Armidale, New England Region, Northern Tablelands, New South Wales, Australia

Notes:
Armidale is a city in the Northern Tablelands, New South Wales, Australia.[2] Armidale had a population of 24,504 as at June 2018.[1] It is the administrative centre for the Northern Tablelands region. It is approximately halfway between Sydney and Brisbane at the junction of the New England Highway and Waterfall Way. Armidale traditional owners are Anaiwan people. Many Gumbaynggirr people have settled in Armidale since colonisation.



rmidale is a cathedral city, being the seat of the Anglican and Roman Catholic bishops of Armidale. St Peter's Anglican Cathedral, which replaced the original St Peter's Church, was designed by the Canadian architect John Horbury Hunt, who also designed Booloominbah at the University of New England. St Peter's Cathedral opened for worship in 1875 and the tower was added in 1938. The Catholic Cathedral of St Mary and St Joseph was dedicated on 12 December 1919.



The city centre is laid out in a grid of streets. The main street is called Beardy Street, named for two of the founding settlers who had beards. The court house was built in the 1850s and is still a prominent feature of the central district. Much of the rest of the city is residential.



The Australian Wool Fashion Awards, which showcases the use of Merino wool by fashion designers, are hosted by Armidale in March each year. The Autumn Festival is a popular annual event of April in Armidale. The festival features a street parade, stalls and celebrations throughout the city. It is a regular part of the city's attractions, often promoting Armidale's diverse culture (for instance, posters set up by council attempt to attract tourists with the motto "Foodies Thrive In Armidale") and autumn colours. During May the annual New England Wool Expo is staged to display wool fashions, handicrafts, demonstrations, shearing competitions, yard dog trials and demonstrations, a wool bale rolling competition and other activities.



Geography

Armidale is on the banks of Dumaresq Creek, in the Northern Tablelands in the New England region about midway between Sydney and Brisbane at an altitude (980 m AHD) ranging from 970 metres at the valley's floor to 1,110 metres above sea level at the crests of the hills. A short distance to the east of Armidale are heavily forested steep gorges dropping down to the eastern coastal plain. Large parts of the highlands are covered by Palaeozoic aged metamorphosed sedimentary rocks. Intruding into these meta-sediments are granite plutons which decompose to form sandy soil, slightly deficient in nutrients. There are also basalt flows which are more fertile for the soil substrates. Those areas away from the deep gorge country tend to display gently undulating terrain mainly used for pastures and where granites occur the areas are usually covered in bushland.



The area contains a number of places of outstanding natural beauty and scientific interest as well as several World Heritage national parks including the New England National Park and the Oxley Wild Rivers National Park. To the west is Mount Yarrowyck Nature Reserve.



The coastal plain can be reached directly at Coffs Harbour via Waterfall Way to Dorrigo and Bellingen on the Bellinger River, a two-hour drive.



History



The Catholic Cathedral of St Mary and St Joseph, Armidale

Before the British colonial settlement of New South Wales, the Indigenous Anewan people occupied the area that encompasses current day Armidale.



Armidale was first settled in the early 1830s, following the earlier exploration of the area by John Oxley. It was named after Armadale on the Isle of Skye in Scotland by George James MacDonald. MacDonald was the Commissioner of Crown Lands and head of the local Border Police detachment in the New England district from 1839 to 1848.



Oxley recommended the region for grazing, and soon early pioneers set up small farms in the locality. The James Barnet-designed heritage-listed Armidale Post Office opened on 1 April 1843.[16][17] The town, which was surveyed in 1848 and gazetted in 1849, was established to provide a market and administration for the farms, but soon after gold was discovered at nearby Rocky River and Gara Gorges, and a gold rush ensued, enlarging the town rapidly in the 1850s. The gold mining settlement of Hillgrove about 40 km east of Armidale was supplied by electricity from Australia's first hydro-electric scheme, the Gara River Hydro-Electric Scheme, remains of which are still visible on the Gara River below the Blue Hole at Castle Doyle. The nearby town of Uralla holds the grave of the famous Captain Thunderbolt ? outlaw Fred Ward ? who caused trouble in the area in the 1860s. As with Ned Kelly, the locals have adopted him as a larrikin hero and make the most of him as a tourist attraction.



Armidale became a municipality in 1863[18] and was proclaimed a city in 1885.

Birth

Matches 1 to 1 of 1

	Last Name, Given Name(s)	Birth		Person ID
1	Hardy, Minnie Margaret	25 Jun 1894	Armidale, New England Region, Northern Tablelands, New South Wales, Australia	I16554