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Populating the Mid North: a History of Settlement
Interactive Maps
A timeline of Settlement with a 5-yearly progression of land surveys.
1854-2012 Construction of Railways
The development and decline of the railways.
The Development of Agriculture
Graphics, showing increase in productivity and land use, with early Newspaper articles
A number of articles related to the history of Guano
Extracts from the Parliamentary Act and Newspaper articles
1836-1970 History of Sheep Scab in SA
Excellent Article by W. Stephen Smith, B.V.Sc.,F.A.C.V.Sc. PDF file.
Infrastructure
1895-1999 The Electrification of the Mid North
Timeline and early Newspaper articles showing the development of the electricity grid in South Australia.
A brief description of the creation of Road Boards, etc, with an 1879 newspaper article on the condition of the Main North Road.
A history of the invention of the Telegraph and its introduction to Australia
Whims, wells and the Morgan - Whyalla Pipeline.
Articles from Early Newspapers & Books
1836-1842 Preliminary & Special Surveys
Extract from H. J. Scott's South Australia in 1887 describing how the British Government organised the sale of South Australia
Correspondence between an 'old' settler and a Glaswegian. The last paragraph is a gem.
1841 The first port, Trade, the Financial Crisis, etc:
Contemporary Newspaper article.
Contemporary Newspaper article.
A short extract from Anthony Forster's book 'South Australia, its Progress and Prosperity' 1866
Rainfall chart, maps and articles describing the creation of Goyder's Line of rainfall.
Newspaper article discussing the state of the government dam, a sign calling Warnertown Napperby, and the need for a school
Newspaper article describing the Hundred, the towns of Carrieton and Eurelia, and the problem of water.
Newspaper article describing the condition of the land on the first railway trip from Murray Bridge to Bordertown
1910 Early Farming on the Appila Plain
Newspaper article describing the settlement of the early agriculturalists.
1914 Petersburg. A Dip into History
Newspaper article describing the establishment of the town of Peterborough, the railways and the water.
- Maps+
1828-1874 Routes of Exploration
Contemporary alongside early maps
1850-1920 Progress of the State:
Pastoral, Alienated Land & Infrastructure
Interactive Maps
2012 Map of the Area covered by this Site
showing Terrain, Subdivisions, Roads, Towns, Services, etc
A timeline of Settlement with a 5-yearly progression of land surveys.
1854-2012 Construction of Railways
The development and decline of the railways.
- Documents+
1834-1917 Parliamentary Acts
Parliamentary Acts in PDF format
Books in PDF format
1829 Wakefield's Colonization Proposals
1839 John Stephens' South Australia
1841-2 Edward John Eyre's Journals
- Climate+
Interactive Graphics
Graphics courtesy of the Bureau of Meteorology
Figures courtesy of the Bureau of Meteorology
- Towns+
- Services+
Police
BankSA
Australia Post
Westpac
NAB
- Accommodation
- Galleries+
In the Hills East of Port Pirie
Watercolours by George Angus, 1846
Trees Alongside Pekina Creek at Orroroo
Abandoned farmhouses between Orroroo and Appila
A drive from Port Pirie over the Hills to the Beetalo Valley
Paddock beside the road between Pekina and Booleroo Centre
Aboriginal Fire Trees North of Port Germein Gorge Road - 1 and 2
Trees beside the road from Laura to Warnertown and Crystal Brook
Town Services
Crystal Brook Art, Craft & Antique Gallery Inc
33 Bowman Street CRYSTAL BROOK . Phone: 8636 3111
Crystal Brook Public Library
CRYSTAL BROOK . Phone: 8636 2150
Police Station
29 Brandis Street CRYSTAL BROOK . Phone: 8636 2200
Crystal Brook Swimming Pool
1 Mais Terrace CRYSTAL BROOK . Phone: 8636 2458
Sport & Recreational Clubs
Crystal Brook Bowling Club
Eyre Street CRYSTAL BROOK . Phone: 8636 2342
Crystal Brook Football Club Inc
Railway Terrace CRYSTAL BROOK . Phone: 8636 2478
Crystal Brook Golf Club Inc
Gladstone Road CRYSTAL BROOK . Phone: 8636 2254
Crystal Brook Motor Cycle Club Inc
CRYSTAL BROOK . Phone: 8636 2564
Education
Crystal Brook Kindergarten
Mais Terrace CRYSTAL BROOK . Phone: 8636 2411
Crystal Brook Primary School
7 Mitchell Road CRYSTAL BROOK . Phone: 8636 2134
Medical
Chris Connelly, Psychologist
70 Mais Terrace CRYSTAL BROOK . Phone: 8636 2266
Crystal Brook Massage Therapy
17 Stanley Street CRYSTAL BROOK . Phone: 1300 342 873
Crystal Brook Medical Practice
Claridge Road CRYSTAL BROOK . Phone: 8636 1180
Spencer Gulf Podiatry
Edmund Terrace CRYSTAL BROOK . Phone: 8636 2001
Willochra Home for the Aged
CRYSTAL BROOK . Phone: 8636 2320
Accommodation
Broughton Lodge Suffolk Stud
CRYSTAL BROOK . Phone: 86365050
Crystal Brook Caravan Park
Bowman Street CRYSTAL BROOK . Phone: 8636 2640
Crystal Brook Hotel
47 Railway Terrace CRYSTAL BROOK . Phone: 8636 2023
Royal Hotel
24 Bowman Street CRYSTAL BROOK . Phone: Hotel 86362018
Agricultural Services
P S Croser
CRYSTAL BROOK . Phone: 8636 2245
Hannaford David & Tracy Smith Seed Cleaning Drying & Grading
David & Tracy Smith Seed Cleaning Drying & Grading
CRYSTAL BROOK . Phone: 0428 847 949
Kerin Agencies
102 Binney Road CRYSTAL BROOK . Phone: 8636 2336
Lower Flinders Animal & Plant Control Board
CRYSTAL BROOK . Phone: 8636 2218
Banks
BankSA
22 Bowman Street CRYSTAL BROOK . Phone: 8636 3179
Beekeepers
K J & H M Grossman, Apiarists
Eyre Road CRYSTAL BROOK . Phone: 8636 2404
Building Contractors & Materials
Groundworx SA
Pirie Road CRYSTAL BROOK . Phone: 0408 220 911
Mid North Concrete Pumping
Lot 199 Government Road CRYSTAL BROOK . Phone: 8636 2180 . 0419 810 406
Adam Norrish Renovations
2 Colton Street CRYSTAL BROOK . Phone: 0412 440
O'Dea Electrical Contracting
Lot 3 Clare Road CRYSTAL BROOK . Phone: 0401 849 731
Perkins Concreting
Cattletrack Road CRYSTAL BROOK . Phone: 8636 2180
Southern Flinders Plumbing & Gasfitting
Craig Jeffries CRYSTAL BROOK . Phone: 0400 183 075
Wohling Electrical
32 Gilbert Street CRYSTAL BROOK . Phone: 8636 2109 . 0419 362 539
Engineering & Machinery
Crouch Rural
26 Brandis Road CRYSTAL BROOK . Phone: 8636 2257
Reddens Machinery Services Pty Ltd
4 - 5 Binney Road CRYSTAL BROOK . Phone: 8636 2137
Rocky River Ag Services
Wongabirrie Road CRYSTAL BROOK . Phone: 8636 2772
Ware Engineering
Clare Road CRYSTAL BROOK . Phone: 8636 2310 . 0417 083 701
Cafes & Restaurants
Harry's Deli
47 Bowman Street CRYSTAL BROOK . Phone: 8636 2207
Jezzabelles Cafe & Takeaway
33 Bowman Road CRYSTAL BROOK . Phone: 8636 2316
Churches
Anglican Church of Australia
55 Brandis Street CRYSTAL BROOK . Phone: 8636 2070
Catholic Church
Catholic Church
Lutheran Church
Lutheran Church
No resident pastor at present
Ring Leona Oborn 8633 1092 or
Melva Kloener 8632 1344 for weekly service times
Uniting Church in Australia
59 Brandis Street CRYSTAL BROOK . Phone: 8636 2045
Computers & Communications
British Aerospace Australia Ltd
CRYSTAL BROOK . Phone: 8636 2849
Fuel Merchants
L H Perry & Sons Pty Ltd
68 Eyre Street CRYSTAL BROOK . Phone: 8636 2274
Gardening & Horticultural
Neil Davidson Worm Farms
9 Frith Road CRYSTAL BROOK . Phone: 8636 3010
Southern Flinders Mowing Service
CRYSTAL BROOK . Phone: 0438 009 848
Motor Engineers & Repairers
Crystal Brook Crash & Auto
29 Darbon Terrace CRYSTAL BROOK . Phone: 8636 2302
Tyreplus
29 Darbon Terrace CRYSTAL BROOK . Phone: 1300 897 375
Retail
Australia Post
2 Railway Terrace CRYSTAL BROOK . Phone: 8636 2021
The Brook Meat Store
Bowman Street CRYSTAL BROOK . Phone: 8636 2026
Crystal Brook Hardware & Garden Centre
42 Bowman Street CRYSTAL BROOK . Phone: 8636 2430
Crystal Brook Natural Products
20 Eyre Road CRYSTAL BROOK . Phone: 8636 2715 . 0408 810 859
Crystal Brook Newsagency
Bowman Street CRYSTAL BROOK . Phone: 8636 2071
Hair Gallery
1 Bowman Street CRYSTAL BROOK . Phone: 8636 2410
IGA
Bowman Street CRYSTAL BROOK . Phone: 8636 2017
Kupsch Bakery
Bowman Street CRYSTAL BROOK . Phone: 8636 2089
Original Patina
9 Darbon Terrace CRYSTAL BROOK . Phone: 0407 792 019
Ramsey Pharmacy
32 Bowman Street CRYSTAL BROOK . Phone: 8636 2063
Shear Success
47 Bowman Street CRYSTAL BROOK . Phone: 8636 2681
Service Stations
BP
26 Brandis Street CRYSTAL BROOK . Phone: 8636 2257
68 Eyre Highway CRYSTAL BROOK . 8636 2222
Surveyors
Kevin Burgess & Assoc Pty Ltd
29 Mitchell Street CRYSTAL BROOK . Phone: 8636 2830
Transport - Heavy
B M & B K Noonan
O'Shaughnessey Road CRYSTAL BROOK . Phone: 0429 810 639
First explored by Edward John Eyre in 1839, Crystal Brook is at the southern gateway to the Flinders Ranges. A service centre to some of South Australia's productive sheep and wheat country, it is an attractive, well maintained town, with a delightful main street.
The Crystal Brook Run was one of the original South Australian pastoral runs, encompassing 1450 square kilometres and the main homestead, Bowman Park, is now part of the Bowman Park Native Fauna Section. Their website can be seen here.
The National Trust Museum (pictured left) was the first two storey construction in the town, originally owned by E. H. Hewett Baker and completed in 1875. It has interesting displays of machinery and farming equipment and an impressive historic photograph exhibition. Because it was once a bakery it has a rare underground oven.
5 km east of Crystal Brook, Bowman Park Native Fauna Section is located on the Heysen Trail and offers visitors an opportunity to walk a short section of the trail at the southern end of the Flinders Ranges. The park has historic buildings which date back to 1847, an excellent Australian reptile collection, and a wide variety of native animals which abound during the hours after dark.
For details of accommodation and opening times contact (08) 8636 2116.
31 August 1932
WHEN CRYSTAL BROOK WAS SHEEP RUN
Kangaroos Were Driven Into The Sea
PIONEER'S STORY
By Our Travelling Staff Representative
Mrs. David Heaslip, who is 88, is a real Crystal Brook pioneer. As a girl of 15, she came to this district to the Bowman's Crystal Brook head station which also included Napperby, Nelshaby and Broughton runs.
The boundaries of this huge stretch of country, owned by John, William, and Thomas Bowman, were the sea and Broughton River.....
....at 15 she was engaged by Mrs. Bowman at Crystal Brook station until she married Mr. Heaslip at Mintaro in 1882. Her husband came up to H. B. Hughes's Boovoolie estate at Gladstone, where for three years he broke in horses for Indian remounts. They then went to live on Nelshaby, Napperby, and at the Bowman's head station until the northern areas were opened up and Mr. Heaslip bought a farm at Hughes Gap, a portion of Booyoolee.
Mr. Heaslip had one of the first contracts to fence Crystal Brook run. He also had the contract to sink the first railway dam at Warnertown - a huge catchment two or three chains long. It is silted level now.
Fighting Drought And Pests
"The season was very good when we went to Crystal Brook, but in 1865, I think it was, there was no water and nearly all the stock were sent to Nelshaby." Mrs. Heaslip told me. "All the calves and foals were destroyed. Most of the sheep were shorn at Napperby, where more than 50 shearers were engaged at the big shed. The wool was carted to Bowman's jetty at Port Pirie.
"During the drought the springs went dry, and they had to sink wells. It was shearing time, but when they went out one morning to get a tank of water they found that the well had been filled with sand overnight. It was nearly dinner time before they got sufficient water."
Mrs. Heaslip recalled the big kangaroo hunts when all the men and dogs from the three stations mustered the marsupials, and drove them into the sea. She spoke of the hundreds of wild cattle, which in drought times stampeded down from the Beetaloo and Napperby hills to the sea, drank the salt water, and perished; the huge wild pigs on the Broughton which were quickly despatched because they killed the lambs.
"I wonder how these pigs got there in the first place," Mrs. Heaslip reflected. "They must have escaped from a ship. Emus were like flocks of sheep in those days between Crystal Brook and Napperby. I have seen blackfellows stalking along behind a big bough and spearing them."
.... The late David Heaslip took up a section of land at Hughes' Gap when Booyoolee was first subdivided. He had to cart water from the creek until he sunk a dam there. Until the railway was constructed the wheat was carted to Port Pirie. One could often see long processions of bullock teams drawing loads of grain in summer and winter. Mrs. Heaslip remembers having seen Mr. Goyders survey camp when he was working out his famous line of rainfall.
