Cadastral map of the town of Arthurton located on Yorke Peninsula in South Australia.

The town of Arthurton, in the centre of Yorke Peninsula, is a small rural community and service town situated about 18 kilometres north of Maitland. The settlement was originally known as Kalkabury but in 1877 the Governor, Sir Arthur Musgrave, renamed the town Arthurton after his infant son.

When the Government decided that Yorke Peninsula should be opened up for agriculture in the late 1860s the surveyors began in the south and worked their way north. Towns were to be established at approximately 10 mile intervals as this was considered a reasonable travelling distance for the times. However local conditions, such as the availability of water, could also influence a location. Once a site was selected the surveyors would receive a town plan from the Surveyor-General in Adelaide. This was generally of the regular grid pattern that Colonel Light had used when he designed Adelaide and always contained allowance, as in Adelaide, for a belt of parkland surrounding the town. These could then be developed for sporting facilities, schools and other facilities as required.

Arthurton was probably intended as a large regional centre, if the number of blocks and open spaces originally surveyed are taken into account. Over the years unreliable water supply and drought have affected regional agricultural activity, and the economic consequences of this influenced the town's eventual size.

Carmichael, Ern, The ill-shaped leg: a story of the development of Yorke Peninsula , Fullarton, S. Aust., 1973

Colliver, PH and Thomson, TM., Kalkabury became Arthurton, Arthurton: Centenary Committee, Arthurton, 1977

Yorke Peninsula planning area development plan : comprising a report and plan for the York Peninsula Planning Area under the provisions of part III of the Planning and Development Act,1966-1975 / South Australian State Planning Authority Adelaide: South Australian State Planning Authority, [1978?]