Parkeston is a suburb of the city of Kalgoorlie, Western Australia, located 3 kilometres (1.9 mi) east of the city centre. At the 2016 census, it had a population of 60,[2] down from 69 in 2006.[3] It contains the Ninga Mia Aboriginal community.
Parkeston was gazetted as a townsite in 1904. It was almost certainly named after Sir Henry Parkes, the "father of Australian Federation".[note 1][4]
The elevation at the railway sidings is 375 metres.[6]
Camp
In 1919 Parkeston had a quarantine camp, due to passengers on trains from Adelaide being required to be quarantined.[7] The internees produced a newspaper known as the Yellow Rag which had details of passengers and crew.[8][9][10]
During and after World War II, Parkeston was the location of a small prisoner-of-war transit and detention camp, also known as the staging camp.[11][12] It operated between June 1940 and March 1947 as a transit place for prisoners transiting across the country by rail, having a capacity of 20 internees in small cells.[13]
Aboriginal community
The Ninga Mia settlement was established in 1983,[14] constructed by Aboriginal Hostels Limited as the Ninga Mia Fringe-Dweller Village.[15] It was created as an Aboriginal Lands Trust Reserve and leased to the Ninga Mia Village Aboriginal Corporation.[16] It was also used by visitors from remote Aboriginal communities in the Western Desert.[17]
Ninga Mia contained around 30 houses as well as a management office, health clinic, communal kitchen and computer room.[18] In 2004, it was described by Guardian writer David Fickling as a shantytown with many houses lacking basic facilities.[14] A state government audit in 2018 found that no major refurbishments had been carried out since the 1980s and recommended that the community be closed; the Aboriginal corporation holding the village lease had been deregistered several years earlier. A number of homes were subsequently demolished and residents relocated.[19] The Department of Communities described Ninga Mia as "a site of continued social dysfunction with no governance, declining, aged and no longer fit for purpose infrastructure, [and] no system of community governance". It reportedly budgeted for the relocation of 56 residents, although some inhabitants were opposed to the closure of the village.[20]
Notes
^The name was suggested in February 1901, a month after the federation of the Australian states. The Goldfields region was a strong supporter of federation, whereas much of the rest of Western Australia opposed it.
^The yellow rag, Hocking and Co, 1919, retrieved 8 February 2024
^"Pneumonic Influenza". The Daily News. Vol. XXXVIII, no. 13, 711. Western Australia. 11 February 1919. p. 7 (Third Edition). Retrieved 8 February 2024 – via National Library of Australia.
^"Items of news". Western Argus. Vol. 24, no. 5075. Western Australia. 11 February 1919. p. 17. Retrieved 8 February 2024 – via National Library of Australia.
^"Items of News". Kalgoorlie Miner. Vol. 53, no. 14, 031. Western Australia. 12 July 1947. p. 4. Retrieved 8 February 2024 – via National Library of Australia.
