Names
Australian Placenames of German Background
Introduction | NT & WA | NSW | QLD | SA | TAS | VIC
Official placenames in the Northern Territory and in Western Australia today
Northern Territory
➽ Hermannsburg - an Aboriginal community (also known as Ntaria) 125 kilometres west-southwest of Alice Springs, on Arrernte Country. You can read more about this place name and its origins in this article.
➽ Poeppel Corner - at Poeppel Corner the borders of the Northern Territory, South Australia and Queensland meet, on Wangkangurru Country. You can read more about this place name and its origins in this article.
Western Australia
➽ Brunswick Junction - a town 160km south of Perth, on Kaniyang Country. You can read more about this place name and its origins in this article.
➽ Hoffman Mill - a rural neighbourhood 27 km north-east of Harvey in the south-west of Western Australia (former timber town), on Pinjarup and Kaniyang Country. You can read more about this place name and its origins in this article.
➽ Mueller Park - a public park in the Perth suburb of Subiaco, on Wajuk Country. In 1883 the park was given the name Mueller Park to honour the famous German-Australian botanist Baron Ferdinand von Mueller, who had helped Western Australian authorities with advice. Due to the wartime anti-German hysteria the Subiaco council changed the name to Kitchener Park in 1916. Lord Horatio Kitchener was a British war hero (and he was Britain’s Secretary of State for War in the early part of the war). The names of Ferdinand Street and Mueller Road, which had also been named after the German-Australian botanist, were also changed. In 1981 the City of Subiaco reinstated the name Mueller Park for the eastern part of Kitchener Park.
Source: Spillman, Ken. & Subiaco (W.A. : Municipality). (1985). Identity prized : a history of Subiaco. Nedlands (W.A.) : University of Western Australia Press for the City of Subiaco. pp.209-210 & p.350
Sign in front of the playground in Mueller Park in Subiaco
➽ Schroeder - a locality northeast of Augusta, on Wardandi Country. Named after the Schroeder family, who farmed there from 1929-1989. After clearing the land they ran some cattle, then grew tobacco and later planted an orange orchard.
Source: Busselton Historical Society, personal communication on 16/12/2003
Former German placenames in the Northern Territory and in Western Australia
Western Australia
➽ Bickley - a suburb about 25 km south-east of Perth's CBD, on Wajuk Country. In the 1890s a railway siding in the Bickley area was known as 'Heidelburg' or 'Heidelburg Grove', which was the name given by George Henry Palmateer to his property. Palmateer owned approximately 120 hectares of land in the area in 1893. Perhaps he named his property for the same reasons that Richard Henry Brown named Heidelberg near Melbourne in the 19th century - people liked the sound of the name and its romantic associations with the famous German university town. In 1915, because of the anti-German mood during World War I, the Railway Department in Western Australia was asked to change the name Heidelburg to something that was not of German origin. The Under Secretary for Lands proposed the name 'Bickley' after a pioneer in the area - that name was accepted in September 1915.
Source: 'Bickley', in Perth and surrounds suburb names. At Landgate - Western Australia's land information authority. Accessed 10/06/2022.