Media: DATA CD, 1406 pages
Author: G. Manning
Year: 2010
Other: b&w photos, appendixes
Publisher: Gould Genealogy

Geoffrey Manning stated in the preface of his previous work on South Australian place names that "Unlike Nellie Melba, with her interminable 'last appearance' this is my final epistle in nomenclature" ... but here is yet another volume.

This volume is the latest edition of Geoff's 'Manning's Place Names of South Australia'. Now retitled to 'Place Names of Our Land' this has to be the bible of South Australian place names, past and present. With over forty years of research, the place names and their meanings now fill over 1400 pages. This edition contains in excess of one million words and one thousand photographs/sketches.

Mr Manning's fascination with nomenclature (place names) began in the 1970s when he was enticed into writing a family history of his immediate ‘Manning’ ancestors and, found what he believes to be the authentic nomenclature of McLaren Vale where his great-great-grandfather, George Pitches Manning, was the pioneer vigneron. Geoff Manning quotes ...

From this excursion into family affairs evolved an innate desire to delve into the broad spectrum of what I was to describe in my first venture into the subject as the Romance of the Place Names of South Australia and, over the past quarter of a century, two further volumes have flowed from ongoing research and, at the risk of being adjudged pedantic, I rescind my statement in my last edition when I declared that unlike Nellie Melba, with her interminable "last appearances", this is my final epistle on nomenclature.

More than just a book on place names, it is partially a gazetteer in that it covers the history and origin of not only place names, but rivers, lakes, hills, wells, creeks, bays, parks, country towns, and suburbs of Adelaide, schools, buildings, railways and more.

A few example entries:

Borrika – A town, 16 km North-East of Karoonda, proclaimed in 2 April 1914. Its school opened in 1915 and closed in 1941; Aboriginal for ‘stranger’s hut’. Photographs of a settler’s home and the children of V.V. Brown are in the Chronicle, 7 May 1931, page 36, of the Institute on 28 April 1932, page 33, of scrub rolling by Mr M.T. Green on 28 April 1932, page 33, of a cricket team on 31 May 1934, page 34.

Houghton – The name derives from either the OE haug-r – ‘cairn, mound’ or hoh – ‘a high place’. Coincidentally, or otherwise, a Prime Minister of England, Sir Robert Walpole, applied the name ‘Houghton’ to his palatial home in East Anglia, England.

Snuggery – A railway station on the Mount Gambier-Beachport line, 11 km South-East of Millicent. The immediate district was described as being ‘in a beautiful valley, situated in somewhat uninteresting locality’. A post office was opened there on 5 February 1951 and on, 4 August 1970, the Australian Paper Manufacturers gave notice to demolish the company’s homes at Snuggery and at this time only ten families used the post office; it closed on 31 August 1970.

Tsong Gyiaou – The name of a young ladies’ school established by Mary Ann Aldersey and her sister Eliza in 1868. Their aunt, Mary Ann Aldersey, was a missionary in Ningpo, China, and, retiring to McLaren Vale, built a house named after a former preaching station. The name is an anglicised form of ‘San Ch’iao’ (pronounced ‘Song Jow’). It is now part of the ‘Southern Districts War Memorial Hospital.

Contents:

A-Z Glossary of South Australian Place Names

Appendix 1. A Brief History of South Australian Nomenclature and an Analysis of Perpetuated Myths - 1893-1990: An address given by Geoffrey H. Manning at the Family History Award Dinner of the SA Genealogy and Heraldry Society on 23 June 1990

Appendix 2. Extract from an Address Given by Geoffrey H. Manning to the West Torrens Historical Society in May 2002

Appendix 3. Comments on South Australian nomenclature taken from local newspapers

Appendix 4. Foreword to Romance of Place Names of South Australia

Appendix 5. Foreword to Manning’s Place Names of South Australia and a review by Dr Rob Linn

Appendix 6. Early Pastoral Plans of South Australia

Appendix 7. Anomalies in South-East Coast Nomenclature

Appendix 8. Random Thoughts on South Australian Nomenclature Presented by Geoffrey H. Manning on 17 May 2005 at a Meeting Sponsored by Ms Jan Gaebler Smith of Holdfast Books

Appendix 9. Twenty-Five Years of Searching South Australian Nomenclature - An Address Given to the Port Elliot Branch of the National Trust on 14 September 2006

Appendix 10. A 2006 Excursion into ‘Taking in the Washing’ within South Australian Nomenclature

Appendix 11. Author’s Preface to the 2006 Edition as published by Gould Books

Appendix 12. Rob Linn’s Foreword to the 2006 Edition titled Manning’s Place Names of South Australia - from Aaron Creek to Zion Hill

Appendix 13. The Old Gum Tree at Glenelg - Historical Place or Myth?

Appendix 14. A Dispute with the Historical Society of South Australia in respect of Editorial Integrity

Appendix 15. Extracts from an Address given by Geoffrey H. Manning to the Kensington & Norwood Historical Society at the Norwood Town Hall on 5 November 2003, Incorporating Reminiscences of his Life over Eight Decades

Appendix 16. Alms Across the Sea - A Tale of Two Towns

Appendix 17. A Social History of Mount Gambier in the 19th Century

Appendix 18. A Social History of Naracoorte in the 19th Century

Appendix 19. The Good Samaritan

Appendix 20. The Township of Glenelg -1839-1904

Appendix 21. Recreation at Glenelg

Appendix 22. Sport at Glenelg

Appendix 23. The Hazards of Sea Bathing at Glenelg

Appendix 24. Glenelg - An Ocean Mail Port

Appendix 25. Crime, Larrikinism and Wanton Mischief at Glenelg

Appendix 26. The Glenelg Jetties and Breakwaters

Appendix 27. Civic Affairs and Public Utilities at Glenelg

Appendix 28. An Early Tramway to Thebarton and Henley Beach

Appendix 29. The Adelaide and Hindmarsh Tramway Company

Appendix 30. Early Thebarton

Appendix 31. The Industries of Thebarton and Contiguous District

Appendix 32. Thebarton - Nomenclature of Streets

Appendix 33. The Public Health of Thebarton

Appendix 34. Religion at Thebarton

Appendix 35. Sport at Thebarton

Appendix 36. Drainage of the Lower South East

Appendix 37. Kent Town Breweries

Appendix 38. Floods and Natural Disasters at Norwood

Appendix 39. Sanitation in Early Norwood

Appendix 40. Coach Transport at Norwood

Appendix 41. Refuges of Norwood

Appendix 42. The Kensington and Norwood Ovals

Appendix 43. German Place Names in South Australia

Appendix 44. The Anzac Highway

Appendix 45. The Nomenclature of Athelstone Revisited

Appendix 46. The Betrayal of Aborigines in Colonial South Australia - A Review of the South Australian Company and the Angas Legend Revisited

Sources and Notes