Mertondale is an
abandoned town located between
Leonora and
Laverton in the
Goldfields-Esperance region of Western Australia.
A prospector named Fred Merton discovered
gold
Gold is a chemical element with the symbol Au (from la, aurum) and atomic number 79. This makes it one of the higher atomic number elements that occur naturally. It is a bright, slightly orange-yellow, dense, soft, malleable, and ductile me ...
in the area in 1898 and the claim turned out to be an exceedingly rich find. The mining warden suggested that a townsite should be declared in 1899, and it was gazetted later the same year.
Merton's lease, named Merton's Reward or Merton's Find, was the main mine in the town. Merton himself suggested the name Mertondale. The gold petered out by 1910 and the town was deserted shortly afterward.
A pastoral lease,
Mertondale Station, takes its name from the old townsite, which is situated within the station boundaries. In 2020 the
Department of Defence Department of Defence or Department of Defense may refer to:
Current departments of defence
* Department of Defence (Australia)
* Department of National Defence (Canada)
* Department of Defence (Ireland)
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bought the station to protect the
Jindalee Operational Radar Network
The Jindalee Operational Radar Network (JORN) is an over-the-horizon radar (OHR) network that can monitor air and sea movements across . It has a normal operating range of to . It is used in the defence of Australia, and can also monitor mari ...
against
Chinese
Chinese can refer to:
* Something related to China
* Chinese people, people of Chinese nationality, citizenship, and/or ethnicity
**''Zhonghua minzu'', the supra-ethnic concept of the Chinese nation
** List of ethnic groups in China, people of ...
attention.
References
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Mining towns in Western Australia
Ghost towns in Western Australia
Shire of Leonora