The wooden station building was opened in 1876 at the terminus of the lightly engineered, 1067 mm (3 ft 6 in) gauge railway from Port Pirie – then a town of fewer than 1,000 people – into the rich agricultural hinterland of the Mid North.

The need was to transport agricultural produce more cheaply to the port for export, mainly to Great Britain, in sailing ships.

Since the railway was such an advance over horse-drawn wagons or bullock drays over unmade roads, traffic soon increased significantly, especially when in the following year the line reached the nearest town in the hinterland – Gladstone, 52 km (32 mi) east of the port – and, more so, Petersburg,[note 2] a further 64 km (40 mi) east, in 1881.

[8] It was a vast improvement in the economics and efficiency of transporting the ore compared with the bullock drays used previously.

[9][10] The ore traffic and the smelter were to have a profound effect on the town, turning it from a bustling small port into an industrial city.