Mondeval in Railway Parade, Leura is a house of historical significance and is listed on the NSW Heritage list. It was built in about 1890 and is a rare example of a Victorian Regency house with high quality finishes. It was one of the first houses built in Leura and was the residence of several notable people over the next century. Today it is the head office of the Cancer Wellness Support Organisation. Early history The land on which Mondeval was built was advertised for sale by William Eyre in the Leura Estate in about 1890. He was an estate agent who owned a large number of blocks in Leura. It is possible that the originator of Mondeval was William Wallace (1817-1893) who was a wealthy Scottish builder and contractor. He lived in a house called Fernbank in Petersham. He and his wife Helen who died in 1890 had no children but they had several nieces who regarded them as parental figures. However he was 75 in 1890 and died in 1893. Perhaps the most likely person to build the house was Samuel Lyons as he is shown in the 1901 NSW Census as living in a house on Railway Parade, Leura. Samuel Lyons (1826-1910) was a Member of the NSW Parliament. He was born in 1826 and at an early age was sent to England to be educated. He went to the University of Cambridge and later returned to Australia and took over the family business. In 1853 he married Charlotte Margaret Futter and the couple had three sons and two daughters. His wife died in 1868 at the age of only 35 and he was a widower for the rest of his life. In the 1890s he retired to Leura and seems to have lived in his own house for many years and then towards the end of his life moved to his daughter’s house which was just around the corner in Hartley Esplanade called “The Hermitage”. His daughter was Carlotta Lackey who had married John George Lackey in 1875. He died in 1910 at the age of 84. In 1907 Alfred Tillotson Durston Jones (1861-1928) bought the house and called it “Kenalbremar”. He was a partner in the family company of T. T. Jones and Sons who were watchmakers and jewellers in George Street Sydney. Alfred was born in 1861 in Sydney. His father was Timothy Tillotson