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What is Denmark like?
Denmark is a dynamic small friendly town of approximately 5,000 residents where artists, musicians, families, retirees and tourists enjoy the sea and tree change.
The town has a spectacular coastline, forests, rolling green hills, vineyards, and the beautiful William Bay National Park.
Denmark has a thriving tourist industry and caters for those on a budget with campsites and caravan parks, B&Bs, hotels, self-contained chalets and indulgent pampering weekend retreats.
Denmark has all services including cafes and restaurants, galleries, wineries, supermarkets, craft shops, medical and sporting facilities, fuel, and banks all close to fantastic beaches. See our Denmark Fast Facts for details.
A little bit of history
Noongar people inhabited the area around Denmark about 40,000 years ago.
Thomas Braidwood Wilson, an English explorer, discovered this area in 1829 when conducting an expedition from Frederickstown - later to become Albany. He came across the river here and named it the Denmark River, after Dr Alexander Denmark, his friend and former tutor at the Naval Medical College in England.
The first European land use was by graziers and in 1893 the Millar brothers set up a sawmilling operation on the Denmark River to meet the needs of the Goldfields, which used huge amounts of timber.
Around 1885 timber leases were taken out in the Denmark River area and 15 years later milling was at its peak. However, resource depletion soon resulted in a total collapse of the timber industry.
The population declined dramatically and only started to revive with the introduction of the Group Settlement Scheme in the 1920s. Small farms of 40 hectares were developed to create pasture for cattle, dairying and orcharding. Conditions were often poor and some of the small farmers could hardly survive.
By the 1960s the population had increased to 1,500 and was becoming attractive to alternative life-stylers and early retirees. Wine growers discovered the value of the rich karri loam for their vineyards with Riesling and Chardonnay being the first grapes grown on Denmark soil. |
