Bute is a town in the Northern Yorke peninsula of

South Australia South Australia (commonly abbreviated as SA) is a States and territories of Australia, state in the southern central part of Australia. With a total land area of , it is the fourth-largest of Australia's states and territories by area, which in ...

, approximately east of

Wallaroo Wallaroo is a common name for several species of moderately large macropods, intermediate in size between the kangaroos and the wallabies, that are native to Australia and Papua New Guinea. The word "wallaroo" is from the Dharug ''walaru'' wi ...

and 24 kilometres west of

Snowtown Snowtown is a town located in the Mid North of South Australia 145 km (90 miles) north of Adelaide and lies on the main road and rail routes between Adelaide and Perth, Western Australia, Perth – the Augusta Highway and Adelaide-Port ...

. It was proclaimed as a town in 1884 and named after the

Isle of Bute The Isle of Bute (; or '), known as Bute (), is an island in the Firth of Clyde in Scotland, United Kingdom. It is divided into highland and lowland areas by the Highland Boundary Fault. Formerly a constituent island of the larger County of ...

, in the

Firth of Clyde The Firth of Clyde, is the estuary of the River Clyde, on the west coast of Scotland. The Firth has some of the deepest coastal waters of the British Isles. The Firth is sheltered from the Atlantic Ocean by the Kintyre, Kintyre Peninsula. The ...

Scotland Scotland is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It contains nearly one-third of the United Kingdom's land area, consisting of the northern part of the island of Great Britain and more than 790 adjac ...

. It was the original site of the Yorke Peninsula Field Days in 1895; they are now held outside Paskeville.

History

The cadastral Hundred of Wiltunga and Hundred of Ninnes were proclaimed in the

County of Daly The County of Daly is one of the 49 cadastral counties of South Australia. It was proclaimed in 1862 and named for Governor Dominick Daly. It covers the northern half of Yorke Peninsula stretching just east of the Hummock- Barunga Range in the ...

in 1874 to enable closer settlement of the area between the Barunga-

Hummock Range The Hummocks or Hummock Range is a range of hills in the northern Mount Lofty Ranges extending north from the eastern edge of Yorke Peninsula in South Australia. It is traversed by the Copper Coast Highway immediately west of where it passes aro ...

s and the coast-side copper-mining communities of Kadina,

and Moonta. In 1882 land in the Hundred of Wiltunga was sold to pioneer grain-growing farmers for between £1 and £1/2/6 per acre. The Government Town of Bute was town surveyed near the southern boundary of the Hundred of Wiltunga in September 1883 and officially named by Governor William Robinson on 13 March 1884. In 1888, the town of Bute and surrounding hundred of Wiltunga was annexed by the District Council of Ninnes, bringing local government administration to the township for the first time. In October 1879 the Brinkworth–Kadina railway line was opened with Bute being at the siding. The next siding towards Kadina on the railway was originally called "15-mile camp" or "16-mile Siding" and later Mona. While the railway was being constructed, some competition existed between Mona and Bute as to which rail-side settlement would become the prime business centre to serve residents, but by 1886 Bute was clearly dominant, being home to a church and school and having had a hotel license granted. In addition to Mona, by the turn of the century, the suburbs of Bute East, Bute South and Bute West existed adjacent to Bute, outside the limits of the original government town. In 1933 the Ninnes council was renamed to the District Council of Bute given that, by then, the township of Bute had far outgrown Ninnes to the south. From 1895 until about 1973, the Yorke Peninsula Field Day event was held at Bute. By 1935 a state-of-the-art aerodrome had been laid down immediately north of the town and become headquarters to the North-Western Aero Club. From the late 1990s a tourist train traversed the by-then-disused railway line from Wallaroo to Bute, but this closed in 2009. In 1998 the boundaries of contemporary Bute were formalised. Bute East, Bute South, Bute West and Mona were all absorbed along with a huge swathe of surrounding farmland to form the new bounded locality of Bute, which occupies approximately the south-eastern two thirds of the Hundred of Wiltunga.

Attractions

Attractions to the town include the nearby Bute tannery, Bute Hobbies Bromeliad Display Gardens and the Bute Hotel. A free-to-view fauna park on the Snowtown Road is maintained by the Bute

Lions Club Lions Clubs International, is an international service organization, currently headquartered in Oak Brook, Illinois. , it had over 46,000 local clubs and more than 1.4 million members (including the youth wing Leo clubs, Leo) in more than 200 ge ...

. Visitors can view emus, peacocks, waterfowl, red kangaroos and other wildlife contained within fenced enclosures. The park also features

barbecue Barbecue or barbeque (often shortened to BBQ worldwide; barbie or barby in Australia and New Zealand) is a term used with significant regional and national variations to describe various cooking methods that employ live fire and smoke to coo ...

facilities and

picnic A picnic is a meal taken outdoors (Al fresco dining, ''al fresco'') as part of an excursion, especially in scenic surroundings, such as a park, lakeside, or other place affording an interesting view, or else in conjunction with a public event su ...

areas. The town is surrounded by agricultural and pastoral land.

References

External links

Yorke Peninsula website
{{authority control Towns in South Australia