KENILWORTH RESIDENTS HAVE CHANCE TO MAKE THEIR MARK ON THE MAP

Minister for Natural Resources and Water, Craig Wallace, today encouraged residents of Kenilworth to become involved in the creation of their community’s history by suggesting new place names.

Minister Wallace is inviting residents to name a geographic feature or area of land by lodging an application with his department.

“The Department of Natural Resources and Water administers the Place Names Act 1994, which controls the official naming of localities, suburbs and geographical features within local government areas,” Mr Wallace said.

“Queensland has over 40,000 official place names and these are constantly being added to by the community,” Mr Wallace said.

“People have a chance to be part of history by creating a new Queensland place name,” he said.

“We do not accept place names that honour living people, we try to avoid duplicating names and commercial names but otherwise people are free to put their mark on the map.”

Some of Queensland’s more unusual names include Baking Board (Chinchilla Shire), Yorkeys Knob (Cairns), Macaroni (Carpentaria Shire), Hell Hole Gorge National Park (Quilpie Shire), Silver Spur (Inglewood Shire), Beer Creek (Esk Shire) and Ginger Beer Creek (Calliope Shire).

Close to 110 new and amended place names were added to the database over the past year.

“The name Kenilworth is derived from a pastoral property name within Obi Obi pastoral run, taken up by Richard Joseph Smith, a merchant and pastoralist in 1850,” Mr Wallace said.

“Smith's wife was reading the Walter Scott novel Kenilworth at the time the town was named. The novel tells the story of the secret, tragic marriage of Amy Robsart to Robert Dudley and Robsart's eventual death.

The place names surrounding Kenilworth are also steeped in history.

·The name Conondale is derived from a pastoral run name used by pastoralist, Donald Tuach McKenzie. McKenzie named the run after the valley of the Conon River, Ross and Cromarty, Scotland.

·Town name Maleny is thought to originate from the Scottish place name Malleny, a village in Midlothian.

Minister Wallace said the place names database reflected the diverse and fascinating background of many of the state’s suburbs and towns.

“While many of the names on the database are European in origin, a large number reflect Aboriginal culture and language,” Mr Wallace said.

Other interesting place names include:

Miallo – an Aboriginal word indicating wild country

Julatten – an Aboriginal word for small creek

Lake Eacham – Eacham is reportedly an Aboriginal word meaning big spring

Lake Barrine – Barrine is a corruption of “barrang”, an Aboriginal word indicating big water.

Malanda – an Aboriginal word indicating the stream known as the Upper Johnstone River, possibly with the connotation little stream with big stones.

Millaa Millaa – a corruption of “millai millai, possibly from the Yindinji language indicating a fruit bearing plant Eleagnus latifolia.

Mr Wallace said people could look up the name of their suburb or town by visiting: www.nrw.qld.gov.au/property/place_names.html

"The place names website is an evolving document and we are always on the lookout for new information about how a suburb, town or land feature got its name."

Media inquiries: Clare Gillic, Minister's Office, 3896 3688.