Dentist’s Hill

Dentist’s Hill is an opal field near the Nine Mile, named for a fatal accident that occurred in the 1920s.

In 1926 or 1927, a travelling dentist, Douglas McEwen, had been driven to Angledool in a T-model Ford to extract teeth from a patient on the Narran River. Returning in the early hours of the morning, the driver, Ray Nickles, was struggling to stay awake. The vehicle crested the hill when it struck a wilga tree. McEwen, asleep in the passenger seat with his head tilted, was struck and killed instantly. In shock, Nickles ran several miles to Bert Beckett’s camp, where Beckett helped him get back to Lightning Ridge to report the accident.

McEwen’s death was recorded in the register of Angledool court house.

• Dentist’s Hill @ MinView.

Article: Research by Russell Gawthorpe and Leisa Carney, edited by Russell Gawthorpe. LRHS research compiled by Len Cram and Barbara Moritz. Sources: LRHS video records, oral history, burial records and memorials; Discover Opals: Before and Beyond 2000 with Surface Indications, Stephen Aracic, 1996, p. 151.