Dendy Park, Dendy Street, and Dendy Brighton Cinema are all named after the first white landowner in the Bayside area, Henry Dendy.
But for thousands of years before his arrival, the Boonwerung people of the Kulin nation loved and cared for the stunning part of Melbourne we today call Bayside.
The original inhabitants considered themselves part of the land and Bayside City Council acknowledges its responsibility to nurture and sustain that land.
The area’s rich history is reflected in Bayside’s parks, reserves and buildings.
The Bayside Architectural Trail highlights significant buildings, while the Bayside
Coastal Art Trail celebrates the lives and work of artists who have captured the area’s beauty on canvas.
The scene depicted by Henry Burn in the watercolour ‘Brighton Beach 1862’ would have been familiar to Dendy, who bought a parcel of land in 1841 in what now forms part of Brighton and Brighton East.
Buyers for Dendy’s allotments were few and a depression ruined his scheme.
The Were family eventually bought it and had more luck when the economy improved, with land sales brisk.
The first European settlers in the Sandringham district were farmers in 1851. Land speculators followed and the first housing allotments were sold in 1852. The area grew quickly and the foreshore area became part of the Shire of Moorabbin, while the municipality of Brighton was proclaimed in 1858.
Foreshore residents separated from Moorabbin in 1917 to form the Borough, then City, of Sandringham in 1923. The railway line generated interest in the area’s estates in the early 20th Century.
Many houses and shops were built around stations and there was a horse drawn tram to Beaumaris.
Visitors often spent the weekend in the area – Hampton was described as ‘where one has room to breathe and grow healthfully bronzed’.
Development increased steadily after both World Wars and the population grew as more land was subdivided.
It was not until 1994 that the City of Bayside was created, with the merging of Brighton and Sandringham with small sections of Moorabbin and Mordialloc.
As part of its commitment to recognising and celebrating the area’s indigenous history, Council recently renamed Tulip Street Reserve in Sandringham as ‘Tjilatjirrin Reserve’, which means ‘to play together’.
About Bayside
- The northern boundary is just eight kilometres from the Melbourne CBD
- Covers 37 square kilometres
- Includes Beaumaris, Black Rock, Brighton, Brighton East, Hampton, Hampton East and Sandringham and parts of Highett and Cheltenham
- Bayside suburbs are served by the Sandringham and Frankston train lines
- The City features a network of village shopping strips, including Church Street and Bay Street in Brighton, Hampton Street, The Concourse in Beaumaris, Sandringham Village and Black Rock Village
