Sheep Hills

Sheep Hills is a locality in the northern Wimmera region, north-west Victoria. It is on the railway line south-east of Warracknabeal, about midway between there and Minyip.

Sheep Hills was the name of a pastoral run taken up in 1847 by Archibald McMillan. Farm allotments were taken up in the mid-1870s, several of the settlers being of a German-Lutheran tradition.

The Sheep Hills district was known as Bangerang (the name of a Lutheran school) and Tarkedia (the name of a State school opened in 1877). In 1886 the railway was extended from Minyip to Warracknabeal and the settlement which grew at the railway siding was named Sheep Hills. A mechanics’ institute was opened in 1888, and within a few years there were a hotel and several stores. Water was supplied by a channel from the Yarriambiack Creek.

There were also Anglican, Catholic, Methodist and Presbyterian churches, the Lutheran community apparently worshipping at Kirchheim, near Minyip.