Jarrahdale

Jarrahdale is a small historic town located 45 km south-east of Perth, Western Australia in the Darling Range.

Jarrahdale is a small historic town located 45 km south-east of Perth, Western Australia in the Darling Range. The name is derived from its situation in a jarrah forest. Established in the late 1800s as the state's first major timber milling operation, it played a key role in the development of Western Australia through the exportation of jarrah around the world. At the 2016 census, Jarrahdale had a population of 1,192. Since 2001, the historic precinct has been managed by the state's National Trust organisation alongside private residential and tourism-oriented developments.

The Jarrahdale Timber Company constructed a railway for the transport of timber from Jarrahdale through Mundijong to Rockingham. In 1872 the townsite was granted timber concessions and the town was born, though it was not gazetted until 1913.The locality was destroyed by an 1895 bushfire. and the town was relocated west of its original position.

Historic buildings in the area include a mill manager's house, nurses' quarters/hospital, general store, single men's quarters, Gianatti store, Murray Arms/Jarrahdale Tavern/Rileys Bar, churches, post office and other buildings. A POW camp was located outside the town during World War II. Recently the old mill office, behind the nurses' quarters, was destroyed by fire, a recurring hazard throughout the township's history.

The population of the town was 600 (400 males and 200 females) in 1898.Bauxite had been mined by Western Aluminium near Jarrahdale throughout the 1960s. The ore was transported by rail to Kwinana for processing at the company's Alumina refinery. In 1967 the company had mined 405,000 metric tons (398,604 long tons) of bauxite.On 14 July 1997, the Jarrahdale townsite was entered on the National Trust's List of Classified Heritage places, the seventh Western Australian town to be so classified.The Shire of Serpentine-Jarrahdale instigated a redevelopment scheme for the Jarrahdale Heritage Park which houses the previous mill sites and the last standing mill built in the 1930s. This mill is still operating as a small production business called Heritage Sawmillers, located on the Gooralong Brook which flows through the townsite. Following negotiations with the landowners Wesfarmers/Sotico, the shire purchased some of the land for housing development and, in 2001, an entire historic precinct was donated to National Trust of Australia (WA), including the site of a closed timber sawmill.