.
- Category:
- Landmark