Extract date: 05/11/2026
| Name | Ranken River |
|---|---|
| Type Designation | Stream |
| Place Id | 17896 |
| Place Type | Feature |
| Status | Registered |
| Date Registered | 1 May 1947 |
| Location (Datum GDA94) | |
| Latitude: -20° 31' S (Decimal degrees -20.527293) | |
| Longitude: 137° 35' E (Decimal degrees 137.598181) | |
| Locality / Suburb | |
| Ranken | |
| Local Government Area | |
| Barkly Shire Council | |
| History/Origin | The Ranken River was originally recorded on maps of the Northern Territory as "Rankine River" from the 1870s until renamed by the Nomenclature Committee in 1947 to RANKEN River (NTG No 79 of 1 May 1947) to agree with the name of the pastoralist John Logan Campbell Ranken who held leases in the area and in Queensland in 1866. Ranken's leases in the NT were held under titles issued by Queensland because at the time the location of the border was unknown. WO Hodgkinson in his report "North-West Expedition" (Queensland Parliamentary Paper of 1877) records ''September 17th (1876) - Shifted camp with Mr Buchanan to the junction of Rankin's Creek with the Herbert, Rankin's Creek, being much larger than the Herbert, below the junction........'' and the summary at the end of the report reads: " .... the Herbert is joined by a larger channel from the NW, called the Ranken, ..... .....Rankin's Creek, by Mr Rankin ...... " Ernest Favenc in "The Explorers of Australia, and their life-work" 1908 wrote " In 1878, Nathaniel Buchanan, a veteran pioneer and overlander of Queensland, made an excursion from the Queensland border to Tennant's Creek on the overland telegraph line. Starting from the Ranken, a tributary of the Georgina, Buchanan struck westerly course...." Bobby Buchanan "In the Tracks of Old Bluey" Central Queensland University Press, 1997 writes "Nat (sic Buchanan) and Ben Crossthwaite made exploratory trips to the west of Lake Mary as far as the Ranken River. This river was named in honour of Nat's friend and contemporary, John Logan Campbell Ranken, who first settled on Avon Downs in 1866. WO Hodgkinson, in his report on the North west Expedition, mentioned meeting Nat near Lake Mary and recorded that he had explored and named the Ranken." From the above information it can be assumed that the Ranken River was named in the 1860's by Nat Buchanan or others after John Ranken, the first pastoralist of what was to become Avon Downs. |
| Date | Gazettal | Comment |
|---|---|---|
| 01/05/1947 | CC79 |