Dixons Brickworks

Name	Dixons Brickworks
Also known as	Dicksons Brickyard
Address	Park Road, Oakleigh
Location	Dandenong Road, between Park Road and Marriott Street
Years of Operation	1891 to 1895

One of the things that made it difficult to find the right person was that; (a) in those days, he is recorded as being either Dixon or Dickson, and (b) there were several James Dixons around.  This James Dixon was the proprietor of the Oakleigh Hotel between 1885 and 1890.  He sold the hotel to Mrs M A Einsiedel and in 1891 he began Dixons Brickworks in Park Street Oakleigh.  

This was another  short-lived brick making venture in Oakleigh, lasting around four or five years.  James was also a builder and owned a number of other properties in and around Oakleigh.  Among them was a large block along Dandenong Road between Park Road and Lever Street extending back towards Scotchmans Creek.

It appears that James was also buying up properties, probably at a significant discount due to the recession in Melbourne at the time and the consequential collapse of real estate prices.  James owned housing blocks around Oakleigh as well as the large property where the brick works was located.

All trace of the brick works had disappeared and no pictures of the works were available by the time the first aerial photographs were taken in 1931.  All that remained were the tracks and roadways in the centre of the photograph.  It appears that the works are where the tennis courts are now.  Homes had been built over much of the other area of the works.  These tracks also disappeared when the football ground was built over them later.  In 1958, a swimming pool was built and the area where part of the works had been is now tennis courts.  I believe that the brick pit was near where the swimming pool is now because an ornamental lake that doubled as a swimming pool was opened there also.  

I suspect that this was a low volume works operating rectangular down draught kilns.