Today we're going to look at a forgotten old town in Tasmania. It's called Merton Vale and no one has lived there for more than 70 years.


ANGELA CAMERON: For more than 70 years these hills hid a forgotten town. Until a curious Glenorchy Council worker decided to explore the area behind this locked gate.

MICHAEL BIDWELL: I myself came up here for lunch one day, escaping the office -- came up here and found not so much this ruin but other ruins and asked questions down in council about what the ruins were -- and no one really knew.

ANGELA CAMERON: Mr Bidwell took us up the hills to show us what has been unearthed from the remains of a town called Merton.

The trail leads to the ruins of a cottage which records show was owned by the Austins, a German family who moved here in the late 1800s.

MICHAEL BIDWELL: This here -- is actually the fire place and it used be an oven and the old Germans used to have these large ovens for building … baking their bread and that sort of stuff.

If you dug all this all out you would actually find a hole in the middle of it.

ANGELA CAMERON: It's rumoured the family was lucky enough to own an early model Ford.

Mr Bidwell thinks this might be the remains of the Austin's garage.

The car would have seemed like a great luxury to the population of about 600 who lived in Merton.

From the little known about the area it's clear the residents weren't rich.

They lived on growing small fruits and cutting timber.

ANGELA CAMERON: Earl Cooper is one of a handful of known Merton descendants.

Mr Cooper's grandparents, Florence and Gustav Klug, came to Tasmania from Germany in the late 1800s and made Merton their home.

Earl Cooper took his extended family to visit the ruins of the house two years ago.

They were surprised to find something left.

EARL COOPER: I really got a shock to see the steps in as good condition as they are.

The steps are definitely still there, the foundations are still there, even some of the fences are still there.

ANGELA CAMERON: All the evidence shows Merton was thriving -- so why was it deserted?

Michael Bidwell found out it was the council's decision to shut the gates after the Second World War.

It simply didn't want people living in the Glenorchy water catchment area.

MICHAEL BIDWELL: As far as I know it was bought through compulsory acquisition and all the houses were dismantled and moved out and so were the people.