[citation needed] However, historian Harold Koch considers that the name may have its origins in the Aboriginal word for possum, either wadyan or wadhan, influenced in interpretation by the term known to English speakers of 'Woden'.

[10] Lovett Tower and a number of other buildings host staff from Australian Government agencies; there is also some light industrial development in the town centre.

In 1920, Walter Eddison was granted a soldier settlement lease on the 764 acres (309 ha) Woden Block 132, covering roughly the present-day suburbs of Phillip and Swinger Hill.

The main north–south arterial road passing to the east of central Woden was named Yamba Drive in honour of the former property.

The large conifer on the Yarra Glen median strip near the Carruthers Street overpass was once part of the homestead garden, and the row of large trees to the left (east) of the southbound Yarra Glen offramp were originally a windbreak for the homestead's garden.

The main parkway connecting Woden Valley with central Canberra, constructed in 1966, was named Yarra Glenn after the former property.

There is a sign marking the location of the former homestead on the pathway between present-day Theodore Street and James Place, Curtin.

Maguire farmed Melrose until 1963 when the land was resumed by the government to establish suburbs in Woden Valley.

A clump of large eucalyptus trees still visible to the left of where the southbound onramp meets the Parkway marks the former location of the homestead.

[19] Chifley and Lyons were the next suburbs to be developed (1965), followed by Garran, Pearce and Torrens (1966), Mawson, Farrer and Phillip (1966), O'Malley (1973) and Isaacs (1986).

[20] The first section of Hindmarsh Drive, connecting Woden Valley with Fyshwick and South Canberra, opened in December 1966.

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people made up 1.4 per cent of the population, which was lower than the national and territory averages.

It also has a tenpin bowling centre and produced NSW champion and award-winning sports journalist Reagan Murphy, who lived in Garran and attended Woden Valley High School in the 1970s.

[citation needed] On Australia Day in 1971 a flash flood at Yarra Glen killed seven people.