View source for Clunes, Victoria

{{Infobox Australian place
| type                     = town
| name                     = Clunes
| state                    = vic
| image                    = ClunesStreetscape.JPG
| caption                  = Main street of Clunes
| image_alt                =
| use_lga_map              = yes
| relief                   =
| coordinates              = {{coord|37|18|0|S|143|47|0|E|display=inline,title}}
| pushpin_map_caption      =
| pushpin_label_position   = right
| map_alt                  =
| pop                      = 1,728
| pop_year                 = {{CensusAU|2016}}
| pop_footnotes            = <ref name="abs2016">{{Census 2016 AUS | id = SSC20577| name = Clunes (State suburb)| accessdate = 9 July 2017 | quick = on}}</ref>
| poprank                  =
| density                  =
| density_footnotes        =
| established              = mid-1850s
| established_footnotes    =
| abolished                =
| gazetted                 =
| postcode                 = 3370
| elevation                = 310
| elevation_footnotes      =
| area                     =
| area_footnotes           =
| timezone                 =
| utc                      =
| timezone-dst             =
| utc-dst                  =
| dist1                    = 146
| dir1                     =
| location1                = [[Melbourne]]
| dist2                    = 34
| dir2                     =
| location2                = [[Ballarat, Victoria|Ballarat]]
| dist3                    = 92
| dir3                     =
| location3                = [[Bendigo, Victoria|Bendigo]]
| lga                      = Shire of Hepburn
| seat                     =
| region                   =
| county                   =
| division                 =
| stategov                 = [[Electoral district of Ripon|Ripon]]
| fedgov                   = [[Division of Ballarat|Ballarat]]
| visitation_num           =
| visitation_year          =
| visitation_footnotes     =
| managing_authorities     =
| url                      =
| maxtemp                  = 19.6
| maxtemp_footnotes        =
| mintemp                  = 6.3
| mintemp_footnotes        =
| rainfall                 = 575.2
| rainfall_footnotes       =
| near-n                   =
| near-ne                  =
| near-e                   =
| near-se                  =
| near-s                   =
| near-sw                  =
| near-w                   =
| near-nw                  =
| near                     =
| footnotes                =
}}
'''Clunes''' is a town in [[Victoria, Australia|Victoria]], [[Australia]], about 36&nbsp;kilometres north of [[Ballarat, Victoria|Ballarat]], in the [[Shire of Hepburn]]. In 2006 there were 1605 people living in the town. Clunes was the site of the first [[gold rush]] in Victoria.

== History ==
The town was home to Victoria's first gold discovery made by [[James Esmond]]. His discovery, printed in the [[Geelong Advertiser]] on 7 July 1851, started the first [[Victorian Gold Rush|gold rush in Victoria]].<ref name="smh">{{cite web|url=http://www.smh.com.au/news/Victoria/Clunes/2005/02/17/1108500206319.html|title=Clunes|date=December 11, 2007|work=Travel|publisher=Sydney Morning Herald|language=en|access-date=2010-01-01}}</ref> The town began a few years later. With the opening of a big gold mine, by the ''Port Phillip and Colonial Mining Company'', the town's population grew to over 6,000 people in the late 1880s.

Clunes [[post office]] opened on 1 October 1857<ref name = "a">{{cite web
| last = Premier Postal History  | title = Post Office List | url = https://www.premierpostal.com/cgi-bin/wsProd.sh/Viewpocdwrapper.p?SortBy=VIC&country= | access-date = 2008-04-11 }}</ref> and in 1874 Clunes was joined to the Victorian railway network. [[Clunes_railway_station,_Victoria|Clunes station]], shown in the [[movie]] [[Mad Max]], was opened in the same year.

In 1873 mine owners tried to bring in Saturday afternoon and Sunday work. The miners refused to work the new hours and went on [[Strike action|strike]]. Some days into the strike the miners started the Clunes Miners' Association. The Association used force to stop the mine owners from bringing in [[China|Chinese]] miners to work in the mines. They stopped the coaches and sent the Chinese back to Ballarat. This action was called the "Clunes Riots". The Clunes Miners' Association is one of the earliest beginnings of the [[Construction, Forestry, Mining and Energy Union]].

From the 1850s through to 1893, Clunes was an important gold field in Victoria. During this time more than {{convert|1200000|oz|kg|0|lk=on|abbr=on}} of gold was dug up at Clunes. Surrounded by grassland, fields and pastures, the town has kept many of its fine historic buildings until today and is one of the architecturally most intact gold towns in Victoria.

==Present==
=== Booktown ===
The idea of a booktown was thought up by Councillor Tim Hayes, Linda Newitt, Graeme Johnston and [[Tess Brady]]. Clunes held its first booktown on 20 May 2007. Over 50 book sellers from around Australia set up shop for the day in the town's historic buildings. The town, which had worked together to make the day, won the [[Hepburn Shire]]'s Community Event of the Year.

Now called 'Back to Booktown', Clunes holds the event every year on the first weekend in May.<ref name="BookTown">{{cite web | url = http://www.clunes.org/booktown/ | title = Clunes Back to Booktown | publisher = Clunes.org | access-date = 2008-02-08 | archive-date = 2008-05-01 | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20080501032816/http://www.clunes.org/booktown/ | url-status = dead }}</ref> With more than 60 book sellers, millions of books, and 15,000 visitors, it has become the largest collection of books in any regional centre of Australia and the biggest Victorian regional book event.<ref name="bt">{{cite web|url=http://www.booktown.clunes.org/|title=Back to Booktown 2010|language=en|access-date=2010-01-01|archive-date=2012-05-18|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120518054441/http://booktown.clunes.org/|url-status=dead}}</ref>

=== Wesley College campus ===
In recent years Clunes has a lot of changes and rebuilding<ref>{{cite web
|url=http://www.aare.edu.au/01pap/llo01457.htm
|title=Who's Owning Whom and Why Does It Matter? – Looking at Learning as Community Development
|work=Doug Lloyd and Tamara Downey
|publisher=aare.edu.au
|access-date=2009-03-12
|date=March 12, 2009
|archive-date=2008-10-21
|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20081021134349/http://www.aare.edu.au/01pap/llo01457.htm
|url-status=dead
}}</ref> after [[Wesley College, Melbourne|Wesley College]], Australia's biggest co-educational private school, to set up a school for its Year 9 students in the town. Opened in 2000, about 80 students live in the Wesley Clunes Residential Learning Village in the centre of town and become part of the local community for an eight-week period each term.

=== Film ===
Because of its historic buildings, many of the outside scenes in the 2003 movie ''[[Ned Kelly (2003 movie)|Ned Kelly]]'', starring [[Heath Ledger]] and [[Orlando Bloom]], were shot in Clunes. One side of the street was decorated to look like [[Euroa, Victoria]], and the other to look like [[Jeriderie, New South Wales]].

Clunes also appears in the movies ''[[Mad Max]]'' starring [[Mel Gibson]] and the remake of the 1950s classic ''[[On the Beach (2000 film)|On the Beach]]''. It also appears in the Australian Broadcasting Corporation television series' ''[[Queen Kat, Carmel & St Jude]]'' and ''[[Something in the Air (TV series)|Something in the Air]]''. Clunes was once closed off to the public for the TV show ''[[The Mole (Australian TV series)|The Mole]]'' in 2001. The mission in that episode was to direct one of the players to pick up another player in a blacked-out car. Julius Avery's 13-minute movie ''Jerrycan'' was made in Clunes. ''Jerrycan'' won the 2008 Jury Prize at the 61st [[Cannes Film Festival]] in [[France]] for short films, showing restless teenagers in rural Victoria.<ref>{{cite web
|url=http://www.theage.com.au/articles/2008/05/26/1211653938586.html
|title=From Cairns to Clunes to Cannes
|work=Jo Roberts
|publisher=www.theage.com.au
|access-date=2008-05-27
|date=May 27, 2008
}}</ref>

=== Sport ===
The town has an [[Australian Rules Football]] team playing in the [[Central Highlands Football League]].  <ref name = "d">{{cite web | last = Full Points Footy | title = Clunes | url = http://www.fullpointsfooty.net/Clunes.htm | access-date = 2008-07-25 | archive-date = 2008-09-07 | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20080907095751/http://www.fullpointsfooty.net/clunes.htm | url-status = dead }}</ref>

[[Golf]]ers play at the Clunes Golf Club on Golf Course Road. <ref name = "golf">{{Citation  | author= Golf Select | title = Clunes | url = http://www.golfselect.com.au/armchair/courseView.aspx?course_id=951 | access-date = 2009-05-11 }}</ref>

==People==
* [[Peter Lalor]], the leader of the miners at the [[Eureka Stockade]], later lived in Clunes and was the chairman of the Clunes Water Commission.<ref name=smh/>
* Artist [[John Langstaff]] was in Clunes in 1862. He won the [[Archibald Prize]] five and was the first Australian artist to receive a knighthood (1928).<ref name=smh/>

==References==
{{reflist}}

==Other websites==
{{Commons category}}
* [http://www.anu.edu.au/polsci/marx/interventions/raceriots.htm Class and racism in the 1873 Clunes Riot]
* [http://www.ballarat.com/clunes/ Clunes tourism information] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20050626161605/http://www.ballarat.com/clunes/ |date=2005-06-26 }}
* [http://www.clunes.org/ Clunes community website]
* [http://www.clunes.wesleycollege.net/ Wesley College - Clunes campus webpages] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080219043019/http://www.clunes.wesleycollege.net/ |date=2008-02-19 }}
* [http://www.https://www.clunesbooktown.org.au Clunes Book Town website]