KENILWORTH, QUEENSLAND

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An attractive village situated in the hills of the Sunshine Coast hinterland. The town hosts the Kenilworth Scarecrow and Limerick Festival held every year in September or October.
Location: 154 km north of Brisbane to the west of Nambour.
Origin of name: Richard Smith set up a cattle run on the east bank of the Mary River in 1850. At the time his wife was reading Sir Walter Scott's novel "Kenilworth" and she decided to name the property "Kenilworth" after the novel. The book's title recalls a town in Warwickshire, England. The town was surveyed off Kenilworth Station in 1921 and took the name of the Station.
Brief history: Early explorers who passed through the area included Ludwig Leichhardt and several sheep farmers. In 1850, Richard Smith selected the Kenilworth cattle run of 16,000 acres on the east bank of the Mary River. The 1884 Land Act led to pastoral land in the Kenilworth area being resumed, surveyed and made available for selection. Farm sizes in this area ranged between 160 and 640 acres. The new settlers in the Kenilworth and Belli areas developed a varied economy in the early period. Most grew maize and vegetables. More and more dairy cattle were brought to the Kenilworth area in the early years of 1900. The town of Kenilworth was surveyed in 1921. The influx of people to take up the new farms made Kenilworth one of the big growth areas in the Maroochy shire during the 1920s.
Natural features: Mary River; Blackall Range; Kenilworth Forest Reserve (Little Yabba Creek; Booloumba Creek; Booloumba Falls; Goldmine Walk Interpretative Trail; The Breadknife rock formation; Peters Creek Walk); Conondale National Park (Conondale Range); Gheerulla State Forest (Gheerulla Creek)
Built features: Kev Franzi Movie Museum; Kenilworth Country Food and Cheese Factory; Borumba Dam
Heritage features: Kenilworth Historic Homestead