Tas That Was
Tas That Was – King Island
Currie, King Island’s biggest town, in 1914.
A very long time ago, King Island formed part of a land bridge that Aboriginals used to travel between Tasmania and mainland Australia. Rising sea levels submerged the bridge around 12,000 years ago.
There were no permanent Aboriginal communities living on King Island by 1799, when Captain William Reed of the schooner Martha became the first European to ever see it. English seafarer John Black visited the island shortly after and named it ‘King’s Island’ after Philip Gidley King, who was Governor of New South Wales at the time.
Governor King soon learned of the island’s existence and quickly arranged for it to be claimed for Great Britain before the French could get to it.*
King Island was formally settled in the late 1800s, and agriculture, grazing, and dairying soon became the main industries. A tungsten ore called scheelite** was also discovered on the south-east coast in the early 1900s, so a mine was established to extract it. It closed in 1990 due to “a failure to market and sell the concentrate produced […] and the high costs associated with the […] plant”.
After the end of the World War One in 1919, soldier settlement farms on King Island were offered to ex-servicemen to help them establish new lives after the conflict. More farms were advertised after World War Two, with The Mount Barker Courier and Onkaparinga and Gumeracha Advertiser reporting in 1952:
“Eighty-eight (88) dairy and fourteen (14) fat lamb farms on King Island […] are now open for application from ex-servicemen who have been classified in any State of the Commonwealth as eligible and suitable for War Service Land Settlement.
“Ex-servicemen interested may obtain an illustrated booklet giving detailed information regarding facilities available on the Island, the farms themselves and conditions of settlement, by application to the Deputy Director, War Service Land Settlement, ‘Claridge House’, 52 Gawler Place, Adelaide.”
Around 161 soldier settlement farms had been occupied under the War Service Land Settlement Scheme by 1959-61; however, King Island News reported that the number had gone down to 137 by the end of September 1965.
Despite this, King Island’s agriculture, grazing and dairying industries are still operating today. Tourism has also become important for its identity and local economy.
Shipwrecked!
Since King Island was discovered by Europeans, a lot of ships have been wrecked off its coast due to a combination of factors, such as rough seas and hidden underwater rocks.
The number of shipwrecks dropped significantly after lighthouses were built on the island. Advances in navigation and weather forecasting have also helped reduce them even further.
* Relations between Great Britain and France were not that great at the time. In fact, the two nations were on the brink of war. It wasn’t until the late 1800s that their relationship began to improve.
** Scheelite is a calcium tungstate mineral that is a highly important ore of tungsten, a critical metal essential for manufacturing extremely hard materials (tungsten carbide) and high-temperature components (filaments, alloys) vital to modern industrial and defense technologies.
Tas That Was is a column that includes:
- anecdotes of life in Tasmania in the past;
- historical photographs of locations in Tasmania; and/or
- documentaries about locations in Tasmania.
If you have an anecdote or photograph you’d like to share with us, please send it to submit@tasmaniantimes.com.
Callum J. Jones is passionate about telling stories. He studied English, History, and Journalism at the University of Tasmania and lived in Western Sydney from 2022 to 2024 while working as a journalist for Professional Planner, a leading online publication for financial planners. Callum has written for Tasmanian Times since 2018 and has also been published in a range of other outlets, including Quadrant and the BAD Western Sydney anthologies.
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