Wyndham

Wyndham is the northernmost town in the Kimberley region of Western Australia, located on the Great Northern Highway, 2, 210 kilometres (1, 373 mi) northeast of Perth.

Wyndham is the northernmost town in the Kimberley region of Western Australia, located on the Great Northern Highway, 2,210 kilometres (1,373 mi) northeast of Perth. It was established in 1886 to service a new goldfield at Halls Creek, and it is now a port and service centre for the east Kimberley with a population of 780. Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people make up 54% of the population. Wyndham comprises two areas - the original town site at Wyndham Port situated on Cambridge Gulf, and 5 kilometres (3.1 mi) by road to the south, the Three Mile area with the residential and shopping area for the port, also founded in 1886. Wyndham is part of the Shire of Wyndham-East Kimberley.

Wyndham is within traditional Doolboong country.The first European to visit the area was Phillip Parker King in 1819. He was instructed to find a river 'likely to lead to an interior navigation into the great continent'. He sailed into Cambridge Gulf, which he named after the Duke of Cambridge, and then sailed up a river which was subsequently named after him. Finding no fresh water on the mudflats, he departed.

Wyndham was established on 14 April 1886, by Government Resident and Warden Charles Danvers Price, who led a party including Commissioner of Crown Lands John Forrest on the Adelaide Steamship Company mail steamer SS Albany.Government Resident Price selected Wyndham as the name for the new town, after Walter George Wyndham, the young stepson of the Governor of Western Australia Sir Frederick Napier Broome.By late-1886, the town was booming and there were three hotels at the port, one of which was a two-storey building, and two taverns at Three Mile Camp, as well as stores, bootmakers' and butchers' shops, a billiard room, a soda water factory, commission agencies, auctioneers and other businesses.

Ships brought in at least five thousand miners who headed off to the Halls Creek goldfields. It is known that during this boom there were times when up to 16 vessels were moored in Cambridge Gulf.

However, by 1888, the gold rush at Halls Creek had ended and the fortunes of Wyndham declined. Wyndham became a tiny settlement serving the pastoral interests in the East Kimberley. By 1912, money had virtually disappeared from the Wyndham economy, and purchases were paid for using promissory notes known as "shinplasters".

In 1942 during World War II, the town and its aerodrome were attacked on four occasions by Japanese aircraft.

Wyndham's significance as a service centre was crucial for the construction of the Ord River Diversion Dam and the town of Kununurra in the early 1960s. With the rise of Kununurra as a larger population centre the significance of Wyndham as a service centre had diminished by the 1980s. Wyndham has regained significance as the port for the region with new mines shipping ore from the port.

Wyndham experiences a hot semi-arid climate (Köppen climate classification BSh), being a little too dry to be classified as a tropical savanna climate (Aw), with a wet season from late November to March and a dry season from April to early November. The hottest month is November with an average maximum temperature of 39.5 °C (103.1 °F), and the coolest month is June with an average maximum of 31.0 °C (87.8 °F). The annual average maximum temperature is 35.6 °C (96.1 °F), one of the highest in Australia. In 1946, Wyndham recorded 333 consecutive days of temperatures over 32 °C (90 °F). The wet season is very humid with the average dewpoint temperature at 3pm in February being 22.4 °C (72.3 °F). In the dry season, in August, it is 8.3 °C (46.9 °F).

Large rain events do occur in Wyndham, such as on 4 March 1919 when 12.5 inches (318 mm) of rain were recorded over a 24-hour period, followed by another 4.6 inches (117 mm) the next day.