Alice Springs Telegraph Station

The Overland Telegraph Line was strung between Adelaide and Darwin in the early 1870s, with repeater stations built every few hundred kilometres to boost the signal on its way. This one went up in 1872 beside a waterhole in the Todd River, and it gave the town its name. The buildings are low and stone, whitewashed inside, arranged around a yard: telegraph office, station master's house, kitchen, blacksmith. They are restored and furnished, and the interpretation covers the technical side alongside the daily life of a very remote posting. The site also tells a harder later chapter, when the station was used as a home for Aboriginal children. Walking or cycling out along the river path is the better approach.

History

In March 1871 the surveyor William Mills, looking for a route for the Overland Telegraph Line through the MacDonnell Ranges, came to a waterhole that was an important camping and ceremonial site of the Arrernte people and named it Alice Springs after Alice Todd, wife of the project's head, Charles Todd. An Arrernte account, recalled by Errumphana to his granddaughter, tells that he and other warriors met the party at Honeymoon Gap and led them to the water in friendship, and the station, built in 1872 to relay messages between Darwin and Adelaide, was one of twelve on the line and the first European settlement in central Australia (Wikipedia, Alice Springs Telegraph Station).

The main sights

• The telegraph office - the working room with its equipment and the line that ran through it.
• The station buildings - restored stone quarters, kitchen and blacksmith set around the yard.
• The original waterhole - the spring in the Todd River bed that the town was named for.
• The river path - the walking and cycling route out from town along the Todd.

When to go

April to September is the comfortable half of the year; from October daytime temperatures climb steadily and the walk out is best done at dawn. The site opens daily and has a cafe, with guided talks at set times. Winter mornings here are cold enough for frost. Late afternoon from the ridge behind the station looks back over the ranges.

Practical notes

It is a modest site, and anyone not interested in the technology of the line may find the buildings repetitive. Entry is charged and cafe prices are Alice Springs prices. The walk out from town is exposed with no water along the way. Parts of the history told here are uncomfortable, which is deliberate, and it does not make for a light outing.

Nearby

Alice Springs itself, with the West MacDonnell gorges starting half an hour west.

Key facts