Burraga

Burraga is also the name of the cadastral parish on the northern side of Thompson's Creek.

Mining and smelting at Burraga had been hindered by the availability of water and fuel for the furnaces; the new owners set about solving these issues.

[16] A narrow-gauge tramway that used two Shay locomotives was constructed around 1912–1913 to bring timber fuel to the smelter.

[20][21][22][23] By mid-1918, wartime shipping conditions had made it impossible to export copper, already sold to the British Government, from N.S.W.

; the smelter at Burraga closed in August 1918, with the ore being sent instead to Port Kembla,[24] via the railway station at Perthville.

[25] The mine closed down, in January 1919,[26] and equipment from the operation, including the remaining Shay locomotive, was sold off in 1920.

[8][27] A long-awaited branch railway line from Tarana to Burraga, which would have allowed coal to be brought to the smelters or ore to be shipped more economically, was built only as far as Oberon; it opened in November 1923.

As the mine expanded, workers settled on the nearby land resulting in the reservation of a site for a village, immediately to the east of the private township, in October 1883.

The village had "the usual businesses", a post office and a public school, which opened in November 1883.

[35][36][6][37][38] As there were no other industries to provide employment the fortunes of the village rose and fell in line with those of the copper mine.

[52] Little remains of the copper mine's operations today; the single remaining tall brick chimney that dominates the site is a remnant of the failed attempt at pyritic smelting, the Burraga Dam on Thompson's Creek survives as a popular angling venue, and there are remnant shafts and slag heaps at the sites of the mine and smelters.

[57] Aside from limited tourism for camping and angling, the economy of the village relies on grazing, nearby softwood forestry plantations, and sawmilling.