Northam is a town situated at the confluence of the Avon and Mortlock Rivers in the Avon Valley, about 97 kilometres (60 mi) north-east of Perth.
The area around Northam was first explored in 1830 by a party of colonists led by Ensign Robert Dale, and subsequently founded in 1833. It was named by Governor Stirling, probably after a village of the same name in Devon, England.
Almost immediately it became a point of departure for explorers and settlers who were interested in the lands which lay to the east. This initial importance declined with the growing importance of the other nearby towns of York and Beverley, but the arrival of the railway made Northam the major departure point for fossickers and miners who headed east towards the goldfields.
