| Dowerin
Latitude 31 12 S Longitude
117 02 E
The townsite of Dowerin,
like many such towns in the central wheatbelt, owes its location to
the railway. In 1906 the government extended the railway from Goomalling
to the developing Dowerin Agricultural Area and decided to survey
a townsite at the terminus. The Aboriginal name of the site chosen
was "Wuguni", but "Dowerin", also an Aboriginal
name, was already in local use for the place, and was the name gazetted
in 1907. The name is derived from nearby Lake Dowerin, first recorded
on maps around 1879. One source suggests Dowerin is the Aboriginal
word for the twenty eight parrot (Dow-arn), and another suggests it
means "place of the throwing stick"(dower).
Harvesting
the Net
sponsored by the
Western Australian Department of Agriculture
Click on the small picture to enlarge |