Explorers Whaling Kent Town The Fowlers Bay Run Mexican Hat/Scotts Beach Coorabie
The town of Fowlers Bay was originally surveyed as the town of Yalata in March 1890, by N W Pethick, with 42 allotments. It was changed to Fowlers Bay on 19 September 1940. The bay was named Fowlers Bay by Matthew Flinders on 28 January 1802, after his lieutenant, R N Fowler who later became Admiral Fowler.
W R Swan, who leased the Fowlers Bay Run, had established the original Yalata Homestead by 1860 on the edge of the beach at Fowlers Bay on the site later developed as the Globe Hotel.
The hall was originally makeshift buildings, whatever was not in use at the time. In 1909, a spacious shed owned by W H Betts was used as a hall and for the New Year's Eve Dance. Another report says that dances were held fortnightly in an old shed at the back of the hotel. The hall was built by Mr Tom Giles, who was also the Harbour Master, and Mr Alf May. G W Murray laid the foundation stone on 28 July 1922 and in January 1923, F J Smart opened the building. It is used today for parties, weddings, anything!
The Globe Hotel, situated at the southern end of the town, was opened on 28 June 1892, by James Riddle, the first licensee. It was closed in 1936. It has now been demolished.
The Fowlers Bay Post Office was opened in 1865 and closed on 14 May 1967. It is the last stone house before the sandhills on the seafront, south of the kiosk, now privately owned. The Post Office was also a telegraph station connected to Eucla. The Fowlers Bay school 1893-1959, was situated on the beach front almost opposite the present hall. The school opened in the middle of 1893 but was often closed over the years and in 1959 it closed permanently. Another building there when the town was first surveyed was the Police Station, which closed in 1961, and is now privately owned. The Police controlled a large area in those days, from Eucla down to Denial Bay.
In 1925, Fowlers Bay was in a steady decline and by 1940 the only businesses that still existed were a boarding house, the Post Office and the school. When the east - west Eyre Highway bypassed them, it seemed the town was doomed.
However, today Fowlers Bay is a thriving tourist area, with a modern, clean caravan park and a small kiosk with groceries, takeaways, bait and tackle and diesel and a playground, public telephone and toilets. Holiday units are also available for rent. Several families live permanently at Fowlers and an ever-increasing number of holiday shacks are being erected. Sightseeing reveals some of the most wild, beautiful, isolated coastal scenery, pristine beaches and fabulous fishing spots in South Australia.
Fowlers Bay was also a stepping off point for inland explorers such as Ernest Giles who left from Fowlers on 3 March 1875, and Richard Thewall Maurice. Maurice died aged 49 years and is buried at the Yalata Station Homestead. It was reported in a 1939 West Coast Sentinel that some of the early settlers at Fowlers Bay had dug up provisions buried by Edward John Eyre, near the Globe Hotel. Major Warburton surveyed the Far West Coast in 1858 and 1860. He recorded that he received much kindness from Swan at Fowlers Bay before he set off for "No Man's Land."
In the much earlier days of Fowlers Bay, there was a whaling station on the shore at Point Fowler, and it is still possible to see whale bones around the area. There were big boilers in the sandhills by Kent Town.
Tom Kent, kangaroo hunter, was the son of Dr Kent after whom Kent Town in Adelaide is named. Tom Kent had set up his own Kent Town behind the sandhills at Fowlers Bay, west of the Globe Hotel, all covered with sand now. An 1892 survey map shows an old chimney near the site and graves were noted nearby. Strings of bottles marked the edge of paths leading to the township. Old timers remembered Kent Town as "a collection of cottages inhabited by kangarooers and their families, a green patch backed by sandhills."
Although proposals to build the jetty began in 1860, it wasn't until 1896 that the jetty was built and it was extended in the years 1907, 1914 and 1945. Its present length is 360 mts, and a great place to try for squid and fish.
For many years, at the entrance to the Adelaide Museum there was a large life size plaster cast of a basking shark. It was 7.5 mts long and 4.5 mts around and weighed 1.5 tonnes. The fish was first seen in Fowlers Bay on Friday 24 July 1914. Once dead, the shark was identified as a species of basking shark, selacha maximus, known to attain a length of 12 mts. At that time, there were no other specimen in Australia and occasioned a great deal of interest. Although it is of great size, this shark is quite harmless to humans. After 50years on display, the plaster cast was replaced by a fibreglass model. The old one was donated to the Ceduna National Trust where it is now a prize exhibit.
In 1858, Mr W R Swan joined forces with Mr Robert Barr Smith and they put in a claim for an immense area of country, which was known as the Fowlers Bay Run. Smith and Swan acquired leases from White Well (the current Head of the Bight area) through to Penong, Charra and down to Point Brown, south of Smoky Bay. They held more than 5000 square ha of land in 1885 and 122,318 sheep were shorn at Yalata and Penong. St Peter Island, near Ceduna, was originally allotted to Barr Smith in 1865 and resumed by the government in 1888. In 1882, Barr Smith had a house built there and used the land for raising sheep. W R Swan stayed two years in the Fowlers Bay area and established the original Yalata Homestead by 1860.
The homestead was established around 1880 in its present position 12 kms west of Fowlers Bay on the road to Coorabie.
G W Murray was manager until 1922. He rebuilt the homestead and it was described as having extensive outbuildings, storerooms, shearing sheds and shearing quarters. The house was a gracious and substantial building remembered for parties and throngs of visitors, the dinners and balls, the glassed-in fernery, beautiful drapes and carpeting, silver and china ware, vast rooms with high ceilings and huge fireplaces. There were tiled passages, halls and skylighted courtyards and great stone tanks at the rear. The Run had a head station, Yalata, and was divided into outstations; Colona, Penong, Charra, Pt Brown and minor outstations; Bookabie, Cundilippy, Nundroo, Pintumba and Pedinga. Smith and Swan gave much away to charitable institutions but used a lot of their Fowlers Bay money to maintain their mansions in Adelaide.
Yalata Homestead was demolished in the 1950s after being abandoned for more than 20 years. The owners of this private property kindly allow access to visitors to view the ruins. Please leave gates as you find them and do not litter the area.
These are two places you must visit as you go sightseeing around the Fowlers Bay area. The sand and the sea and the views are spectacular. Travel along the cliff tops for fabulous views, stroll along sandy beaches, try some beach fishing - plenty of salmon when in season!
There are no facilities at Coorabie. The name Coorabie is aboriginal for "magpie water"' taken from the aboriginal word Kuragabie. The township of Coorabie came into existence as the result of a request and petition forwarded to the Commissioner of Crown Lands in June 1913 by the Coorabie branch of the Agricultural Bureau. A counter petition was also signed by 31 people who did not want a new town! It was decided that a town would be started and Coorabie was proclaimed in February 1915. A small cemetery is situated on the western side of the town. A school was opened in 1897 in a shepherd's hut west of the town, with 12 children in attendance. In 1901, a new building was erected by the residents. This building had the dual role of school and hall. In 1909, a larger hall was built under the supervision of George Cabot. The Coorabie War Memorial, built by Mr Walter Fox in 1950, is situated at the junction of four roads in the heart of Coorabie. Today the town consists of around 8 houses, tennis courts, disused school, hall and SA Transport depot. And there are some wonderful sandy beaches and great fishing spots nearby!
