Wagga Wagga - Restaurants, Hotels, Pubs, Business Directory, Visitors, Shops, What\'s on, Events, Conference

In December 1829, the early colonists first sighted the land on which the flourishing City of Wagga Wagga now stands. A small party of explorers headed by Captain Charles Sturt passed over the site of future Wagga Wagga on its expedition of discovery down the Murrumbidgee and Murray Rivers. Settlement swiftly followed. The first to settle in the North Wagga area was Charles Tompson. In the 1840's many of the squatters brought their wives and families to live on their runs.

Wagga Wagga was proclaimed a town in 1849 and in the same year surveyor Thomas Townshend marked out the town. By the end of the 1850's there were four hotels in Fitzmaurice Street. In the 1860s the population totaled approximately 700, but by 1881 it had increased to 3,975. In 1879 the railway line was extended south of the river.

On the 1st of July 1856 Wagga Wagga's first hospital opened in a small slab cottage with a bark roof on the sandhill in Kincaid Street. A new hospital was erected at the corner of Tarcutta and Little Gurwood Streets in the early 1860's.

A National School was built in 1861 at the corner of Tarcutta and Little Gurwood Streets and by the end of the year it had 47 students.

By May 1869 eighty-nine boys and sixty-four girls were enrolled. In 1872 a new schoolhouse and teachers residence were built on the 'sandhill' on the corner of Gurwood and Simmons Streets.

Wagga Wagga was referred to as 'a sporting little town' as early as the 1850's. When the population was mainly male, hunting, shooting, prize fights, foot races and horse racing were the popular sports of Wagga. By the 1870's some team sports, cricket and football were played. Later, rowing, swimming, cycling, tennis, golf and bowling clubs were formed.

In 1940 the Wagga Wagga RAAF Base was established and a year later the Kapooka Army Recruit Centre opened its doors.

On 1st January, 1981, the existing City of Wagga Wagga became amalgamated with the adjoining Shires of Kyeamba and Mitchell.

By the turn of the century several schools, churches and a hospital had been established and maintained in the Wagga Wagga district. The Wagga Wagga Borough Council and the Kyeamba and Mitchell Shire Councils had improved roads and bridges. The council had planted trees, established parklands and lit the main streets. Water was reticulated and gas was being used for lighting and cooking.

The City incorporated as a Borough in 1870 and was proclaimed a City in 1946. Wagga Wagga has an area of 488,600 hectares. At the 30th June 1998 it had an estimated population of 58,000.

b/w image - The Bridge Hotel, formerly the Hope Inn, licensed by Thomas Turvey in the 1860s

Information and images courtesy of Wagga Wagga - A History, Sherry Morris