Visitors to Strangways Springs on the Oodnadatta Track will come away with an improved understanding of the site’s historical, cultural and ecological significance after six new interpretive signage panels were installed in July. The new signs were installed by FOMS volunteers during the field trip of July 2014.

The result of a partnership between the volunteer group Friends of Mound Springs (FOMS), the Arabana people and the SA Government, the new signs replace their aging and badly faded predecessors to tell the stories of the Overland Telegraph and the mound springs. FOMS members revised and updated the signage text while Natural Resources SA Arid Lands worked with Aaron Stuart, then Chair of the Arabana Aboriginal Corporation, to ensure the wording appropriately reflected the Arabana community’s traditional and ongoing association with the site.

The new signs were installed by FOMS members Bruce Gotch and Alan Williams on a bitterly cold July day when maximum temperatures over the inland struggled to reach double figures. The new replacement panels were funded by Natural Resources SA Arid Lands and it is hoped that they will remain serviceable for the next six to eight years.

FOMS and Natural Resources SA Arid Lands would also like to acknowledge S Kidman & Co for the considerable funding and effort they invested in the 1990s to fence the mound springs and the ruins of the repeater station.