About Forbes and the district

Forbes is a town in the Central West of New South Wales with a population of approx 7000. Located in the heart of the Lachlan Valley it is one of New South Wales’ primary producing areas – and regarded as one of the richest.

The rural economy is based around the major sale yards complex – Central West Livestock Exchange, an abattoir, feed lots, dairy, beef and hay exports, wool, wheat, grain seed crops, oil seed crops, fruit and vegetables.

John Oxley the explorer passed by what is now known as Forbes in 1817 and named it, Camp Hill. Squatters in the 1830’s knew it as Bogabigal, the post office originally knew it as Black Ridge and it was not till the gold miners of 1861 that Forbes was chosen as the name, after Sir Frances Forbes, the first Chief Justice of New South Wales.

Gold was discovered in what is now the town’s King George V Park in 1861 and the population jumped to 30,000 but by 1863 the gold frenzy moved to the NZ goldfields and the population dropped to 3500.