This is a set of three panels, explaining the importance of the Murray River, to the community. The left-hand panel reads:
RIVER BOAT TRAIL
"This interpretative Trail tells the stories of the people and boats that made the River Murray a busy inland highway during the latter nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.
"From the 1850s fleets of paddle steamers and their barges carried produce from station and farms to transit points downriver.
"There were also floating shops, mail steamers, mission boats and passenger liners, as well as small fishing boats, powerful milk launches and ferries providing links across the waterway. Some river boats helped build the locks and weirs while others kept the channels clear of snags.
"Ports, trading companies and shipbuilding facilities were established along the river and many of the Murray's settlements developed because of the trade brought by the river boats."
There is an inset map, showing Shipwrecks, and Land-based Heritage Sites: 'The Riverboat Trail is a series of 18 signs along the South Australian section of the River Murray from Goolwa to Border Cliffs and across Lakes Alexandrina and Albert.'
The middle panel also has a couple of photos, with the following transcribed:
WAIKERIE
'…the river boats their only link…'
"Waikerie began as a village settlement in 1894, part of a government scheme to open up land along the upper Murray. Steamers brought the settlers' rations of tea, sugar, flour and milk but mostly these 'blockers' fended for themselves in small communal groups. It was a harsh environment with the river boats their only link to a world they had left behind.
"Waikerie was one of nine such farming communites where people who had not met before had to band together for the common good. Each family was allotted land, tools and a horse, as well as funds for food, but whatever was grown or caught was common property.
"The scheme eventually failed and 1910 land was allotted to the first group of private settlers, who grew oranges, peaches, sultanas and other fruits on the irrgated blocks. Again the river boats were essential, bringing in supplies and equipement an transporting the produce to Morgan for transfer to Adelaide markets.
[On the right-hand side is the following]
RIVER WRECKS
William R. Randell & barge Cobar
"The wreck of the side-wheeler, William R. Randell, is located downstream from Waikerie, a short distance below Lock 2. The paddle steamer was abandoned in the 1930s and sand during the 1939 floods.
"The wreck of the Cobar barge, which for many years was used by the William R. Randell, is nearby.
"Parts of both vessels are usually visible above the waterline and provide important archaeological information about the construction of river boats.
J.G. Arnold
"The paddle steamer J.G. Arnold came to grief near Holder Bend in 1942. At the time it was being delivered from Morgan to Mildura for the Victorian Foresty Commission, but, with the river in flood, it sank in deep water just above Waikerie Cliffs and was not recovered.
The right-hand panel sits a little forward of the middle panel, and its transcription reads:
Snagging Boats
"Some of the river's greatest hazards were the snags - the remains of trees that had been flushed downstream or had toppled into the river from the adjacent banks. With their branches and roots largely underwater, snags not only blocked waterways, but could puncture the hull of a steamer or barge.
"From 1855, the three colonial governments along the river (South Australia, Victoria and New South Wales) were paying snagging parties to remove the masses of fallen red gum branches and trees from the waterway. Some of these snags were hauled from the river by bullock teams, but in places where it was difficult to get to the river, boats were used.
"In 1857 South Australia financed Francis Cadel to remove snags ad other hazards along the Murray. He designed the first purpose-built snag boat, the Grappler, which was fitted with a crane that could lift 14 to 15 tons.
"Anothe snag boat, the PS Industry was built in 1876 and was replaced by a second vessel of the same name in 1911.
"De-snagging involved winching the trees or logs from the river and burning them; identifying and burning riverside logs that could become snags; and cutting trees that were about to fall into the channel."
Address: Leonard Norman Drive, Lions Riverfront Park, Waikerie, SA, 5330, Australia
Visited: 1448, Thursday, 31 May, 2018