Editing Diggers Rest, Victoria (section)

==History==
[[File:DiggersRestHotelRuins.JPG|thumb|left|[[Diggers Rest Hotel]] Ruins]]

Diggers Rest began life as a stopping place on the road to the [[Bendigo]] goldfields, with the Post Office opening on 18 June 1860.<ref name = "a">{{Citation| last = Phoenix Auctions History  | title = Post Office List | url = http://www.phoenixauctions.com.au/cgi-bin/wsPhoenix.sh/Viewpocdwrapper.p?SortBy=VIC&filter=*Diggers*Rest* | access-date = 22 March 2021 }}</ref> [[Caroline Chisholm]] started a women's shelter in the area. The town grew in the 1870s and 1880s and became a postal village with a general store, post office, weighbridge, mechanics' institute and a chaff mill. The [[Diggers Rest Hotel]] was built by 1854, and later enlarged, and became an important stopping place on the route to the goldfields. It was severely damaged by fire.<ref>{{cite news |title=Historic Diggers' Rest hotel destroyed in suspicious fire |url=https://www.smh.com.au/national/historic-diggers-rest-hotel-destroyed-in-suspicious-fire-20081030-5bll.html |access-date=20 March 2024 |work=[[The Sydney Morning Herald]]}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |last1=O'Connor |first1=David |title=Charred remains still a mystery – DiggersRest.com |url=https://www.diggersrest.com/home/charred-remains-still-a-mystery/ |work=DiggersRest.com |date=25 April 2016 |language=en-AU}}</ref>

Diggers Rest is referred to as being famous for the first controlled powered flight of an aeroplane undertaken in Australia. The flight was performed by [[Harry Houdini]] on the 18th of March, 1910.<ref>[http://www.ctie.monash.edu.au/hargrave/houdini_bio.html Hargrave Pioneers: Harry Houdini]</ref><ref>{{cite web | url=https://www.sl.nsw.gov.au/stories/aviation-australia/our-first-aviators | title=Our first aviators | date=3 May 2016 }}</ref> The only café in town is named in his honour.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.houdinis.com.au/ |title=Home |website=houdinis.com.au}}</ref>

To the north of Diggers Rest township within the locality is the former township known as Aitken's Gap, The Gap or [[Buttlejorrk, Victoria|Buttlejorrk]].