Explorer Charles Sturt was one of the first Europeans to visit the area in 1844. He spent six months trapped by drought at Depot Glen, south of Tibooburra. He then tried to travel north west and was defeated by the desert. Burke and Wills also went through the area in 1861 on the journey north towards the Gulf of Carpentaria. It was the search for Burke and Wills that led to the opening up of the country for the pastoral industry. Following a gold rush to the Albert Goldfields, gold was found around Tibooburra in 1880. At first the area was called The Granites. When in 1881 the goldfields warden W.H.J. Slee had a town laid out he named it Tibooburra. Although he named the streets after European explorers, he preferred the Aboriginal name for the locality for the town. Slee had his observations on Aboriginal customs in the Tibooburra region published by the Linnean Society of NSW. The town's name could be derived from an Aboriginal word for heap of boulders. There was drought in 1884. In 1887 Slee reported that there were 19 gold puddling machines at work, with a population at and about Tibooburra of 250. It was said that gold was found exposed in the streets after heavy rain. By the turn of the 20th Century the gold mining activity had waned, to be replaced by the pastoral industry. Sheep stations, necessarily large in area due to the aridity, were the mainstay of Tibooburra until the 1980s, providing most of the social and commercial activity. For over a century the township had remained remote because of rough unsealed roads, but with the popularity of 4WD driving, and ever increased bitumen roads, it became within comfortable reach of the tourism industry. In more recent times musicians and artists, in particular Clifton Pugh, became fascinated with this remote outback region. Pugh often stayed at the Family Hotel where he painted a number of murals, drawings, and sketches on an inside wall of the hotel.
Tourist attractions
Apart from the arid landscape, the main natural tourist attraction is the remarkable granite rock outcrops which erupt immediately beside the town streets. Historic buildings, harking back to the pioneering era, are found about the town. Nearby is Sturt National Park, which incorporates Cameron Corner, where the borders of three States meet; Queensland, South Australia and New South Wales. Although there is a "settlement" at Cameron Corner, services there are even more limited.
Heritage listings
The Mount Wood Station is a heritage-listed former cattle station in the Sturt National Park.
Tibooburra Outback School of the Air is the town's education provider, servicing both the local residents and the children of property owners in the area. It was established as a Distance Education Centre in 1991 by Tony Bush after being approved for the project in 1990. Prior to that students attended in town, and students on properties were educated through central schools further afield in towns such as Broken Hill. The school itself was established in 1886. No high school facilities exist in the town, children travel 365 km to the nearest high school, do home schooling, or attend boarding schools. Once a term students from the external properties attend a 'mini-school' at the school. Mini-schools typically have themes and consist of a range of fun and educational activities. Out of town families also receive two home visits a year, in which a teacher and students visit and spend the day on the property. In 2004 the school switched from radio based education to the Satellite Education Program.
Climate
Tibooburra has an arid, desert climate with temperatures reaching above in summer. Temperatures are milder in winter, averaging around in the daytime but frosts are common during night-time. Rainfall is scant throughout the year, apart from the occasional thunderstorm, though in March 1949 and January 1974 the town received around or nearly twice its average annual rainfall. In its driest year of 1919, only fell.
