In 1876 Lake View House was home to Ethel Florence Richardson (known by her pen name Henry Handel Richardson), famous Australian writer and author of The Getting of Wisdom.

Richardson depicted the house and her early life in Chiltern, under the fictional name of ‘Barambogie’, in The Fortunes of Richard Mahony, acclaimed as being one of Australia’s greatest novels.

The Lake View collection includes examples of Richardson’s personal items including the desk on which she wrote her first novel.

“…the small red-brick, one storeyed house, into which we now packed, is still clear in every detail. I liked it because all its windows were french windows and usually stood wide open, which gave one a sense of freedom, and because it had a verandah running round three sides of it. Though our heaviest furniture had been disposed of, the rooms were uncomfortably full, and the garden was often considered too hot for us; but on the verandah we could be sure of finding shade and space.”