Barron River
Named by Native Police Inspectors R. A. Johnstone and A. Douglas in 1876 after Thomas Henry Bowman Barron, chief clerk of police in Brisbane, the 165-kilometre-long Barron Rverdrains a catchment area of approximately 2,138 square kilometres and empties into the Coral Sea between Machans Beach and Cairns Airport. The river had been discovered a year earlier by James Venture Mulligan, who misidentified it as the Mitchell River.
From its headwaters near Herberton in the Mount Hypipamee National Park, the Barron flows north across the Atherton Tablelands before turning east towards Kuranda, the 260-metre Barron Falls and ther Barron Gorge. It eventually reaches the Cairns floodplains near Smithfield.
Mulligan's misidentification is not surprising. The Barron's tributaries include some of the Mitchell's former headwaters, including the Clohesy River, that used to flow northwest to the Gulf of Carpentaria. The additional water flowing over the Barron Falls helped carve out the Barron Gorge, though much of the water that used to flow over the falls has been diverted into the Tinaroo Dam or used to generate electricity at the Barron Gorge Hydroelectric Power Station.
Barron River is also the name of an electoral district of Queensland's Legislative Assembly formed in 1971.
