Donald McLean (pastoralist)

Donald McLean (c. 1780, perhaps 16 May 1772 – 11 October 1855) was a pastoralist in the early days of the British colony of South Australia, remembered as the colony's first wheat grower.

McLean, a Scotsman from Duisky, near Blaich, Ardgour, Argyleshire, was in July 1837 an early investor with the South Australian Company; for his ₤1000 he was entitled to select one "town acre", one surveyed section near the city and the option on one future "special survey" further away. His family were once substantial landowners, but he was reduced to the status of tenant farmer. He was clearly not without means however; ₤1000 would be equivalent to several million dollars today.

The 1836 famine in Scotland which led to one of the Highland Clearances may have been a factor in this decision, and to live in the new province. He and his large family emigrated on the Navarino, falsifying their ages and occupations in order to qualify for free passage. They arriving at Holdfast Bay on 6 December 1837. He selected "town acre" number 57 on Hindley Street and Section 50, Hundred of Adelaide, an 80 acres (32 ha) property at Hilton, South Australia, a few miles from Adelaide, adjacent to one of Dr. Everard's selections. Immediately on arrival in South Australia he sent his son Allan to Van Diemen's Land (now Tasmania) to bring back a team of working buffalo, implements and seed wheat, which they planted and reaped by hand in 1838, arguably the first such crop in the colony. He built a modest house. Ten years later he sold the property to John Marles (c. 1817–1914); it is now the suburb Marleston.

He selected a property at Strathalbyn, part of the Angas Special Survey of 1841, and was the second settler there, after Dr. Rankine. He built a two-storey house which he named either "Auchanadala" or "Auchanada's", where he died in October 1855.

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