Thirroul () is a northern seaside suburb of the city of Wollongong, Australia. Situated between Austinmer and Bulli, it is approximately 13 kilometres north of Wollongong, and 73 km south of Sydney. It lies between the Pacific Ocean and a section of the Illawarra escarpment known as Lady Fuller Park, adjacent to Bulli Pass Scenic Reserve. Name Thirroul was originally called Robbinsville in 1880 by its settler community after a local landowner, Frederick Robbins. In 1887 the Railways Department opened a railway station in the town, and sometime later officially adopted the term "Thirroul". The source for this suggestion was probably Archibald Campbell, then owner and editor of the Illawarra Mercury, a man who was interested in indigenous terminology. His original manuscript transcription of the aboriginal word for the cabbage tree palm which flourished in the area was Dthirrawell, which was later transcribed as Thirroul. As the word circulated, in 1892 a Port Kembla Aboriginal elder William Sadler objected to 'Thirroul' as meaningless. The proper term must be, he claimed, throon, referring to the bush leeches collected in the escarpment below the town and later the site of the would later become the Excelsior Colliery. A local historian, Joseph Davis, cleared up the confusion in the November 1994 edition of the Illawarra Historical Society Bulletin. Campbell's original manuscript transliteration of the aboriginal term was Dthirrawell was close to an illegible scrawl for the clerk who partially misread it and simplified the term as Thirroul. History Before European settlement, the territory belonged to the Wodiwodi Aborigines, who spoke a dialect of Tharawal, which some sources still suggest as an alternative etymology for the Thirroul toponym. Cabbage tree palms were once plentiful in the area and early white settlers harvested them to make strong fence posts. Stands of these trees are still visible on either side of Bulli Pass. Early settlement began in the late 1860s in the hilly area of the village as the lower beachside area was swampy and susceptible to flooding with high tides sometimes combining with heavy rain. Occupations consisted of farming, cedar logging, whaling and fruit growing and eventually mining when the Bulli Mine was opened in 1859 and the Bulli Jetty which shipped the coal from the mine opened in 1863. The township was known as North Bulli until February 1880 when the name of Robbinsville was chosen. The new name was decided upon at a