Railway stations in years past often had gardens around them or on the platforms. This was no coincidence, as each station was manned with enough personnel to handle busy periods. The idle times in between were in many cases taken up maintaining the appearance of the station area, and depending on the people involved, this often included establishing gardens. In the Adelaide area, Mount Lofty was a prime example.



Eyre Peninsula is largely an area of low rainfall and, especially in the early years of settlement, harsh conditions. Water was (and still is) a scarce commodity, so this is not somewhere one would expect the railway garden tradition to appear. Nonetheless, Cummins and Minnipa both had small garden plots beside their station buildings. These plots were carefully fenced to keep feral creatures and wandering livestock out, and faithfully maintained. In the early Twentieth Century the railway stations were the focus of the Peninsula communities’ identities. Roads were mostly non-existent, and everything needed came in by rail. Wheat, cream, eggs and livestock were shipped out by rail. The arrival of the train was a social occasion, with people dressing up, chatting, and eagerly distributing the incoming mail. The little garden plots formed a backdrop to this social ritual. The photograph shows the Cummins garden in the 1920s.

Over the decades a series of changes crept in, slowly changing the way of life of these rural communities. Better roads, faster communications, withdrawal of passenger rail services, and staffing reductions at country stations meant that these little gardens were forgotten. Cummins lost its one to station building extensions, and the one at Minnipa languished in a heavily overgrown state.

In the late 1990s the good folk at Minnipa were trying to recapture the spirit of the town and arrest the downward slide afflicting many rural towns. As part of this effort they took on the old railway garden. They cleared all the vegetation, repaired the fence, restored the stone terracing and edging that had been a feature of the garden for so many years, and re-established the garden with suitable plants. Their efforts have been rewarded with a spectacular display of colour in the centre of town. The Minnipa railway garden today is a superb living example of a piece of railway and community history, and proof that the spirit of these little rural towns is alive and well.