Cairns, Australia

Cairns is a city in Queensland, Australia,[4] on the tropical north east coast of Far North Queensland. The population in June 2019 was 153,952, having grown on average 1.02% annually over the preceding five years.[1][5][6] The city is the 5th-most-populous in Queensland, and 15th in Australia.[citation needed]

The city was founded in 1876 and named after Sir William Wellington Cairns, following the discovery of gold in the Hodgkinson river.[7] Throughout the late 19th century, Cairns prospered from the settlement of Chinese immigrants who helped develop the region's agriculture. Cairns also served as a port for blackbirding ships, bringing slaves and indentured labourers to the sugar plantations of Innisfail.[8] During World War II, the city became a staging ground for the Allied Forces in the Battle of the Coral Sea. By the late 20th century the city had become a centre of international tourism, and in the early 21st century has developed into a major metropolitan city.

Cairns is a popular tourist destination because of its tropical climate and access to tropical rainforest and the Great Barrier Reef, one of the seven natural wonders of the world.

History

Main article: History of Cairns

Prior to British settlement, the Cairns area was inhabited by the Gimuy Walubara Yidinji people,[9][10] who still claim their native title rights.[11] Yidinji (also known as Yidinj, Yidiny, and Idindji) is an Australian Aboriginal language. Its traditional language region is within the local government areas of Cairns Region and Tablelands Region, in such localities as Cairns, Gordonvale, and the Mulgrave River, and the southern part of the Atherton Tableland including Atherton and Kairi. The area in which the city is located is known in the local Yidiny language as Gimuy,[9] and the clan who inhabited the region before colonisation are the Gimuy-walubarra clan.[10]

1874 map showing native wells situated within the future site of Cairns

From 1770 to the early 1870s the area was known to the British simply as Trinity Bay. The arrival of beche de mer fishermen from the late 1860s saw the first European presence in the area. On the site of the modern-day Cairns foreshore, there was a large native well which was used by these fishermen. A violent confrontation occurred in 1872 between local Yidinji people and Phillip Garland, a beche de mer fisherman, over the use of this well. The area from this date was subsequently called Battle Camp.[12] In 1876, hastened by the need to export gold mined from the Hodgkinson goldfields on the tablelands to the west, closer investigation by several official expeditions established its potential for development into a port. Brinsley G. Sheridan surveyed the area and selected a place further up Trinity Inlet known to the diggers as Smith's Landing for a settlement which he renamed Thornton.[13][14] However, after Native Police officers Alexander Douglas-Douglas and Robert Arthur Johnstone opened a new track from the goldfields to Battle Camp, this more coastal site became preferable.[15] Battle Camp was renamed Cairns in late 1876 in honour of the then Governor of Queensland, William Cairns. The site was predominantly mangrove swamps and sand ridges. Labourers gradually cleared the swamps, and the sand ridges were filled with dried mud, sawdust from local sawmills, and ballast from a quarry at Edge Hill.

The Cairns Parish of the Roman Catholic Vicariate Apostolic of Cooktown (now the Roman Catholic Diocese of Cairns) was established in 1884.[16]

Farm in Cairns in 1897

Cairns War Memorial, c. 1936

Debris from the construction of a railway to Herberton on the Atherton Tableland, a project which started in 1886, was also used. The railway opened up land later used for agriculture on the lowlands (sugar cane, corn, rice, bananas, pineapples), and for fruit and dairy production on the Tableland. The success of local agriculture helped establish Cairns as a port, and the creation of a harbour board in 1906 supported its robust economic future.[17][18]

The Wharf Estate Cairns went on sale in Brisbane via auction on 19 February 1889 by John Macnamara & Co. Land Auctioneers. The land was part of the place known as the Railway Reserve. The sale was described by the Auctioneers as the 'largest ever yet held in Northern Queensland'.[19][20][21]

On 25 April 1926 (ANZAC Day), the Cairns Sailors and Soldiers War Memorial was unveiled by Alexander Frederick Draper, the mayor of the City of Cairns.[22][23]

During World War II, the Allied Forces used Cairns as a staging base for operations in the Pacific,[24] with United States Army Air Forces and Royal Australian Air Force operational bases (now the airport), as well as a major military seaplane base, Naval Base Cairns, in Trinity Inlet, and United States Navy and Royal Australian Navy bases near the current wharf. Combat missions were flown out of Cairns in support of the Battle of the Coral Sea in 1942. Edmonton and White Rock south of Cairns were major military supply areas and U.S. Paratroopers trained at Gordonvale and the Goldsborough Valley. A Special Forces training base was established at the old "Fairview" homestead on Munro's Hill, Mooroobool. This base was officially known as the Z Experimental Station,[25] but referred to informally as "The House on the Hill".

After World War II, Cairns gradually developed into a centre for tourism. The opening of the Cairns International Airport in 1984 helped establish the city as a desirable destination for international tourism.

In the 2016 census the urban area of Cairns had a population of 144,730 people.[26]

The population in June 2019 was 153,951.[1]