Loddon

Distinguished and Famous people from Loddon

🔧 John Piccoli

John Piccoli created a distinctive sculpture garden near Boort using an unlikely material: spanners. After contracting polio as a child, he ran the family farm from a wheelchair and later developed large metal sculptures from tools that had finished their more conventional working lives. He and his wife Sonia welcomed visitors to the garden, making the work part of the district’s public identity. Loddon Shire named him Citizen of the Year in 2016. His local contribution brought together farming, making and hospitality, demonstrating how familiar workshop objects could acquire a surprisingly expressive second career.

📚 Albert Jacka

Albert Jacka grew up in Wedderburn after his family moved there when he was five. He attended the local school, worked with his father and later joined the Victorian State Forests Department before enlisting in 1914. At Gallipoli in May 1915, his actions at Courtney’s Post earned the first Victoria Cross awarded to an Australian in the First World War. Later service brought further decorations. His connection with the Loddon district is childhood, schooling and early employment, rather than birthplace: he was born at Layard near Winchelsea. That distinction preserves the genuine Wedderburn story without relocating its beginning.