DetailsEccleston Frederic duFaur was a London born immigrant, educated at Harrow. In 1863 he had entered the NSW Department of Lands office in Sydney as a draughtsman.
DuFaur was a man of of independent means who,at his own expense, organised expeditions of a geographical nature. The best known of these was the expedition in search of traces of the lost explorer, Ludwig Leichhardt. For this du Faur was elected to the Royal Geographical Society in 1877.
In 1888 he took up 25 acres of land on the North Shore, at Eastern Road, in a new district which he persuaded the authorities to call Turramurra. From Turramurra he spent much of his spare time exploring the foreshores of Cowan Creek.
Convinced that this beautiful waterway should not be settled indiscriminately, he tried to convince the Minister for Lands, Sir Henry Copeland, that a trust should be set up to administer it, in the manner of the National Park already estalished south of Sydney. Sir Henry Copeland replied that the government did not propose establishing any further National Parks, and there the matter rested.
Nor easily dissuaded, du Faur constructed a road through the bush to Bobbin Head and invited the Governor of NSW, the Earl of Jersey, to visit the area. Following the visit du Faur had an ally in his efforts to have the bushland surrounding Cowan Creek protected. In 1894 the area was proclaimed a National Park. 'The Shaping of Hornsby Shire' pp87-88. KeywordsKu-Ring-Gai Chase TrustKu-ring-gai Chase National Park