King Island - Tasmania - Islands of Australia

King island has about 2000 residents, mostly in the towns of Currie on the west and Grassy (a former mining town) on the east. Temperature and rainfall are generally moderate, but the island is sometimes swept by “Roaring 40’s” gales, where winds can reach 100 kilometers per hour.

Two large nature reserves help to protect and display the island’s many native plants and animals. As with other Australian islands, large-scale farming is gradually being broken up into specialty farms which produce small amounts of gourmet items of various types, including lobsters, crayfish, oysters, crab, fish, grass-fed beef, sausages, lamb, native pepper, fine cheeses, virgin water, local teas, honey, and kelp products.

At the end of the 18th century, European explorers sighted and named King Island. Sealers and hunters were the first white people to stay for any length of time, occasionally joined by castaways from the numerous shipwrecks in the difficult waters surrounding the island.

In 1825, King Island and the rest of Van Diemens land were declared their own state, separate from Victoria, eventually renamed Tasmania. Early settlers Smith and Turnbull take up farming and grazing. Telegraph cables and the Cape Wickham lighthouse soon followed, but ships continued to founder in the shallow water until the Currie lighthouse began operating in 1880.

In 1888 the island was opened up for settlement, and by the beginning of the 1900s the town of Currie was built, and the population had grown to nearly 200 – a figure which nearly quadruples over the next ten years as prospectors joined into the community when scheelite and tin were discovered, along with tiny traces of gold.

In the aftermath of World War I, fifty “soldier settlements” are created for returning war veterans, and a memorial is built for the twenty-two soldiers who never would return, even as the first planes arrive on the island. Improvements came quickly after that, with an airfield, a telephone cable, a bank, a golf club, a library, and more.

After World War II, two hundred settlements were again provided to returning soldiers. The Tasmanian Hydroelectric Commission builds a power plant; mining, farming and kelp processing are the island’s major industries.

In the 1980s the economy starts to turn more towards tourism with new parks and reserves gazetted, and more hotels and museums built. Hydro Tasmania opens a “wind farm” pilot operation in 1998.

King Island (Australia) King George Island (Australia) Mount Pitt (Australia)

 

Your Feedback about King Island