Thackaringa is a rural locality, civil parish, railway stop and cattle station in Far Western New South Wales.[1]
Thackaringa is located at 141.0623°, −32.0245°, 489.263 km from Sydney and between Cockburn, South Australia on the border with South Australia and by Silverton in the north-east. Thackaringa is at an altitude of approximately 204m.[2]
Thackaringa is arid and sparsely settled with the economy derived mainly from broad acre agriculture, though some mining occurs.[3] Thackaringa is on the Silverton Tramway and Thackaringa railway station operated from 2 January 1889 until 12-Jan-1970.[4] [5]
The nearest town is Cockburn, South Australia.
The northern part of the district is cut by a large retrograde shear zone containing large garnets and refractory minerals.... There are many other small mineral deposits found in the Thackaringa district where quartz veins and/or granitic rocks have crystallised including the Thackaringa davidite belt and pods of large rutile crystals.[6]
Thackaringa has a Köppen climate classification of BWh and BWk desert.
The Parish is part of the traditional lands of the Wiljali people.[7]
The area was opened by Europeans due to the discovery of minerals in the 19th century.[8] [9] There was a grazing property, known as Thackaringa Station, and the first discovery of silver ore in the area was made there in 1875, by Julius Nickel who was digging a well. In 1888, the population of Thackaringa was between 200 and 300 people.[10] Silver, lead, feldspar and beryl are still extracted in the area today.[11]