Georgetown is a rural town and

locality Locality may refer to: * Locality (association), an association of community regeneration organizations in England * Locality (linguistics) * Locality (settlement) * Suburbs and localities (Australia), in which a locality is a geographic subdivis ...

in the

Shire of Etheridge The Shire of Etheridge is a local government area in Far North Queensland, Australia in what is known as the Savannah Gulf region. Its economy is based on cattle grazing and mining. It covers an area of , and has existed as a local government e ...

Queensland ) , nickname = Sunshine State , image_map = Queensland in Australia.svg , map_caption = Location of Queensland in Australia , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name = Australia , established_title = Before federation , establishe ...

, Australia. In the , the locality of Georgetown had a population of 348 people.

History

Georgetown area may have been part of North America 1.7 billion years ago based on the characteristics of rocks found in Georgetown matching those of northern Canada rather than the rest of Australia. Researchers at

Curtin University Curtin University, formerly known as Curtin University of Technology and Western Australian Institute of Technology (WAIT), is an Australian public research university based in Bentley, Perth, Western Australia. It is named after John Curtin, ...

have postulated that 100 million years later, this landmass collided with what is now northern Australia, at the

Mount Isa Mount Isa ( ) is a city in the Gulf Country region of Queensland, Australia. It came into existence because of the vast mineral deposits found in the area. Mount Isa Mines (MIM) is one of the most productive single mines in world history, base ...

region, forming the Nuna supercontinent. Georgetown was on the northern border of

Ewamin The Ewamin or ''Agwamin'' are an indigenous Australian people of the state of Queensland. Language Their language, now extinct, was formerly thought to be interchangeable with Wamin. Peter Sutton's fieldwork in the early 1970s enabled him to dr ...

lands. The Etheridge River was the site of a gold rush in the 1870s; the town of Georgetown was established on the site of the diggings. Originally known by the name Etheridge, the town's name was changed in 1871 to honour an early gold commissioner, Howard St George. Georgetown Post Office opened on 15 January 1872. Georgetown State School opened on 14 September 1874. By 1900, grazing had replaced gold mining as the region's primary source of income. The Georgetown Public Library opened in 2003. In the , Georgetown had a population of 254. In the , the locality of Georgetown had a population of 243 people. In the , the locality of Georgetown had a population of 348 people.

Geography

Georgetown is on the

Etheridge River Etheridge may refer to: People * Bill Etheridge, a British politician, Member of the European Parliament for UKIP * Bob Etheridge (born 1941), US Representative * Chris Etheridge, British sidecarcross rider * Emerson Etheridge, late US Represent ...

Far North Queensland Far North Queensland (FNQ) is the northernmost part of the Australian state of Queensland. Its largest city is Cairns and it is dominated geographically by Cape York Peninsula, which stretches north to the Torres Strait, and west to the Gulf Co ...

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands. With an area of , Australia is the largest country by ...

. The

Gulf Developmental Road Gulf Developmental Road is an Australian highway linking the Cairns and Normanton regions in northern Queensland, Australia. It is the only sealed (asphalt) road linking these two regions. In the east, the road begins at an unnamed junction o ...

passes through the town, linking

Cairns Cairns (, ) is a city in Queensland, Australia, on the tropical north east coast of Far North Queensland. The population in June 2019 was 153,952, having grown on average 1.02% annually over the preceding five years. The city is the 5th-most-p ...

- to the east - and Normanton - to the west. Georgetown is the administrative headquarters of the Shire of Etheridge, a local government area encompassing the nearby settlements of Mount Surprise,

Forsayth Forsayth is a rural town and locality in the Shire of Etheridge, Queensland, Australia. In the , Forsayth had a population of 129 people. Geography Forsayth is in Far North Queensland approximately by road from Cairns. The town is the termin ...

and Einasleigh.

Climate

Georgetown has a borderline

tropical savanna climate Tropical savanna climate or tropical wet and dry climate is a tropical climate sub-type that corresponds to the Köppen climate classification categories ''Aw'' (for a dry winter) and ''As'' (for a dry summer). The driest month has less than of ...

(

Köppen Köppen is a German surname. Notable people with the surname include: * Bernd Köppen (born 1951), German pianist and composer * Carl Köppen (1833-1907), German military advisor in Meiji era Japan * Edlef Köppen (1893–1939), German author and ...

''Aw'') bordering on a

hot semi-arid climate A semi-arid climate, semi-desert climate, or steppe climate is a dry climate sub-type. It is located on regions that receive precipitation below potential evapotranspiration, but not as low as a desert climate. There are different kinds of semi- ...

(''BSh''). The

wet season The wet season (sometimes called the Rainy season) is the time of year when most of a region's average annual rainfall occurs. It is the time of year where the majority of a country's or region's annual precipitation occurs. Generally, the sea ...

from mid-November to March is hot and humid with like all of tropical Queensland highly erratic rainfall. During the wet season, rainfall is highly concentrated into a few days from monsoonal depressions or remnant

cyclones In meteorology, a cyclone () is a large air mass that rotates around a strong center of low atmospheric pressure, counterclockwise in the Northern Hemisphere and clockwise in the Southern Hemisphere as viewed from above (opposite to an an ...

. Wet season weather can vary from daily thunderstorm rains in active monsoon months like January and February of 1974 when rain fell on fifty-five consecutive days and fell between December and March, to long sweltering and dry spells as in 1925/1926, when only fell during those four months. The

dry season The dry season is a yearly period of low rainfall, especially in the tropics. The weather in the tropics is dominated by the tropical rain belt, which moves from the northern to the southern tropics and back over the course of the year. The ...

from April to mid-November is very warm, becoming sweltering in the “build-up” to the wet season during October and November and almost completely dry. Nevertheless, the height of the dry season features cool to pleasant mornings more typical of the

humid subtropical climate A humid subtropical climate is a zone of climate characterized by hot and humid summers, and cool to mild winters. These climates normally lie on the southeast side of all continents (except Antarctica), generally between latitudes 25° and 40° ...

areas to the southeast, and Georgetown is amongst the most northerly locations in Australia to record frost, with the temperature falling as low as on 9 July, 1974.

Heritage listings

Georgetown has a number of

heritage-listed This list is of heritage registers, inventories of cultural properties, natural and man-made, tangible and intangible, movable and immovable, that are deemed to be of sufficient heritage value to be separately identified and recorded. In many i ...

sites, including: *

: Aspasia Mine and Battery * South Street: Antbed House

Education

Georgetown State School is a government primary (Early Childhood-6) school for boys and girls at High Street (). In 2014, Georgetown State School had an enrolment of 57 students with 3 teachers. In 2018, the school had an enrolment of 42 students with 4 teachers (3 full-time equivalent) and 7 non-teaching staff (4 full-time equivalent). There are no secondary schools in Georgetown, nor nearby. The options are

distance education Distance education, also known as distance learning, is the education of students who may not always be physically present at a school, or where the learner and the teacher are separated in both time and distance. Traditionally, this usually in ...

and boarding school.

Facilities

Georgetown Terrestrial Information Centre

Georgetown has a racecourse, swimming pool and a tourist information centre and camping/caravan park. The

Etheridge Shire Council The Shire of Etheridge is a local government area in Far North Queensland, Australia in what is known as the Savannah Gulf region. Its economy is based on cattle grazing and mining. It covers an area of , and has existed as a local government e ...

operates a public library at Low Street, Georgetown. The Georgetown branch of the

Queensland Country Women's Association The Queensland Country Women's Association (QCWA) is the Queensland chapter of the Country Women's Association in Australia. The association seeks to serve the interests of women and children in rural areas in Australia through a network of loca ...

has its rooms on the Gulf Developmental Road. The Terrestrial Information Centre contains the Ted Elliot Mineral Collection, comprising over 4500 local and international mineral specimens. St Patrick's Catholic Church is at 26 High Street. It is within the Gulf Savannah Parish of the

Roman Catholic Diocese of Cairns The Roman Catholic Diocese of Cairns is a diocese of the Catholic Church located in the state of Queensland, Australia. It is a suffragan diocese of the Archdiocese of Brisbane. The diocese was erected as a vicariate apostolic in 1877 and was ...

In popular culture

Georgetown is one of the real locations mentioned several times in the novel ''

A Town Like Alice ''A Town Like Alice'' (United States title: ''The Legacy'') is a romance novel by Nevil Shute, published in 1950 when Shute had newly settled in Australia. Jean Paget, a young Englishwoman, becomes romantically interested in a fellow prisoner ...

'' by

Nevil Shute Nevil Shute Norway (17 January 189912 January 1960) was an English novelist and aeronautical engineer who spent his later years in Australia. He used his full name in his engineering career and Nevil Shute as his pen name, in order to protect ...

References

External links

University of Queensland: Queensland Places: Georgetown

Etheridge Shire Council

Town map, 1983

{{authority control Towns in Queensland Populated places in Far North Queensland Shire of Etheridge Localities in Queensland