Pioneers of Maytown & Palmer River GoldfieldsPrint Page

The monument commemorates the pioneers of Maytown and the Palmer River Goldfields.

Once the busy administrative and commercial centre for the lucrative Palmer River goldfield,in 1886 the population of Maytown reached 154 Europeans and 450 Chinese. There was no Christian church, but there was a Chinese temple. By the turn of the century the town had a branch of the Government Savings Bank, a state school, courthouse, school of arts, hospital, police barracks, one hotel, eight stores – four of which were Chinese, a baker, saddler and Miners Institute.

The population was 252 Europeans and 422 Chinese. But, by 1924 only Wah Chong & Company’s store remained open. Buildings like the school that closed in 1925 remained, abandoned, until World War Two in the hope of a mining revival. Mining has continued on the field but has always been too small-scale to revive the township. The decline in gold mining activity on the Palmer River is essentially what saw its demise.

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