Winmalee

Postcode: 2777

Winmalee is an Australian suburb officially established in 1972. The suburb has historical significance as it was once considered a part of Springwood, the first settlement in the Blue Mountains.

Winmalee is located to the north of Springwood and south-west of the small town of Hawkesbury Heights, situated in the Blue Mountains, New South Wales. Winmalee is surrounded by Blue Mountains World Heritage National Park, as with most of the city of the Blue Mountains. This World Heritage National Park was recently placed on the World Heritage List and is known as the Greater Blue Mountains Area World Heritage Site. The Blue Mountains is officially known as "The City Within a World Heritage National Park".

The area now officially known as Winmalee was once inhabited by a race of Aboriginal Australians known as the Dharug tribe. This was a nomadic tribe which inhabited much of the Lower Blue Mountains until European exploration and settlement. The dialect spoken by the tribe is known as the Dharug language. Current figures place the date of this settlement as beginning up to 50,000 years ago.

In 1971 the Department of Education selected "Winmalee" as the name for a new school in the area. Though the residents of the area approved this as the name for the proposed school they rejected it as a name for the suburb. The name Winmalee was chosen by the Department of Education as the result of a competition that had been organised amongst the local people. Terry Macauley, who was to be one of the school's original primary students, suggested the name "Winmalee", an Aboriginal word for North. The word was in fact never used by the Dharug tribe's people in relation to the area, but is instead a reference to its previous unofficial name.

Winmalee was finally officially established as an independent town on 28 April 1972 after the Minister for Lands, Tom Lewis MLA announced the suburb's independence from Springwood and approved the name Winmalee despite objections from residents.

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