The state government has provided $66,000 for an archaeological assessment, oral history recording and historical research into the area south of Orange near the Shiralee housing estates.

Museum and heritage coordinator with the Orange City Council, Alison Russell, said The Springs occupied a thin stretch of land at least 500 metres long from the 1920s to the 1940s.

“There were at least 18 families living here in the ’30s,” she said.

“The huts were made out of corrugated iron, whatever materials they could find.

“There was a bath here made out of kerosene tins.”

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The area is alongside a former stock route that is now a cycling and walking path.

It is planned to have interpretative signs installed to recognise its past.

The Springs was home to Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal people before being cleared by the council.

Western NSW parliamentary secretary Rick Colless said the Heritage Near Me Local Strategic funding would help protect the heritage asset.

“The area was cleared by the council in 1936 and represents the cooperation between communities throughout this period,” Mr Colless said.

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“The site contains remnants from the original 20^th century settlement including historic hut foundations and other moveable heritage items.

“As Orange grows, residents and tourists want to know more about the town’s history and heritage.

“The project will aim to connect the community with the history behind the Aboriginal fringe camp which lived here in Orange from the 1920s-40s.”

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Council’s Aboriginal Community Engagement Officer Donna Monaghan said it was an important site.

“It was a fringe camp and residents were both Indigenous and non-Indigenous, so they shared the space and survived out here and lived basically off what they had,” she said.

“It would have been vast in native trees and animals would have come and drunk from the springs I guess, and that would have been a food source for many of the residents out here as well as plants and native trees.”