The tiny settlement of Coonamble was proclaimed a township in 1861 and was in the middle of a boom period when the first edition of the Coonamble Times was printed on 1 April 1885.
From a collection of small huts in the area between the Castlereagh River and the Magomodine Creek (known as the Coonamble Creek) near the present Warrena Creek bridge, businesses were still moving to higher ground after a series of floods in the 1870s and new businesses were joining them along Castlereagh, Namoi and Aberford Streets.
The activity was intense.
A court house was built in 1874 in the vicinity of 15 Tooloon Street; no less than four new hotels were constructed, including the Commercial Hotel in 1876; three or four banks; two large stores in Castlereagh Street – Lewis Mason’s and Fog & Polin, and two in Namoi Street – Willmotts and Herrmans; as well as the first St Barnabas Church of England (1875).
Cobb and Co were operating a bi-weekly service between Mudgee and Coonamble by 1876.
The district’s first newspaper, the Coonamble Independent (subtitled The Castlereagh River Advocate), published its first edition on 12 January 1878.
The first two government buildings made of brick were built in Aberford Street, the Court House with a Watch House (1877) and the public school building (which is now the CHS library) in 1879.
The building of the Mechanics Institute hall which could seat between four and five hundred people, had been completed in early 1880.
Coonamble was declared a Municipal District on 3 May 1880 with the first council meeting held in the Court House in July.
One of the new council’s first projects was the ‘alignment and formation of streets and the provision of footways …
‘Tree stumps and burrs had to be removed before any work could be done in Castlereagh and Namoi Streets.’
In 1881 the brick Post Office was constructed on its present site at the corner of Castlereagh and Aberford Streets.
In 1883 the Brigidine nuns arrived to start a Catholic school, and the same year the first P&A Show was held.
The foundation stone was laid for a hospital on the current site in 1883 and was opened the following year.
Also in 1883 the first bridge was built over the Castlereagh River.
‘A general store was built on the corner of Namoi and Aberford streets for the On Sing Chong Company which was headquartered in Sydney. They also established a fruit and vegetable garden in West Coonamble, supplying the needs of residents for 1/- (Shilling) Per week.’ Other Chinese gardens were already operating in the years prior.
1883 was also the year that the national government established the Aborigines Protection Board with the intention of assisting Aboriginal people but which kept them isolated from the rest of the population in camps on stations or in reserves on the outskirts of towns.
Large numbers of rural settlers were still arriving, especially after the Crown Lands Act of 1884 increased the size of selections in this region to a more viable 2,560 acres.
‘Carriers, stockmen, fencers, dam makers, shearers and other itinerant workers made the town their headquarters.’
Coonamble township was busy with industry.
The Mooy brothers had established a sawmill where ‘most of the timber for town and district buildings were cut’.
There were carriage and coach builders, saddlers, a brickyard, at least one brewery and cordial factory, a soap factory, various bakeries, blacksmiths, a jeweller and more.
A newsagency, first opened by the Canhams in a shed attached to a house near the river end of Castlereagh Street, had been doing business since the early 1870s and the first telegraph service was operating from the post office by the mid 1880s.
Pollution in the river and creek, including from a wool scour and a slaughterhouse located on the outskirts of town, was a concern as was the hygiene of the populous as the town continued to grow.
In 1885 the Council bought a ‘night soil cart and called for tenders for the emptying of closets and cesspits’.
Council also ‘instructed herdsmen to impound the cattle, sheep, pigs and goats that roamed unattended through the streets of the town.’
The Coonamble Times was born towards the end of a three year drought – and just a few weeks after two prisoners escaping the lock-up at Coonamble police station fatally shot Constable John Mitchell.
Optimism abounds
Still, the founder saw potential in the town and district, and felt there was a sufficient market for a second newspaper.
While there are no handy population figures for the time, it is likely that the township had no more than 1000 residents.
There was higher rainfall in 1886/87 but this was followed by a series of very dry seasons which broke with a flood in 1890.
The first rabbits had arrived in the district and gradually became a major pest, decimating precious pastures, as well as providing a food source for those who needed it.
Without a permanent water supply, townspeople relied on their house rainwater tanks or a public well in the eastern park.
It was still some years before electricity reached the town, with kerosene street lights lit by hand each night.
Coonamble was definitely in the wild west when Irish immigrant John McWilliam arrived from Mudgee with his family to set up the Coonamble Times in early 1885.
Thanks to the tenacity of local residents and business people, the Coonamble Times has now borne witness and recorded the life of the town and district for the past 140 years.
EDITOR’S NOTE: This rough outline of Coonamble in the 1880s has borrowed liberally from Joan McKenzie’s book, ‘The Vision Splendid’. The phrases in parentheses are hers, with some gaps filled by accounts reproduced in the Official Souveneir booklet published for the ‘Back to Coonamble’ Week held 14 to 19 September 1925.