(C) Don Copley

NAREMBEEN

HEMA Map reference 74/C7

32° 03' 57" S 118° 23' 44" E

Statistics

Caravan Parks

Narembeen             08 9064 7308

Services

Attractions

Museum, Hidden Hollow, Roe Lookout, Wakemans Lake, Graball nature reserve, Railway goods shed, Mt. Walker Rock, Anderson Reserve, Twine Reserve, Roe Dam, St. Paul’s Church, Gate 54, Machinery Museum, Walker’s Lake trail, Cairns Rock, Wadderin Wildlife Sanctuary, The Old Prospector's Trail, Holleton,  Apex Park, E.M. Jones Park, Walkers Lake Walk Trail.

Buildings of note

Hotel 1925, Museum 1928, Road Board building 1927, Town Hall 1940.

Calendar of events

September: Springorama. October: Spring-o-rama. December: Picnic, Late night shopping.

(C) gladysclancy

Description

J.S. Roe (are you getting tired of reading his name yet?) was again the first European explorer to travel through the area in 1836. Roe gave Emu Hill its name after the birds that he found living here.

Narembeen appears to have been established as a place to build a pub. Many towns have grown up around an existing pub but this one was established with the express purpose of building a hotel. The teetotal settlement of Emu Hill (gazetted in 1918) would not allow a pub in their town so Henry Hale & Paddy Connolly started a private town of their own and built the pub in 1922 which still exists.

Settlement began in 1850 but remained sparse until after 1920 when the railway finally arrived. The building of the hotel was all it took for Narembeen to overtake Emu Hill and become the major settlement in the area and by 1925 the town’s population had risen to over 2000. Narembeen, although a reasonable sized town was not gazetted until 1968.

Narembeen appears to have been originally spelled Narimbeen and was used as the name of Charles Smith’s property that was situated around Emu Hill. The property was later renamed Cumminin and Narimbeen was not used again for quite some time. The meaning of the name is unsure but one source quotes 'place of the female emu'.

The story of the Blain brothers (Frank and Bert) is closely connected with the development of the area and but for the First World War it may have had a much happier ending.

The brothers came out to Western Australia in 1910 after being seduced by advertising that said things like ‘No droughts! Splendid climate! Abundant rainfall! Land given away.’ Obviously there were no false advertising laws back then.

They worked hard at a number of jobs while building up enough money to purchase their own land. Eventually in 1911 they got over 900 acres in what is now the shire of Narembeen.

They lost almost everything in a bushfire in 1912 and had to return to working for others to get the money to replace their losses.

The next two years were spent getting the farm back in order and struggling to keep their heads above water. By the time the First World War started the brothers were starting to see some return for their hard work and in 1915 they had an exceptional year. So much so that they were the only ones in the area to clear their debts and make a small profit.

Unfortunately they were caught up in the madness of war and after enlisting in 1916 went to fight in France. Bert was wounded in 1917 and died from the effects of the wound. His brother died in similar circumstances the following year. They were just two of the sad losses in the meat grinder that was the Western Front.

Sometime before he died, Bert wrote home to his family; ‘You sometimes hear of these stay-at-home nobs writing about the glorious battlefield etc – they ought to come and smell one, and see if they can sniff anything glorious about it. I fail to.’

It is individual stories like this that bring home the stupid waste of life that war is responsible for and yet all over the world insane people continue to fight each other for no good reason. As if everyday life wasn’t hard enough!

(C) Don Copley