Laanecoorie, Victoria

Laanecoorie is a locality situated on the Loddon River in Victoria, Australia. It has a community hall, church, and caravan park.[3]

Laanecoorie Victoria
Laanecoorie
Coordinates	36°49′S 143°55′E
Population	177 (2016 census)
Postcode(s)	3463[1]
Location	104 km (65 mi) NW of Melbourne 20 km (12 mi) NE of 15 km (9 mi) S of [2]
LGA(s)	Shire of Loddon
State electorate(s)	Ripon
Federal Division(s)	Mallee
Localities around Laanecoorie: Waanyarra Tarnagulla Woodstock West Dunolly Laanecoorie Shelbourne Betly Eddington Eastville

Laanecoorie is situated on land once part of the huge Simson run which was taken up in 1840 by Donald Campbell Simson (1809-1851), a Scot from Islay in Scotland's Inner Hebrides. Simson briefly had two partners, but the partnership soon failed and Simson then had the run alone. He was at different times assisted in running his station by his two brothers, John and Hector Norman, who both had their own careers. The station originally comprised three runs, Languy-e-Coora, Cairn Curran and Janevale. The last portion possibly having been named after Donald's wife, Jane Coghill. Cairn Curran was soon resumed by the original lessee, Edmund Bryant, and Simson took other land nearby, built a homestead there and soon after named his combined lands Charlotte Plains. Hector, known as Norman, married Bryant's daughter, Jane, and took his own run, Sutton Grange, near Mount Alexander in 1849. The station's name may have been in use privately by the Simson family, but it was used officially only from 1845 when Donald and his family began permanent occupation. Charlotte Plains, once an important sheep station with an excellent stock capacity and profitable wool production, went into decline after Simson's death in 1851 and in the 1860's and 1870's his two surviving sons exploited it until they sold off its last lands by 1876.

Gold was discovered around Laanecoorie at Jones Creek in 1853 and later on at Poseidon in 1906. The first farm was selected by the Lyon brothers in 1857.

The first bridge over the Loddon River was built in 1870, but was destroyed in the big flood of 1909 at the same time as the Laanecoorie Weir was breached. The weir had been constructed in 1891 and was the second irrigation scheme for Victoria. The well-known engineer and World War I general, Sir John Monash, designed and built a new bridge of reinforced concrete beam and slab construction, which still remains today.[4]