Rock Flat is a rural locality in the

Snowy Monaro Regional Council The Snowy Monaro Regional Council is a local government area located in the Snowy Mountains and Monaro regions of New South Wales, Australia. The council was formed on 12 May 2016 through a forced merger of the Bombala, Cooma-Monaro and Snow ...

local government area of New South Wales, Australia. It is located south of

Cooma Cooma is a town in the south of New South Wales, Australia. It is located south of the national capital, Canberra, via the Monaro Highway. It is also on the Snowy Mountains Highway, connecting Bega, New South Wales, Bega with the Riverina. ...

, on either side of the

Monaro Highway Monaro Highway is a highway in Victoria, New South Wales, and the Australian Capital Territory, in Australia, linking in Victoria to Canberra in the Australian Capital Territory (ACT) via the Monaro region. From its southern terminus, it fo ...

. The area now known as Rock Flat lies on the traditional lands of

Ngarigo The Ngarigo people (also spelt Garego, Ngarego, Ngarago, Ngaragu, Ngarigu, Ngarrugu or Ngarroogoo) are Aboriginal Australian people of southeast New South Wales, whose traditional lands also extend around the present border with Victoria. They ...

people. Near the Monaro Highway crossing of Rock Flat Creek, there is a mineral spring that comes to the surface, on the bank of the creek. The spring water issues from near the base of a small rocky mount composed of highly inclined beds of quartzite and the surface of the flat in the vicinity of the spring is tufaceous limestone that has been deposited there by the spring water. The flow rate of the spring is about 245-litres per hour. The spring water has a pleasant taste and is carbonated. The water contains carbonates of

calcium Calcium is a chemical element; it has symbol Ca and atomic number 20. As an alkaline earth metal, calcium is a reactive metal that forms a dark oxide-nitride layer when exposed to air. Its physical and chemical properties are most similar to it ...

sodium Sodium is a chemical element; it has Symbol (chemistry), symbol Na (from Neo-Latin ) and atomic number 11. It is a soft, silvery-white, highly reactive metal. Sodium is an alkali metal, being in group 1 element, group 1 of the peri ...

, and

magnesium Magnesium is a chemical element; it has Symbol (chemistry), symbol Mg and atomic number 12. It is a shiny gray metal having a low density, low melting point and high chemical reactivity. Like the other alkaline earth metals (group 2 ...

. It is likely that this spring is the one referred to as

Richard Bourke General Sir Richard Bourke, KCB (4 May 1777 – 12 August 1855) was an Irish soldier, who served in the British Army and was Governor of New South Wales from 1831 to 1837. As a lifelong Whig (liberal), he encouraged the emancipation of con ...

's Spring by the explorer Dr J. Lhotsky in 1834. Lhotsky had thought highly enough of the spring water to bring bottled samples of it with him on his return journey. The spring was still in its natural state in the 1880s. It was used by local settlers to make bread and

damper A damper is a device that deadens, restrains, or depresses. It may refer to: Music * Damper pedal, a device that mutes musical tones, particularly in stringed instruments * A mute for various brass instruments Structure * Damper (flow), a mech ...

(presumably making use of minerals that are present in the spring water). Early attempts to bottle the water seem to have failed. The first successful attempts, to exploit the spring commercially, seem to date from around 1900. The spring water was bottled and sold under the name 'Koomah Spa', from that year. It was bottled by the company, E. Rowlands Pty Ltd, using a

crown cork The crown cork (also known as a crown seal, crown cap or just a cap), the first form of bottle cap, was invented by William Painter in 1892 in Baltimore. The company making it was originally called the Bottle Seal Company, but it changed its na ...

, then relatively newly invented, to seal the bottle. The company sent a consignment of its bottled water to Osterley House, in England, and subsequently quoted its owner, Lord Jersey, as saying, "''No mineral water comes up to it and it has travelled excellently''". By the late 1930s, the spring was all but forgotten. The spring remained accessible to the public into the 1970s, but is on private property and public access is no longer permitted. A small deposit of

fire clay Fire clay is a range of refractory clays used in the manufacture of ceramics, especially fire brick. The United States Environmental Protection Agency defines fire clay very generally as a "mineral aggregate composed of hydrous silicates of alumi ...

in the locality has been mined in the past. Rock Flat became a favoured camping spot for teams on the road south from Cooma. A village of Rock Flat was planned, around 1886, near the site of the spring, but there is no sign of it now except that one of its streets, Cooma Street, still appears on modern day maps. There was a railway station, also known as Rock Flat, that lay within the locality, on the now disused

Bombala railway line The Bombala railway line is a branch railway line in the south of New South Wales, Australia. The northern part of it forms part of the main line from Sydney to Canberra, but the southern part is closed. It branches off the Main South line at J ...

; it opened in 1912 and closed in 1974. There are some remnants at the railway station site. Rock Flat had a school from 1884 to 1918, and a post office from 1890 to 1978.

References

External links

Plan of the Village of Rock Flat
{{Snowy Monaro Regional Council Localities in New South Wales Snowy Monaro Regional Council

See also

References

External links