Millers Pool
Goorgygoogup, also referred to as Millers Pool is a place of great significance to the Noongar people. The natural pool was located near Booryulup (close to Richardson Park) and Beenabup (Como Beach). This was a site for women to safely give birth while being protected and cooled by the tall rushes and clean water flowing in from the river.
William Kernot Shenton saw the potential for the pool to aid his milling operation, and a spur channel was dug from the pool to his mill, allowing boats easy access to offload grain. In 1896 the pool took on another life as a wildlife sanctuary. Worried that the black swan was becoming extinct, the colonial government built a fence around the pool and offered a bounty: any healthy swan presented to Constable Rewell of the Water Police was worth a guinea. Though housing hundreds of swans and operating until 1914, the Millers Pool Swannery failed to produce a breeding population.
The pool was a controversial feature, considered both a valuable natural landmark and a mosquito-infested eyesore. It was finally destroyed in 1938, filled in with silt gained from dredging ferry channels through the Narrows.
