City of Salisbury: History
For millennia, the Aboriginal Kaurna people were custodians of the Adelaide Plains, including the Salisbury area.
The township of Salisbury was laid out by John Harvey, who had migrated from Scotland in 1839. He named it after the Salisbury Plain in Wiltshire, near where his wife was born. Harvey purchased land beside the Little Para River in 1847 and in the following year sold allotments in the town. It became a service centre for surrounding farms and by 1881 the population was close to 500. Harvey's African heritage has often been ignored in South Australia's history, and the council website has not yet acknowledged that history, which Mayor Gillian Aldridge has said is needed.
The District Council of Salisbury was formed in 1933 by an amalgamation of parts of the abolished District Council of Munno Para West and the District Council of Yatala North. The population of the township at incorporation was 2385, but almost doubled from 1940 when the federal government built a munitions factory at Penfield, reaching 4160 by 1947.
The town council was briefly renamed the District Council of Salisbury and Elizabeth in August 1963, but reverted to its former name after the Elizabeth area was severed to form the new town of Elizabeth in February 1964.
City status was granted as the City of Salisbury on 6 July 1964.