1838 - region explored by the “Overlanders” after Charles Sturt had navigated the Murray-Darling systems in 1829
Moama village established in 1845, originally known as Maiden's Punt, after James Maiden - punt owner, station master, publican & post-master - the township was re-named Moama in 1851
Moama became a popular cattle market & crossing place, but when the cattle market crashed in late 1850's, so did Moama - partly attributed to strong competition from Echuca
Echuca founded in 1853 by Henry Hopwood who provided punts & a pontoon bridge which were the only means of crossing the Murray & Campaspe Rivers
1855 - 1st land sale in Echuca, Major Thomas Mitchell purchased allotment in 612 High St on which he built a hotel, beating his great rival Henry Hopwood who had to settle for the adjoining block to the south.
1861 - Common School opened
1864:
old Moama village was wiped out by flooding in 1870
1870's the steamer boom era:
Echuca becomes the largest inland port in Australia and second only to Melbourne as a port in the 1870's
Echuca's paddle steamer & red-gum industries flourished from 1865 to 1880's when new railroads opened more economic routes to the colonial cities
Echuca 208 School built in 1874
Bank of NSW opens in 1877
Iron Bridge opened in 1878 and with gradual decline in river trade, the commercial centre moves southward away from High St, to Hare St, towards the railway station, which by then was a busy transport terminal.
Chinese Masonic Society building built in 1878 which became headquarters for the Chinese population who were largely market gardeners
1900, the steamer trade is killed off by railway competition
major flooding:
Murray River waters regulated by series of weirs & dams constructed in 1920's after a drought in 1914 left the Murray as a series of pools
most of the current paddle-steamers were built in 1920's
1974: rejuvenation of the old High St which had became rundown, with the recreation of Port of Echuca as a tourist centre and the retrieval & restoration of a paddle steamer, the P.S. Alexander Arbuthnot, which had sunk 20yrs earlier
Echuca was 'put on the map' by the filming of “All The Rivers Run” in the early 1980's