Known as Galinyala by the traditional owners, the Barngarla people, it is situated on the shore of Boston Bay, which opens eastward into Spencer Gulf.

[11] The Barngala people have been acknowledged as the traditional owners, and their name for Port Lincoln is Galinyala, which in the Barngarla language[12] means "place of sweet water".

[13] Matthew Flinders was the first European to reach Port Lincoln under his commission by the British Admiralty to chart Australia's unexplored coastline.

Light decided that it might be dangerous for merchant ships trying to enter the unfamiliar territory after a long voyage and that there was not enough of what he thought was good agricultural land, nor enough fresh water to sustain a city.

As a result, Governor George Grey ordered a detachment of the 96th Regiment of the British Army under the command of Lieutenant Hugonin to enforce control in the area.

After an initial defeat at Pillaworta, the 96th in combination with the Mounted Police and armed settlers were able to restore full British authority by the end of 1843.

[17] In 1849, five Aboriginal people including an infant were poisoned after being given flour mixed with arsenic by hutkeeper Patrick Dwyer near Port Lincoln.

City status was granted to Port Lincoln on 21 January 1971 and the proclamation was read at the opening of the tenth annual Tunarama Festival on the Australia Day weekend.

The lack of a reliable surface water supply was a factor preventing Port Lincoln from being proclaimed the colony's capital city in the 1830s.

The Iron Knob to Kimba pipeline completed in 2007 provides limited transfer capacity of River Murray water into the Tod-Ceduna system.

Following the development of a long term water supply plan for Eyre Peninsula, the South Australian government is progressing detailed investigation of augmentation options.

[5][6][4] The economy is based on the huge grain-handling facilities (with a total capacity of over 337,500 tonnes), the canning and fish processing works, lambs, wool and beef, and tuna farming for the Japanese market.

[33] Home of Australia's largest commercial fishing fleet,[citation needed] Port Lincoln now has a thriving aquaculture industry that farms the following species: southern bluefin tuna, yellowtail kingfish, abalone, mussels, oysters, and experimentally, seahorses and spiny lobsters.

[citation needed] Frank Moorhouse recommended the South Australian government lend the Haldane family 20,000 pounds which they used to build a super vessel.

A proposal by Centrex Metals to export iron ore through an expanded facility at the existing Port Lincoln wharf was approved by the South Australian Government c. Oct 2009.

The chief public concern was the potential harm that spillage or dust plumes might cause to the profitability or reputation of the region's dominant seafood industry.

The book Blue Fin by Colin Thiele was set in Port Lincoln, with the movie of the same name filmed in nearby Streaky Bay.

[44] Port Lincoln was visited in 1939 by English travel author Eric Newby, while he was crew in the 4-masted barque Moshulu, which anchored outside of Boston Island.

Newby wrote about his experiences on the round-trip from Ireland to South Australia in his book The Last Grain Race (1956), and several pictures of Port Lincoln as it appeared in 1939 are included in his photo-essay of his voyage, Learning the Ropes.

[citation needed] On the TV show Neighbours, the Brennan brothers, Tyler, Mark and Aaron, are originally from Port Lincoln.

Historically, South Australia's first rural newspaper, the Port Lincoln Herald, owned by Robert Thomas, was published on 10 April 1839, before ceasing publication in September 1840.

Free to air TV stations available in Port Lincoln are ABC, SBS, Seven GTS/BKN (formerly Central Television), the Nine Network and Southern Cross Ten.