Owen, South Australia

Owen is a rural community in the heart of the Adelaide Plains. Owen is 150ft above sea-level and receives a reliable 416 mm of rain annually and was first settled in about 1865. It is about 80 km north of Adelaide in South Australia and is approximately 30 minutes by road to the nearest main regional centre of Gawler. It is in the Wakefield Regional Council. There was a second railway siding about northwest of the Government Town of Owen named Woods. The small village by this station is now considered to be part of Owen. At the 2011 census, Owen had a population of 272.The town services a small community of 634 people who live in the town and the surrounding postcode area. For a small town, Owen is very well serviced having a community Church, post office, bowling club, Senior Citizen's Club, a circuit Doctor, Country Fire Service station, primary school, public swimming baths, a hotel, a grocery/deli, children's playgrounds and a golf course. In its heyday in the 1950s, Owen also had a bank, police station, drapery and a butcher.The countryside surrounding Owen was once largely given over to sheep and cattle grazing. However, since the early 1990s the area has become better known for cropping . The Adelaide-Balaklava broad-gauge railway line passed through Owen and the railway yard is marked by a series of massive concrete grain silos typical of this region. The town's other main feature is a typical 1940s large concrete water tower of 98ft in height.