The joint traditional owners of this area are the Kungarakan and Warai peoples. Their rights to the land are recognised in the Finniss River Land Claim, granted in May 1981. The first European to travel here was surveyor George Goyder in 1869, who noted a green copper-like ore at a place called Giants Reef — which would later be identified as torbernite, a uranium-bearing mineral. That discovery attracted little interest. The Kungarakan people suffered at least three poisoning incidents during the early colonial period, a history that sits under the uranium story and must not be forgotten when telling it.

In April 1948, the Commonwealth of Australia Gazette published a notice offering £25,000 for the discovery of uranium ore in Australia. The demand was driven by the United States and Britain, who had identified Australia as a potential source in the nuclear age following World War II. Jack White — buffalo shooter, crocodile hunter, prospector — was running a small farm with his Aboriginal partner when he recognised the ore from a colour pamphlet. He delivered samples to the Mines Branch in Darwin on 13 August 1949 and later claimed the full reward.

Mining began in 1954 under a contract between the Australian Government and the UK-US Combined Development Agency. Between 1954 and 1971, the mine produced 3,530 tonnes of uranium oxide and 20,000 tonnes of copper concentrate. Days before the mine officially opened, four staff were killed when two trucks collided. A total of 863,000 tonnes of uranium ore were processed before the site was abandoned — without rehabilitation.

The Federal Government, through the Australian Atomic Energy Commission, controlled the mine. The mining company, Conzinc (later part of the Rio Tinto Group), consistently denied responsibility for rehabilitation when the mine closed in 1971. What followed was one of Australia's most documented environmental failures. Sulphides in the ore began to oxidise, releasing acid and heavy metals into the East Branch of the Finniss River. The 1,500 millimetres of annual rainfall — ideal for oxidation — carried contamination downstream. Elevated gamma radiation, alpha-radioactive dust, and radon daughter concentrations were detected.

A Commonwealth-funded $16.2 million cleanup program began in 1983. By 2003, a government survey found that capping designed to contain radioactive waste for at least 100 years had already failed in under 20 years. The Northern Territory and Federal Governments continued to dispute responsibility for the remaining contamination of local groundwater.

After the mine closed, the open-cut pit filled with water and became Rum Jungle Lake. It is considered the only water body in the Darwin region not inhabited by crocodiles, which made it immediately popular with swimmers, canoeists, and scuba divers. The irony is not subtle: a uranium mine pit, in a contaminated landscape, became a recreation reserve because it was the one place you could swim without worrying about being eaten.

In November 2010, low-level radiation readings prompted a temporary closure. After testing by the Environmental Research Institute, the lake was declared safe and reopened in October 2012. In June 2024, the Coomalie Community Government Council released a community survey about planned further rehabilitation works on the lake — meaning the conversation about what to do with Rum Jungle is still ongoing, more than fifty years after the mine closed.