Murranji Track

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Sister Ellen Kettle vehicle while travelling on the Murranji track, 1962 Sister Ellen Kettle en route on Murranji track.tif
Sister Ellen Kettle vehicle while travelling on the Murranji track, 1962
Stock on Murranji Track after being dipped at Lake Nash, 1953 Stock on murranji stock route after being dipped at lake nash.png
Stock on Murranji Track after being dipped at Lake Nash, 1953

The Murranji Track or Murranji Stock Route is a stock route in the Northern Territory of Australia and it runs between Newcastle Waters and Top Springs. [1] The track was primarily operational between 1904 and the late 1960s and it attracted descriptions as the "ghost road of the Drovers" and the "death track". [2] It was used as an entry point to the Barkly Tableland and it is nearby to Wave Hill, Auvergne and Victoria River Downs Stations. [3] [4]

Contents

It is on the lands of the Mudburra and Djingili peoples and their rights to this land has been established by the Aboriginal Land Rights (Northern Territory) Act 1976 and the Native Title Act 1993. [5] [6]

Use of the track declined from 1966 when the Buchanan Highway was completed and it is now rarely used as a stock route and is now an unsealed road. [5] [7] [8] It is 644 km long. [9]

History

The land surrounding the Murranji Track was first explored by Europeans by John McDouall Stuart who found it impenetrable [10] and it was first used as a track by pastoralist and drover Nat Buchanan in 1886 when taking cattle to The Kimberleys (Western Australia). [9] [11] Buchanan travelled alongside Gordon Buchanan, "Greenhide" Sam Croker, Willie Glass, Archie Ferguson and Mick Berry. [12] Their journey was successful as they were led through by a Mudburra guide, who showed them where to find water, and the name "Murranji" comes from the name for a species of burrowing frog in the Mudburra language. [5] [12]

Use of the track was limited until, in 1904, one of Sidney Kidman's drover's, Blake Miller used it and it became a popular shortcut; despite this at least 11 drovers are known to have died along its route. [12]

It was notoriously difficult to transport stock on this track because of the lack of waterholes, with dry stages of up to 180 km, dense scrub (thorny lancewood and bullwaddy) and limestone soil. When moving cattle the limestone soil had the effect of making a drumming sound; this often spooked cattle. [1] The main water sources were soakages named the Bucket (Wirntirrkuji), the Murranji and Yellow Waterhole (Binjacootra). [5] The Bucket was named for an iron bucket left there by Buchanan. [13]

Ernestine Hill wrote about the history and development of the track for Walkabout (magazine) in 1949. [13]

Major improvements were made to the track during World War II with government bores being built and bulldozers being used to smooth the road; writing about these improvements Hilda Abbott said "since then the cattle have walked like gentlemen through wide, scrub-bordered boulevards". [14] Abbott also said of the track more generally: [14]

Just after the "Wet" the Murranji is magic. It lies in the southern fringe of the jungle country winding through close forests of tall straight lancewoods. Bulwaddi trees with gnarled branches and spindly dark foliage are sombre and savage looking but the bloodwoods will be in bloom, each creamy blossom holding a globule of honey.

— Hilda Abbott, ABC Weekly, 10 November 1951

One of the most famous trips on the Murranji Track was by Edna Zingenbine in 1950 who was the first female "Boss Drover" and made headlines throughout Australia. [15] In the 1950s it was also frequently travelled by Bill Tapp who established a droving business which used it regularly. [16] [17] It was also travelled by Ellen Kettle in 1962 as pictured above.

Graffiti

The tanks along the Murranji Track are also home to a significant collection of graffiti, these date from the late 1930s to the 1960s and are a unique form of documentation along the track. All of these messages are faded and some have completely disappeared but many still survive. The graffiti primarily consists of messages, insults, poems, laments and drawings of the Murranji drovers. There are also a number of signatures including one by Owen Cummins the "Territory's own man from Snowy River". [18]

The remaining drawings were photographed and traced onto plastic sheets by archaeologist and historian Darrell Lewis. [18] The graffiti have been replicated in Lewis' detailed history of the track in The Murranji track: ghost road of the drovers (2007). [19]

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References

  1. 1 2 "Welcome to Newcastle Waters". www.exploringaustralia.com.au. Retrieved 22 February 2024.
  2. ↑ "The Murranji Track – Boolarong Press" . Retrieved 22 February 2024.
  3. ↑ Hartt, Haliden (1 October 1944). "Out on the Murranji". Walkabout . Retrieved 23 February 2024.
  4. ↑ Australian Geographical Society. 124143 421c3670-a164-5721-8ebb-e16110b2ed57 (1 June 1950), "MURRANJI TRACK (1 June 1950)", Walkabout, 16 (6), Australian National Travel Association: 10, ISSN   0043-0064 {{citation}}: CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link)
  5. 1 2 3 4 5 Office of the Aboriginal Land Commissioner (1987). "Murranji land claim, PP no. 250 of 1987, Report no. 25". Trove. Retrieved 22 February 2024.
  6. ↑ "DCD2007/002 - Newcastle Waters - Murranji Determination". Native Title Determination Details. 26 September 2007. Retrieved 22 February 2024.
  7. ↑ "Buchanan Highway". NT Place Names Register. Retrieved 23 February 2024.
  8. ↑ "Map of Murranji Stock Route in the Northern Territory - Bonzle Digital Atlas of Australia". www.bonzle.com. Retrieved 22 February 2024.
  9. 1 2 O'Neill, Sally, "Nathaniel (Nat) Buchanan (1826–1901)", Australian Dictionary of Biography, Canberra: National Centre of Biography, Australian National University, retrieved 22 February 2024
  10. ↑ Doolan, Jack (1 August 1995). "Terror tales of Murranji track". Northern Territory News .
  11. ↑ "ADVENTURES ON THE MURRANJI TRACK". The Sydney Morning Herald . No. 32, 605. New South Wales, Australia. 27 June 1942. p. 7. Retrieved 22 February 2024– via National Library of Australia.
  12. 1 2 3 Doolan, Jack (20 September 1987). "Murrinji Track, sinister, tough". Sunday Territorian. p. 36.
  13. 1 2 Australian Geographical Society. 124143 421c3670-a164-5721-8ebb-e16110b2ed57 (1 November 1949), "ALONG THE MURRAN-JI (1 November 1949)", Walkabout, 15 (11), Australian National Travel Association: 18, ISSN   0043-0064 {{citation}}: CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link)
  14. 1 2 Abbott, Hilda (10 November 1951). "The Murranji Stock Route". ABC Weekly. Retrieved 23 February 2024.
  15. ↑ "GIRL TO BOSS DROVING OUTFIT". Townsville Daily Bulletin . Vol. LXX. Queensland, Australia. 21 April 1950. p. 2. Retrieved 22 February 2024– via National Library of Australia.
  16. ↑ Tapp Coutts, Toni (2010), Bill Tapp : cattle king : the story about a big man with a big hat and a big heart, Toni Tapp Coutts, ISBN   978-0-646-53363-6
  17. ↑ "Killlarney convoy has slow trip". Northern Standard . Vol. 8, no. 11. Northern Territory, Australia. 12 March 1953. p. 6. Retrieved 29 February 2024– via National Library of Australia.
  18. 1 2 3 Lewis, Darrell (Darrell J.) (2007), The Murranji Track : ghost road of the drovers, Boolarong Press, ISBN   978-1-921920-23-3
  19. ↑ "Darrell Lewis – Boolarong Press" . Retrieved 29 February 2024.
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