St Clair

About St Clair

The St Clair property is behind Lake St Clair and is 33 acres. The old St Clair mission, an Aboriginal mission where many Wonnarua people lived and worked, was located on part of this property.

St Clair Mission operated in Singleton, Hunter Valley, NSW till 1918 when it was taken over by the Aborigines Protection Board. In New South Wales, the idea of developing reserves to ‘protect’ and ‘civilise’ Aboriginal people, i.e. encourage Aboriginal people adopt a European way of life and belief system, developed as early as 1815. At this time Governor Macquarie …Read More

The history of this property is important to the Wonnarua people, who have little record of their history prior to the white settlement.
St Clair has been formally recognised as a protected Aboriginal place by the Government.

Wonnarua Cultural Park

It is intended that St Clair will become a meeting place and cultural centre for the Wonnarua people. This place would be known as the Wonnarua Cultural Park, and would have a community hall, agricultural shed, fishing and camping grounds, community gardens and a replica of the old church. You can view the Master Plan for this project on the left. Click the image to view a larger version.

WNAC have already received funding for stage one of the project from RMS. It is currently looking at other funding sources for the remaining stages of the project.

Work at St Clair

WNAC have maintained the St Clair site over the years, and by doing so have engaged and supported local Aboriginal Businesses to do the land maintenance. In recent times it has been done by Wonnarua Mine Rehabilitation, a business owned by WNAC that employs local Aboriginal People. They are currently clearing large amounts of weeds from the property.
View the gallery below to see some of the work that has been happening at St Clair: