The Rodda Collection contains 80 postcards and photographs of Walhalla taken and collected between 1905 and 1920. It appears that they were collected by Arnold Rodda. The Victoria Government Gazette announced the appointment of an Arnold E. Rodda as a member of the board of advice for the School District of the Shire of Walhalla No. 372 on 8 June 1910, and the Walhalla Chronicle lists an AE Rodda as the secretary of the Walhalla Mechanics' Institute on 7 August 1914.

Walhalla was once classified as the wealthiest town in Victoria. At its peak it had a population of over 4,000 people and there were 15 hotels, 40 shops, two breweries, seven churches, a school with over 500 students in the town. Walhalla's wealth and population were based upon gold which was discovered in 1863. Many of the images in the collection are of the Long Tunnel Gold Mine, founded in 1863, one of the most prominent in the region it closed in 1914 and by 1915 there were only 17 shops in the town.

References
Victoria Gazzett, 8 June 1910, p. 2690
Walhalla Chronicle, 7 August 1914, p.2
Gwynydd Francis James & Charles Gordon Lee (1970). Walhalla Heyday. Melbourne: Robertson & Mullins

More Information