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Humpty Doo is a small town in Australia's Northern Territory, situated just south of the Arnhem Highway, approximately 40 km from Darwin. At the 2006 census, Humpty Doo had a population of 5,413.〔 Its local government area is Litchfield Municipality. The town is a popular stopping point for tourists travelling between Darwin and Kakadu National Park, and boasts many attractions of its own. The main industries are agriculture and tourism; however, most residents commute to Darwin or Palmerston for work, and many regard the town more as an outer suburb. It has frequently been noted on lists of unusual place names. The locality of Humpty Doo is named after the station originally called ‘Umpity Doo’; however, origins of the name are uncertain. Four derivations have been suggested: *from "the Army slang term "umpty" used in 1917 for the dash when reading Morse code" (however, the station name was in use in 1910) *from a colloquialism to describe "everything done wrong or upside down" *the place was known as "Umdidu", an English language corruption of an Aboriginal term which meant a popular resting place〔()〕 *from the translation of aboriginal English that described the area as being the location of "humpy two", as in, two humpies ==History== The Djerimanga (also known as Woolner) people are recognised as the traditional owners and first inhabitants of an area, from the present day site of Humpty Doo east into the Adelaide River wetlands. Their way of life remained unchanged until the first contact with European explorers in the 19th century, most likely during the 1864 expedition to explore the areas surrounding the Adelaide River, led by Boyle Travers Finniss. In September 1869, Surveyor General of South Australia, George Goyder, completed work to divide the hinterland surrounding the present day Litchfield Shire into parcels. These parcels were subsequently divided into smaller allotments, and made available to settlers as pastoral leases and freehold titles. Following the discovery of gold near Pine Creek during the 1880s, the subsequent influx of Chinese miners to the Northern Territory led to a high demand for food crops such as rice. Rice planted on the floodplains near Humpty Doo were used to meet this demand, with some success.〔("Humpty Doo" ),"The Sydney Morning Herald", Sydney, 8 February 2004〕 Experiments with other tropical crops, including sugar cane, coffee and rubber, were attempted, most of these planted in the vicinity of Beatrice Hill to the east of the present day town. Experiments were made with livestock too and it was hoped that the banks of the Adelaide River could be developed to include loading facilities for live cattle export. By 1887, plantations on the floodplains had been abandoned due to the financial difficulties of the land owners. Despite this, rubber trees and coffee bushes showed particular potential. A single harvest of 10 tons of coffee beans was exported to Melbourne during the short lived experiment.〔Litchfield Council ("Agriculture at Beatrice Hill" )〕 In 1910, the name "Umpity Doo" first appeared, to describe buildings and improvements on a survey plan of Agricultural Lease No. 28, held by Oscar Herbert. Herbert died in 1974 at nearby Koolpinyah.〔http://www.ntlis.nt.gov.au/placenames/view.jsp?id=2047〕 In 1954, after some experimentation by CSIRO and based on previous successful rice crops, a joint Australia-U.S. company called Territory Rice Ltd. was formed, with a plan to irrigate the sub-coastal plain of the Adelaide River in order to commercially produce rice. The rice project was 20km east of the present town, on part of the Humpty Doo Station where the name "Humpty Doo" was first used. The plan was a complete failure due to several factors: an invasion of geese, soil that was too saline, and an insufficient amount of drainage, all combined with poor management. The company gave up the land to the government in 1962. The irrigation dam, called Fogg Dam, still exists and is a good site for bird watching. Local resident, Neville Skewes opened a small store on Mount Bundey Road (now the Arnhem Highway) in 1967. At this time, there was very little development, with most of the surrounding area being bushland. On 11 September 1971, after being granted a liquor licence, Skewes and his wife Helen opened the Humpty Doo Hotel-Motel. The opening of the Hotel coincided with further improvements to the road east to Kakadu and Arnhem Land, and encouraged further urbanisation of the area around Humpty Doo. In 1982, the Royal Australian Navy opened the Humpty Doo Transmitting Station. This replaced a facility at Coonawarra East that was destroyed by Cyclone Tracy in December 1974. The station supports the naval base , located in Darwin. On 21 July 2007, the town played host to the first of the 'Triple J goes AWOL' concerts, sponsored and organised by the national youth radio station Triple J. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Humpty Doo」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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