Barrow Creek, Northern Territory

Barrow Creek Northern Territory
Hut at Barrow Creek
Barrow Creek
Coordinates	21°31′55″S 133°53′20″E / 21.53194°S 133.88889°E / -21.53194; 133.88889Coordinates: 21°31′55″S 133°53′20″E / 21.53194°S 133.88889°E / -21.53194; 133.88889
Population	4 (2016)

Barrow Creek is a very small town, current population of 11, in the southern Northern Territory of Australia. It is located on the Stuart Highway, about 280 km north of Alice Springs, about half way from there to Tennant Creek. The main feature of the town is the roadhouse/hotel. A number of mining companies are currently exploring in the area, although none of the current residents are involved in the mining industry.

The Barrow Creek area is the traditional home of the Kaytetye Aboriginal people. Humans have lived in Australia, and perhaps this area, for at least 40,000 years.

With the arrival of Europeans in the latter part of the 19th century, settlers competed with the Kaytetye for land and resources. Cultural misunderstandings on land and property rights resulted in mutual killings.

John McDouall Stuart passed through the area in 1860. He named a creek near the current town after John Henry Barrow, a preacher, journalist and politician who was born in England in 1817 and migrated to South Australia in 1853. At the time of first European habitation of the site, he was Treasurer of South Australia.

Barrow Creek was chosen as a site for an Overland Telegraph morse repeater station by John Ross in September 1871. The station was officially opened on 16 August 1872 by Charles Todd. It was one of 15 such repeater stations on a network traversing Australia and linking to Europe, providing essential communication services. A manned repeater station in newer buildings remained in operation until at least the 1970s. There was also a post office and telephone exchange servicing local cattle stations. The original Telegraph Station has been preserved and is now a monument to the troubles which beset the early days of the Territory.