Gundagai
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Gundagai is a town of 8,500 located on the Murrumbidgee River 390 km south-west of Sydney, New South Wales, Australia.
The area was the traditional home to the Wiradjuri aboriginal people before European settlement and it is believed the name Gundagai derives from the Wiradjuri word gundabandoobingee which some have thought to mean 'cut with a hand-axe behind the knee'. British explorers Hamilton Hume and William Hovell were the first Europeans to visit when they passed through Gundagai in 1824 and Charles Sturt made an appearance in 1829 at the start of his voyage to the mouth of the Murray River.
The original 1838 town was hit by several floods of the Murrumbidgee river. The June 25, 1852 flood swept the town away, killing at least 78 people (and in the process becoming the largest natural disaster in Australia's history), and an even higher flood in 1853 caused the town to be redeveloped in its current site.
A Gold rush hit the area in 1858 following the discovery of gold and mining continued initially until 1875 and following a second gold rush in 1894, mines operated again until 1905.
In 1867 an iron truss bridge, the Prince Alfred bridge, was completed across the Murrumbidgee river, with a timber viaduct leading to it across the river's flood plain. The bridge has a total length of 921 metres and probably was the first truss bridge built in Australia. In 1902 a second (railway) bridge was built, with a total length of 819 metres.
The gold mining made the town prosperous, a centre for bushrangers, and gave the town a romantic bush appeal that resulted in Gundagai becoming a byword for outback town in Australia. Evidence of this can be seen via the number of stories, songs and poems that reference Gundagai. These include the Jack O'Hagan composed songs Where the Dog Sits on the Tuckerbox (five miles from Gundagai), Along the Road to Gundagai and When a Boy from Alabama Meets a Girl from Gundagai, as well as Banjo Patterson's The Road to Gundagai and the traditional ballad Flash Jack from Gundagai. Additionally, the town is mentioned in Henry Lawson's Scots of the Riverina and C.J. Dennis' The Traveller.
In 1977 the Sheahan bridge was opened, a concrete and steel bridge on the Hume Highway, at 1143m the second longest bridge in Australia after the Sydney Harbour Bridge, replacing the Prince Alfred bridge as the crossing of the Murrumbidgee river.
Beyond romantic bush appeal, the historic bridges and the associated tourism, Gundagai's economy remains driven by sheep and cattle, as well as wheat, lucerne and maize production.
