St Johns Wood, Queensland - St John's Wood Estate

St John's Wood Estate

After George Rogers Harding died in 1895 his estate was indebted to the Queensland National Bank Limited. The bank initially had difficulty in selling the land but eventually sold it in 1917 to the next owner, Francis Michael Anglim. Anglim initially used the land to breed Thoroughbred Brood Mares. He subsequently subdivided the land in 1923, and sold it as a housing estate called St John's Wood after the house. In the following year the neighbouring Glen Lyon Estate was also subdivided, and the tramline to Ashgrove (Oleander Dr.) was finally completed. This assisted in the rapid development of the area. In August 1927 a feature article appeared in the Brisbane Courier.

St Johns Wood ...on account of its beauty, has been sold to the best people in the State—people of wealth, repute and undoubted position. This alone will make the name of St Johns Wood a hallmark of distinction and exclusiveness.

Anglim died in 1931. In 1932 Edward Albert Hawkins purchased the property and although he planned a major extension to the Granite House, it did not proceed and he remained living at his Clayfield residence. He converted the house into two flats, partly enclosing the verandas and separating the service wing at the rear into a separate dwelling. At the same time he obtained an old school building at auction from the West End State School and used the materials to reconstruct a Recreation Hall adjacent to the Granite House in 1936. His Nephew, Thomas Joseph Byrnes Leeper, inherited the property on Mr Hawkins' death in 1956 and in 1957 he arranged a further subdivision of the remaining property into six building allotments, further reducing the size of the Granite House allotment to its present area of 1432m2. This resulted in the front of the house facing the side boundary with access now from Piddington Street. Ownership of Granite House changed several times and Mr and Mrs Guerassimoff converted it back to a grand house.