Bridge across the Bogan River

Nyngan (and Canonba)
Pleasant country town and service centre on the Bogan River
Nyngan is a country town of some 2500 people, situated by the Bogan River on the eastern edge of the Great Outback. It is located on the Mitchell Highway between Narromine and Bourke, 583 km north-west of Sydney and 173 metres above sea-level. The Barrier Highway also starts at Nyngan, heading west to Cobar. Wool, wheat and cattle are the primary local produce in what is a very productive pastoral and agricultural shire.

The district was originally inhabited by the Ngiyambaa Aborigines. Thomas Mitchell explored the Bogan River in 1835, camping on the future townsite. He recorded the local Aboriginal word 'nyingan', said to mean 'long pond of water', though other meanings have been put forward. Squatters had settled in Mitchell's wake before he had even begun the return journey.

The acting botanist with the expedition was Richard Cunningham, the younger brother of noted explorer Allan Cunningham. He was killed by Aborigines 84 km south-east of Nyngan when he got lost after straying from the main party (a cairn marks the spot, near the locality of Tabratong). Apparently Cunningham approached the Aborigines gesticulating that he was hungry. They fed him and he made camp with them but he aroused suspicions in the course of the night when he arose several times so they clubbed him to death while he slept. A cairn has been erected to mark the spot. The police investigated and arrested three men who readily confessed. Two later escaped and a third was taken to Sydney, his fate unknown.

This was not an isolated incident. Relationships with Aborigines on the lower Bogan River were characterised by conflict and, as a result, the government cancelled all pastoral licenses beyond the Derribong run in 1845.

It is said that a massacre occurred in the area in 1842. During a prolonged drought some stockmen employed by William Lee set off from a station 16 km north of Peak Hill in search of water with 1200 cattle in tow. They came across a large waterhole, to the north of present-day Nyngan, where a large number of Aborigines were camped. The whites informed the Aborigines that only those who wished to work could stay and the rest must leave. Not surprisingly, this caused considerable ill-feeling. When one Aborigine shook his fist at the stockmen he was strung up by the wrists and whipped. One of the white men was concerned at the signs of growing resentment and tried to convince the others to leave but, failing in his endeavours, he departed on his own. He looked back later in the day and noted birds of prey hovering over the distant site. He returned and found five badly mutilated bodies and one survivor with severe wounds.

When the deaths were reported a police troop was sent to inflict punishment. It is said three were killed and three arrested but it is believed that hundreds more Aborigines were subsequently killed. Certainly when Thomas Mitchell revisited the area in 1845 he was surprised by the absence of Aborigines when he had estimated a thousand to live along the river during his 1835 expedition. When word of the massacres reached Governor Gipps he cancelled William Lee's squatting license.

The small town of Canonba was the first local settlement of any duration. It was established to the west of the Bogan and 28 km north-west of today's Nyngan. Cobb & Co made it a coach stop on the route north-west to Bourke and to the properties of the far west. Bushranger Charles Rutherford was shot by the owner of the Canonba Inn in 1867 while bailing up the establishment.

Nyngan was gazetted as a reserve for water in 1865 but a townsite was not reserved until 1880. It was surveyed in 1882 when the Dubbo-Bourke railway was under construction. The track arrived in Nyngan the following year, signalling the end of Canonba's existence. Symbolically enough, a number of houses from the older settlement were dismantled and re-erected at Nyngan in 1883.

By this time the initial emphasis on cattle had been balanced by the grazing of merino sheep for their wool. Wheat-growing also began in the 1880s although unreliable rainfall has always been a problem, as the Bogan only flows after rain. The town received a secure water supply in 1942 when water was relayed along a 62-km canal from the Macquarie River.

Nyngan became a municipality in 1891. A meatworks developed on the outskirts of town in the 1890s for the boiling down of sheep and an experimental farm was established in 1910 to further wheat cultivation.

Nyngan, little known in the east, entered the national psyche in 1990 when it was deluged with the worst floods of the century. The townspeople laid 260 000 sandbags on top of the established levee but the waters inundated the entire town, causing $50 million worth of damage and necessitating the airlift by helicopter of 2000 citizens, virtually the entire population. A national relief fund was established to help the town recover.

Today Nyngan's role as a rail centre has terminated with the cancellation of the service to Bourke and it is now a service centre to the surrounding district. The Agricultural Show is held in May.

Things to see:  

Tourist Information
Burn's Video and Gift Shop is the local information centre. It is located at 105 Pangee St, between Tabratong and Dandaloo Sts, tel: (02) 6832 1155.

Nyngan Council Chambers and Town Hall

Historic Buildings
Most of the town's heritage buildings are located in Cobar and Bogan Sts. The town hall (1897), courthouse and post office (1880) are in the former, between Terangion St and Tabratong St. On opposite corners of the Bogan and Terangion St intersection are the Anglican and Catholic Churches. Bogan St also has a number of private homes from the 1890s. Barrett's Hotel, in Nymagee St, was built in 1865, then rebuilt after a fire, in 1884. A blacksmith's and stables was once located to its rear. The Heritage Coffee Shop is located in a building which was once the Nyngan Hotel (1883), on Nymagee St.

Heritage Centre
The old railway station in Pangee St, near the Dandaloo St intersection, has been restored and converted into an historical museum. It includes a display relating to the 1990 flood and the old telephone exchange, amongst other items relating to local history.

Vanges Park
Adjacent the railway station in Pangee St is a helicopter, a gift from the Australian Government to the people of Nyngan to commemorate the occasion in April 1990 when 2000 people, nearly the entire population, were evacuated, largely by helicopter, due to the breaching of the levee by record floodwaters.

Blue Arrow Tour
The Blue Arrow Tour (22.6 km) starts at the Heritage Cottage and is guided by signposts featuring a blue arrow on a white background. There is an accompanying booklet available from the information centre. It offers a comprehensive overview of the major places of interest around the town.

Memorial Sculpture
The Pioneer Memorial sculpture of a drover, his dog and a mob of sheep is located at the corner of Pangee and Moonagee Sts.

Rotary Park
Rotary Park, on the western bank of the Bogan River, adjacent the Mitchell Highway, is a pleasant rest area with a miniature rainforest.

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The Nyngan Coach Works

Visitors can see Don Burns building and restoring Cobb & Co coaches and Royal Mail vehicles, utilising 19th-century methods and technologies. There is a coach display area, a blacksmith's shop, an old police lock-up, a range of original parts for horse-drawn vehicles, and an old pioneer's cottage. It is located in a Council Depot and Workshop on the corner of Moonagee and Nymagee Sts.

Cobb & Co Heritage Trail
The historic inland coaching company, Cobb & Co, celebrated the 150th anniversary of its first journey in 2004 (and the 80th anniversary of its last, owing to the emergence of motorised transport). The trailblazing company's contribution to Australia's development is celebrated with the establishment of a heritage trail which explores the terrain covered on one of its old routes: between Bathurst and Bourke.

Cobb & Co's origins lay in the growing human traffic prompted by the goldrushes of the early 1850s. As the Heritage Trail website states: 'The company was enormously successful and had branches or franchises throughout much of Australia, New Zealand, South Africa and Japan. At its peak, Cobb & Co operated along a network of tracks that extended further than those of any other coach system in the world ­ its coaches travelled 28,000 miles (44,800km) per week and 6000 (out of their 30,000) horses were harnessed every day. Cobb & Co created a web of tracks from Normanton on the Gulf of Carpentaria and Port Douglas on the Coral Sea down to the furthest reaches of Victoria and South Australia ­ in all, a continuous line of 2000 miles (3200km) of track over eastern Australia from south to north, with a total of 7000 miles (11,200km) of regular routes' (see www.cobbandco.net.au).

Cobb & Co sites include the Nyngan Coach Works, the Heritage Coffee Shop (which has items from the coaching days), the post office, the Royal Hotel (on the riverbank, at the corner of Cobar and Nyngan Sts), Barrett's Hotel (in Nymagee St) and the Nyngan Museum. Also in the district are the ghost town of Canonba (once a thriving Cobb and Co coach terminal), the Buckiinguy property (once owned by Cobb & Co partner William Franklin Whitney, whose child is buried on the property), Duck Creek Bridge (the first bridge built west of Dubbo), built especially to facilitate Cobb & Co traffic, Larsen's Pub, the ruins of the Monkey and Willeroon change stations, and remnants of a zig-zag fence, especialy designed to allow Cobb & Co coaches to pass through stockyards without opening and closing gates.

	Tourist Information
	Nyngan Tourist Information Outlet 105 Pangee St Nyngan NSW 2825 Telephone: (02) 6832 1155
	Motels
	Alamo Motor Inn Mitchell Hwy Nyngan NSW 2825 Telephone: (02) 6832 1660 Rating: ***
	Canonba Motel/Hotel 129 Pangee St Nyngan NSW 2825 Telephone: (02) 6832 1559 Rating: **
	Country Manor Motor Inn 145 Pangee St Nyngan NSW 2825 Telephone: (02) 6832 1447 Rating: ***
	Nyngan Motor Inn Mitchell Hwy Nyngan NSW 2825 Telephone: (02) 6832 1501 Rating: ***
	Hotels
	Australian Hotel 42 Nymagee St Nyngan NSW 2825 Telephone: (02) 6832 1108
	Barretts Hotel 64 Nymagee St Nyngan NSW 2825 Telephone: (02) 6832 1028
	Overlander Hotel 89 Pangee St Nyngan NSW 2825 Telephone: (02) 6832 1535 Facsimile: (02) 6832 1517
	Caravan Parks
	Nyngan Caravan Park 12 Old Warren Rd Nyngan NSW 2825 Telephone: (02) 6832 1705 Rating: *
	Riverside Caravan Park Barrier Hwy Nyngan NSW 2825 Telephone: (02) 6832 1729 Rating: **
	Restaurants
	Nyngan Motor Inn Mitchell Hwy Nyngan NSW 2825 Telephone: (02) 6832 1501