The Royal Tour to Kununurra - March 17th 1963

The 1963 Royal Tour Open Day at Kununurra Museum

  There will be an Open Day at the Kununurra Museum on Sunday March 17th 2013

On that date in 1963, Kununurra was a stop for the Royal Tour, when, HRH Queen Elizabeth II addressed crowds and opened the Australian Inland Mission (AIM) Hospital in Kununurra. In 2013 it will be 50 years since March 17th 1963, the day the Royal Tour landed, reputedly, the first time, that the Queen and a Royal Tour party had landed on a "dirt strip" runway. Do any royal watchers know if this is true? If so please contact us. A countdown to this 50th anniversary has been added to the sidebar on the right.

Some newly digitised images are available online, of a control tower, which was erected for the 1963 Royal Tour, then dismantled. It was made of scaffolding, but no doubt equipped with the latest technology available in 1963. These photographs and others in the collections also show two RAAF fire tenders, which were reputed to have been flown to Kununurra on RAAF transport aircraft, then flown away.