The Hospital on the Hill and the Port on the Bay
Zoe Waters, Executive Director, Barwon Health Foundation
For generations, two landmarks have helped define the Geelong we know today: the hospital on the hill and the port on the bay.
One has cared for our community. The other has connected it to the world, for almost two centuries, their stories have been more closely intertwined than many might realise.
In February 1849, a public meeting was held at the Theatre Royal in Malop Street to consider how a young and rapidly growing Geelong might establish its own hospital.
There was no enormous government investment waiting. Instead, there was a community willing to build something it believed Geelong needed.
Around that time, a local shepherd named Tim Malloy tragically died after being bitten by a black snake. It was discovered that he had left his estate, a cottage in Britannia Street, Geelong West, and his life savings of £50 to help establish a public hospital for the people of Geelong.
It was an extraordinary act of generosity from a member of a fledgling community, and one that helped lay the foundations for a tradition of giving that continues in Geelong today.
The hospital’s foundation stone was laid in 1850 and, two years later, on 23 April 1852, the Geelong Infirmary and Benevolent Asylum admitted its first patient.
As ships crossed Corio Bay, carrying new arrivals and goods from faraway shores, wool was transported down the hill to the waterfront and Geelong grew around the bustling port. When people needed care, through illness, injury or the arrival of a new baby, they made their way up the hill to the hospital.
The port and the hospital did not simply witness Geelong’s growth. They grew with it.
At around the same time, Geelong’s wool trade was flourishing. Bluestone wool stores rose near the waterfront, and the wharves became the gateway through which our region connected with the world.
The wharves and the hospital wards were built by generations of Geelong people who shared something important: a belief in the future of our city.
That shared history only deepened over time. In March 1915, James Hill, chairman of the Geelong Harbour Trust Commissioners, sent the Mayor of Geelong a cheque for £505 - the equivalent of around $127,000 today - to purchase a motor ambulance for the hospital. This was a significant and innovative investment in healthcare for the people of Geelong.
During the First World War, Osborne House in North Geelong, purchased by the Harbour Trust in 1905, also became a naval hospital, serving wounded military personnel.
Across the decades, both organisations changed names, expanded and evolved. But their purpose remained remarkably consistent: serving Geelong and the wider region.
Today, another chapter is being written between the hospital on the hill and the port on the bay.
The new Barwon Women’s and Children’s will change how Barwon Health provides care for generations of local families. To complement the government investment, Geelong Port has made a generous $50,000 gift to the Barwon Health Foundation’s Women’s and Children’s Appeal to help bring that future to life.
There is something wonderfully full circle about that contribution.
More than a century after a Harbour Trust chairman helped fund an ambulance for the community, the port is again contributing to the future of healthcare provided by Barwon Health for the people of Geelong and our region.
This is not simply a donation from one organisation to another. It is the continuation of a relationship woven through the history of Geelong, from the bay to the hill, from one generation to the next.
Nearly two centuries after the story began, two organisations find themselves doing what they have always done, investing in the health and prosperity of the community they have served for generations.
From the hospital on the hill to the port on the bay, our buildings may change, our city may grow and generations will come and go.
But what endures is the belief that has shaped Geelong from the beginning: that the future of this place is something we build together.
