Stanwell Park

Postcode: 2508

Stanwell Park is a picturesque coastal village and northern suburb of Wollongong, New South Wales, Australia. It is the northernmost point of the Illawarra coastal strip and lies south of Sydney's Royal National Park.

Stanwell Park was the name given to the farm established on the grant given to Matthew John Gibbons in 1824. He was given most of the area called Little Bulli which included present-day Stanwell Park and Coalcliff. The whole of Northern Illawarra went under the Aboriginal name Bulli which means rising up, about the only thing one can do along the narrow coastal strip and indentations of Northern Illawarra. Bulli remains the name of an Illawarra suburb further south from Stanwell Park.

The area was originally inhabited by the Wadi Wadi Aboriginal group. It was first traversed by 3 shipwrecked sailors in an epic journey of survival along hundreds of miles of coastline until rescued at Wattamolla, north of Stanwell Park. Two of their companions were unable to negotiate the Coal Cliffs where the Sea Cliff Bridge is today, and their remains were found by explorer George Bass, who also reported on the rich coal seam apparent in the cliffs.

Mr Gibbons installed a convict, John Paid, to manage the Stanwell Park farm. Paid however used the out-of-the-way valley and a hideout for a gang of bushrangers he formed. He adopted the name of Wolloo Jack and his gang terrorised the Bargo to Liverpool area until he and others of the gang were sent to the gallows in 1829.

The valley continued to attract extraordinary people: Major Sir Thomas Mitchell, one of Australia's best-known explorers built the first house at Stanwell Park; Supreme Court Judge John Fletcher Hargrave later owned and holidayed in the area, his inheritance coming to Lawrence Hargrave, one of the world's most important aviation pioneers of the 1890s in the lead-up to powered man flight. He performed his most important experiments at Stanwell Park.

Now Stanwell, or The Park, is home to about 1200 people, a dormitory suburb for commuters to the nearby cities of Sydney and Wollongong, and a popular tourist destination.

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