The lakes were previously an unreliable source of water, filling out during flood periods and disappearing when the river level dropped. As early as 1894 plans were put forward for conservation of the resource but a water storage scheme was not implemented until 1949 (completed in 1960). The current storage capacity is 1 794 000 megalitres, 3.5 times the volume of Sydney Harbour and covering eight times its area. Lake Menindee, the largest, is 16 x 14 km in surface area. The purpose of the scheme is the provision of regulated flows for water supply and irrigation. A pipeline which runs from Menindee provides Broken Hill with a regular supply of water.
Historically the Darling River has been associated with the Barkindji Aboriginal people who travelled its length from Wilcannia through Menindee and down to Wentworth. They relied upon the river for water and food, using canoes and elaborate stone traps for their fishing. The town's name is said to derive from the Barkindji place name 'Minandichee'.
It is thought by some that the first Europeans in the immediate vicinity, the 1835 party of Major Thomas Mitchell, laid the foundations for what turned out to be disastrous relations with the Aborigines. Mitchell followed the Bogan and Darling rivers down to Menindee and the surrounding lakes, which he named Laidley's Chain of Ponds after the deputy commisary-general of NSW (the Barkindji called them 'Wontanella' meaning 'many waters').
At the lakes Mitchell selected a campsite on top of the sandhills. According to Mitchell's account trouble broke out when two of his party took a kettle for fresh water and some Aborigines they encountered wanted it. A white was clubbed and a black shot. A skirmish broke out and another black was killed. The Aborigines fled to the water where a woman with a baby on her back was killed. Mitchell records that 'a mournful song, strongly expressive of the wailing of women' was then heard and they hurriedly departed for the north expecting heavy retaliation.
Charles Sturt travelled up the Darling from the Murray in 1844 during his exploration of the interior. He arrived at the site of Menindee in 1844 and then headed north-west (see entries on Broken Hill, Milparinka, Tibooburra).
As pastoralists, drovers and shepherds followed in the wake of the explorers frequent and violent conflict arose with the Aborigines. The whites encroached upon traditional hunting grounds and raped the black women. The Aborigines killed and ate white stock, attacked droving camps and stole station food and stores. The trouble was serious enough to cause drovers to shun the area and landowners to abandon their properties, at least until 1853 when police were brought in to secure the area. Afterwards the tide turned against the Barkindji who were subsequently decimated by European disease, forcibly driven from the land and moved to government missions at Menindee, Lake Cargelligo and Ivanhoe.
While most skirmishes were limited in scope there were two ill-publicised massacres in the area. Leaseholds along the Darling stipulated that the property owners had to provide the Aborigines with provisions and permit the hunting of traditional game. When Avoca station, to the south, fell upon a period of hardship the bread provision was garnished with arsenic and the entire tribal group was found dead the next morning. On the shore of Boolaboolka Lake, to the east, a group of whites shot a tribe and left the skeletons to bleach in the sun, suggesting their conviction that they would not be held answerable.
The first settler in and effective founder of Menindee was Tom Pain and his family who arrived in 1852, determined to establish a home and business on the river. He opened the Menindee Hotel the following year. With numerous additions it is still open and considered the second-oldest hotel still in continuous operation in NSW. It is now known as Maiden's Menindee Hotel for the simple reason that it was owned, from 1896 to 1979, by the Maiden family (see entry on Moama). It burnt down a couple of years ago and a more modern hotel now replaces the original and historic building.
With the growth of the river trade in the 1850s, the arrival of a police force and Pain's presence, prospects for the settlement of the region improved. The runs of the Central Darling were officially surveyed and opened for tender in 1855. Explorer John McKinlay took up several of the properties, including 'Menindel', one of the first small frontage blocks along the Darling. This station later became Kinchega.
Captain Francis Cadell, who pioneered the operation of river steamers along the Murray, established a store near the hotel at Menindee in 1856. It was named Wurtindelly after the Aboriginal word for the sand ridges on which it was built. These two buildings became the nucleus around which the town grew. Although not the first to navigate the Darling, Cadell is the first whose name is recorded. It was not until early 1859 that he travelled upriver as far as Mt Murchison station (see entry on Wilcannia) and visiting his Menindee store on the return journey. Settlers began to pour into the region with news that the Darling was navigable.
Burke and Wills reached Kinchega station in October 1860 on their expedition to the Gulf of Carpentaria. They journeyed on to Menindee by steamer, stayed at the Menindee Hotel then continued north.
Burke split the expedition in two. He headed an advance party of eight while Wright was left in charge of the main body of the expedition, which was to bring up the rear. Burke, Wills, Gray and King set off for the Gulf of Carpentaria leaving Brahe in charge of a stockade at Cooper Creek. Brahe was to wait for Wright's party but they never showed up. Four months later Gray was dead and Burke, Wills and King staggered back to Coopers Creek barely alive, only to find that, just seven hours prior to their arrival, Brahe's team had left some provisions and departed.
One of those who waited at Cooper Creek was Dost Mahomet, one of the party's Afghan camel drivers. After losing an arm in a camel-related accident Mahomet settled in Menindee and worked in the bakery of William Ah Chung, who established one of the first market gardens in town. His grave is located about 1 km out of town on the road towards Broken Hill. Ah Chung's bakehouse, built around 1880, is still standing in Menindee St. It currently houses an art gallery.
A post office opened at the fledgling settlement in 1861 and the site was officially known as 'Perry' but locals protested and the township was gazetted as Menindie in 1863 (it was respelled Menindee in 1918). Growth was initially slow but with the help of the steamers Menindee became an important river port and telegraph station. The boats were quicker and much cheaper than bullock trains although in drought periods the water level would sometimes fall so low the waterways became unnavigable.
The 1860s and 1870s were a period of expansion for the town. However, when gold and other mineral finds were made to the north in the late 1870s and 1880s, employees along the Darling chased the new prospects and Wilcannia displaced Menindee as the main river port and business centre. Consequently, Menindee slowed down to become a service and community centre to the surrounding district. As previously mentioned this role was later supplemented by fruit and vegetable production when the lakes' irrigation potential was harnessed.
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