Morgan

History

Several Aboriginal names are recorded: Korkoranna for Morgan itself, Koolpoola for the opposite flats, and Coerabko ('Katarapko'), meaning meeting place, for the bend locality. Morgan is in the traditional lands of the Ngaiawang people. Nganguruku people moved to the Morgan area when they lost access to their traditional lands further south. The first Europeans to visit were the expedition of Charles Sturt, who passed by in a rowboat in 1830. The first Europeans to visit overland, by horseback, in March 1838, was the expedition of Hill, Oakden, Willis, and Wood. They noted a large Indigenous population. The locality was originally known to Europeans as the North West Bend, or Nor'west Bend, or Great South Bend, due to an acute change in the trend and direction of the Murray. The westward flowing stream of the river turns here to flow southward. The nearby pioneering pastoral station, Northwest Bend Station, established in the 1840s, still bears that name. The town was proclaimed in 1878, the year the railway line from Adelaide via Kapunda was opened, and was named at that time after Sir William Morgan, then Chief Secretary, later Premier of South Australia. A large wharf was built, and Morgan, being the railway terminus (hence the name of a local hotel), became one of the busiest ports on the Murray. It handled nearly all the goods that were being imported and exported (particularly wool) to and from a vast region upstream from Morgan along the Murray and Darling rivers. At its peak, Morgan was the second busiest port in South Australia (behind only Port Adelaide), with six trains a day carrying freight from the Murray to the sea at Port Adelaide. As road transport improved through the early part of the 20th century, river transport declined. The railway to…

Most-observed species

• Whistling Kite

  Haliastur sphenurus (Vieillot, 1818) · Aves
  443
• Galah

  Eolophus roseicapilla (Vieillot, 1817) · Aves
  382
• Noisy Miner

  Manorina melanocephala (Latham, 1801) · Aves
  371
• Crimson Rosella

  Platycercus elegans (Gmelin, 1788) · Aves
  352
• Magpie-lark

  Grallina cyanoleuca (Latham, 1802) · Aves
  304
• Australian Magpie

  Gymnorhina tibicen (Latham, 1802) · Aves
  288
• Welcome Swallow

  Hirundo neoxena Gould, 1842 · Aves
  277
• Australian Pelican

  Pelecanus conspicillatus Temminck, 1824 · Aves
  265

Most recent

• M 4.4 — 2020-05-14
  15 km WSW of Burra, Australia
• M 2.7 — 2007-08-03
  23 km SSE of Burra, Australia
• M 2.5 — 2007-06-12
  26 km E of Angaston, Australia
• M 2.7 — 2006-08-26
  41 km NE of Kapunda, Australia
• M 3.3 — 2004-05-23
  17 km NE of Nuriootpa, Australia