History of Perth, Western Australia

[1] The city inherited its name due to the influence of Sir George Murray, then Member of Parliament for Perthshire and Secretary of State for War and the Colonies.

[2] Before the founding of the Swan River Colony, the indigenous Noongar people were well established in the southwest corner of Western Australia, hunting and gathering.

From 1831, there were hostile encounters between settlers and Noongars that culminated in several executions and massacres that lead to the disintegration of the tribes and their retreat to the swamps and lakes north of the river.

With relatives in the powerful British East India Company, Stirling was predisposed to the idea of a West Australian colony with potential for Indian Ocean trade.

With Frederick Garling and the botanist Charles Fraser, Stirling spent 12 days exploring the river, travelling as far upstream as the Ellen Brook junction.

Under intense pressure from the settlers, Stirling's energetic Surveyor-General, John Septimus Roe went to work demarcating the allotments along the river.

Fremantle was to be the port city, and entry into the colony; Guildford was the loading point for agricultural produce that was to be shipped down the Swan River; and Perth was the administrative and military hub.

[6] The boundaries of the capital Perth were defined by the Swan River to the south and east, by the promontory of Mount Eliza to the west, and by a chain of swamps and lakes to the north.

The site was chosen for its access to fresh water and river transport, the availability of building materials, fine views of the Darling Scarp and the shelter offered by Mount Eliza from naval bombardment.

Transport in the early years was primarily along the coastline and river system, and one of the earliest projects was the construction of a 280-metre (920 ft) canal creating Burswood Island.

On 11 July 1833, a senior warrior named Yagan, of the local Aboriginal tribe near the Swan River, was murdered after a bounty was issued for his capture following the slaying of a couple of settlers.

Constructed of locally harvested clay bricks, mellow in colour and soft in texture, the public architecture of the colony was relatively small-scale as befitting a new settlement.

The convict workforce led to an improvement in the prospects of the colony, however Perth's underlying identity as a remote and rustic frontier town remained unchanged.

Despite being proclaimed a city by Queen Victoria in 1856,[13] fourteen years later a Melbourne journalist described Perth as:[14] a quiet little town of some 3000 inhabitants spread out in straggling allotments down to the water's edge, intermingled with gardens and shrubberies and half rural in its aspect ...

The main streets are macadamised, but the outlying ones and most of the footpaths retain their native state from the loose sand – the all pervading element of Western Australia – productive of intense glare or much dust in the summer and dissolving into slush during the rainy season.This village-like atmosphere of scattered single and two story brick or stone residences, surrounded by gardens, remained unchanged until the 1880s and 1890s.

During this time two events significantly shaped the development of both central Perth and the wider metropolitan region: the construction of a railway from Fremantle to Guildford, completed in 1881,[15] and the Western Australian gold rushes, commencing in 1885.

The discovery of gold in the Kimberley, Murchison and Kalgoorlie regions in the 1880s and 1890s, and the concurrent granting of responsible government to Western Australia in 1890 had a huge impact on the development of Perth.

The physical nature of the city changed dramatically with economic prosperity and the increase of population as a result of gold rush immigration.

Its streets were lined with elaborately styled multi-storey buildings, many of which were designed by members of a now large architectural profession, and the population had spilled over into new suburbs that encircled the city.

With the railway line providing a boundary to the north, and the Government domain to the south, commercial and professional development was concentrated within the city's central axis, bounded by William and Barrack Streets.

Eventually, several department stores opened in this precinct, including Foy and Gibson, Aherns, Bon Marche, Myers and David Jones.

This began to change in 1961 with the lifting of the iron-ore embargo and, over the next decade, the discovery of nickel, petroleum, bauxite, natural gas and alumina deposits throughout the state.

Events were held from 22 November to 1 December at Perry Lakes Stadium in Floreat and Beatty Park Aquatic Centre in North Perth.

In the 1980s, a political scandal, which came to be known as WA Inc, caused the loss of public money – an estimated minimum of $600 million – and the insolvency of several large corporations.

Some major businesses based in Perth suffered financial difficulties, in part due to the 1987 stock market crash, and eventually entered bankruptcy.

After almost two years of enquiries and hearings, it was found that the state government had engaged in major business dealings with prominent businessmen, including Alan Bond, Laurie Connell and Warren Anderson.

In the late 1980s arson attacks on Asian-owned businesses by Jack van Tongeren and his white supremacist group the Australian Nationalist Worker's Union gained internal attention and strained ties with Western Australia's growing Asian community.

In the first decade of the 21st century, driven by the Western Australian mining boom and associated economic development, it became Australia's fastest growing capital.

In recent years Perth has been getting a larger share of overseas migrants who, due to the demand for workers in the mining industry, are predominantly arriving on skilled migration visas.

On 19 September 2006, the Federal Court of Australia brought down a judgment finding that Noongar native title continued to exist over the Perth metropolitan area.