Ball House,
Little River Road,
Little River

Bluestone complex of buildings in a ruined state close to the railway line to the east of the Little River township.

1997

Context Pty Ltd

City of Wyndham Heritage Study 1997

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eng

Bluestone building or complex of buildings remains in a ruined state close to the railway line to the east of the Little River township. The ruins are surrounded by dense boxthorn and were seen only from the railway line.

It appears that there may be at least two buildings on the site, although they may have once formed a single structure. One appears as a bluestone, once having a gabled roof. The other is similar in form but retains its roof. It has both bluestone and brick components. The former building is presumed to have been a house and the latter a shed or barn. A number of artefacts and building materials have been piled along the boundary fence.

An old stone house on the Railway Reserve, off Little River Road, at Little River, is said to have been associated from the1890s with the Ball family.  Ball descendents, Margaret and Emma, who helped at the Little River School, remember growing up in the old house.

A search of district rate records confirmed that in 1910 or earlier George Ball, farmer, occupied four acres of land in the Railway Reserve, owned by the Railway Department. George Ball (with John Ball) was the owner still during the First World War period. By the late 1920s, Emma Ball was rated for the four acres in the Railway Reserve.

Earlier, in the 1890s, George and Thomas Ball, farmers, owned a farm homestead on 48 acres of land on the south side of Little River between McLeans and Devines Roads. In the late 1920s, Emma Ball owned the homestead property on 49 acres of land in Little River Road (Crown Allotment 2 in Section 1, Parish of Bulban).

Mrs G.M. Green, who subdivided land on the north side of Little River in 1975, is said to also own the site of the old building on the railway line.