WELLINGTON

town ("parish"), Taunton Deane district, administrative and historic county of Somerset, England, just west-southwest of Taunton. The first duke of Wellington (Arthur Wellesley, who took his title from the town), victor of the Battle of Waterloo (1815), is commemorated by a monument (National Trust property) on the highest point of the nearby Blackdown Hill. Wellington School, at its foot, was founded in 1841. Pop. (1991) 9,621. capital city, port, and chief commercial centre of New Zealand, extreme south North Island. It lies on the shores and hills surrounding Port Nicholson, an almost landlocked bay that is ranked among the world's finest harbours. Mount Victoria rises 643 feet (196 metres) near the centre of the city. In 1839 a ship belonging to the New Zealand Company arrived with officials who were to select a site for the company's first settlement. The site chosen, at the mouth of the Hutt River, proved unsuitable, and a move was made to Lambton Harbour on the west shore. The settlement was named in 1840 in recognition of the aid given the company by Arthur Wellesley, 1st duke of Wellington. It was made a borough in 1842 and a municipality in 1853. In 1865 the seat of the central government was transferred there from Auckland. The city is part of the Wellington local government region. Wellington is the nation's transportation and communications hub. Rail and road services extend from it to all parts of North Island, and steamers to Picton and Christchurch link the capital to similar services on South Island. The city's international airport is also the focal point of the country's internal aviation network. The harbour, serving domestic and international shipping, imports petroleum products, motor vehicles and parts, coal, and minerals and exports frozen meats, newsprint, dairy products, wool, hides, and fruit. The Wellington-Hutt area is a major industrial centre with factories producing apparel, footwear, transportation equipment, machinery, metal products, textiles, printed materials, processed foods, chemicals, soap, and rubber goods. The area also has railyards, shipyards, and oil-storage depots and is the terminus of the natural-gas pipeline from the Kapuni field. The capital controls New Zealand's banking and finance and houses the central offices of governmental departments. Much of the city is built on land reclaimed from the bay. Notable institutions include the Parliament buildings, the town hall, the central library, Victoria University of Wellington (founded 1899), an Anglican cathedral, the War Memorial Carillon (a World War I memorial), and a zoo; Te Papa Tongarewa, a national museum, opened in 1998. The (old) Government Building (1876) is reputed to be one of the world's largest wooden structures. Pop. (1996) city, 158,275; urban area, 335,468. local government region, extreme southern North Island, New Zealand. It includes the cities of Wellington (the national capital) and Lower Hutt, Upper Hutt, Porirua, and Masterton. The broad Hutt River valley, once the locale of dairy farms and market gardens, has absorbed much of Wellington city's urban expansion since the 1950s. There is still much open farmland to the north, however. East of the city of Wellington is the Rimutaka Range and east of that, the Wairarapa Plain. One of the earliest European-settled sections of North Island, Wairarapa (Maori: "Glistening Waters") was pioneered in the 1840s. Fruit and vegetable, dairy, sheep, and beef cattle farming predominate. The business and administrative centre of the plain is Masterton, in the north. The western and southern boundaries of Wellington local government region consist of hilly, isolated coastland fronting the South Pacific Ocean. Pop. (1991) 402,892. town, east-central New South Wales, Australia. It lies at the confluence of the Macquarie and Bell rivers. The site, used by John Oxley as a base for exploration (1817-18), was named by him after the Duke of Wellington. A convict settlement from 1823 to 1831, it was proclaimed a town in 1846, a municipality in 1879, and a shire in 1947. In 1950 Wellington was merged with Macquarie and a portion of Cobar shires. It serves a region producing sheep, cattle, fruits, vegetables, and mushrooms. The town has flour mills and sawmills, freezing and dairy-processing works, and farm and earth-moving machinery plants. Burrendong Dam on the Macquarie and the Wellington limestone caves are close by. Pop. (1991) 9,197.