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Queensland State Archives posted a photo:

The station homestead was an important landscape feature that assisted the establishment and survival of the Queensland pastoral industry and the community of people associated with the industry. As the physical buildings are abandoned, deteriorate and are demolished over time, the survival of the remaining homesteads is under threat.

A ‘homestead’ is the main house or head statino on a large landholding running livestock, together with its associated outbuildings. These homesteads with their cluster of buildings resembled small villages. Queensland pastoral settlement was initiated by expansion from New South Wales to the Darling Downs and by 1844 there were 30 squatting stations. Some of these like Canning Downs and Coochin Coochin were painted by Sydney artist Conrad Martens in the late 1850s.

Following separation from New South Wales in 1859, rapid expansion occured west into the Maranoa and Warrego, then north into Mitchell and Burke districts. After

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Queensland State Archives posted a photo:

Though Stanthorpe was occupied by pastoralists in the early 1840s and farm selectors in the 1860s, it was the mining started by the Pioneer Tin Mining Company in 1872 that put the place on the map.

The building of the railway line through Stanthorpe provided miners with substitute employment during 1881-83, but it was orcharding that provided a sustained economy for the town.

A Catholic priest Jerome Devadi and Robert Hoggan of Lyra, south of Stanthorpe, experimented with fruit varieties and encouraged orcharding. Summer vegetable growing (when it was too hot at lower levels) was also profitable. Pome fruits were extensively grown, but so were stone fruits, grapes and tobacco.

Discharged servicemen were also settled on orchard blocks west of Stanthorpe, and villages taking their names from battlefields of the Western Front, such as Pozieres, Passchendale and Bapaume, were created.

A branch line passing through them was opened in

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Queensland State Archives posted a photo:

The Great Barrier Reef lies along the east coast of Queensland, from the Gulf of Papua to Lady Elliot Island, a coral cay 100 km north-east of Bundaberg. The Barrier Reef is a World Heritage Area (1981) It includes about 2900 unconnected coral reefs, 300 reef islands or sand cays, of which nearly one-third are vegetated. There are also outlying continental islands such as in the Whitsunday and Lindeman groups. Present-day reefs are about 8500 years old. They sit above layers of reef and alluvium dating back at least 2 million years.

Lindeman Island is about 20 sq km and was occupied for livestock grazing in 1906. A homestead and woolshed were refurbished for tourist accommodation in 1923, and grass-hut bungalows were added. Medium-rise apartments brought accommodation to about 300 guests (1990).

Description source: Queensland Places

Image source: Queensland State Archives, Digital Image ID 906

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Queensland State Archives posted a photo:

“Beautiful Lindeman.”

A recent visitor to Lindeman Island and its adjacent attractive spots summed up the glories and charms of this enchanting group of islands by exclaiming, “Beautiful Lindeman.” Its delightful hills and valleys, forest and fern-clad slopes, set as it were within a charmed circle of golden sands, were described as something to be seen to be realised. “Magnetic Island is beautiful and most attractive,” added the visitor,” but then Lindeman is so vast in comparison. Flocks of sheep and goats roam almost unnoticed over its wide stretches of heavily-grassed country. One can walk for miles and miles along peaceful shores, or climb the rugged heights where huge rocks overhang the silent glades and beaches below. Even these giant boulders are covered with maidenhair gowing in riotous profusion. But who could describe the view from one of these observation posts? It reminds me of the

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Queensland State Archives posted a photo:

Artwork by George Coates

The yellowfin tuna is one of the open ocean’s fastest, strongest predators and an important fishery species everywhere that it lives. Reaching weights of at least 190 kg and lengths of nearly 2 m, the yellowfin tuna is a large species that will eat just about anything that it can swallow (typically whole). Like many open ocean bony fishes, yellwofin tunas start out as extremely tiny larvae, no more thatn a few millimeters long and weighing only a few hundredths of a gram. Within two years, individuals reach lengths of one meter and are sexually mature.

The yellowfin tuna is a highly prized food fish and is fished heavily throughout its range. Generally, scientists believe that these fisheries are managed fairly well, and the species is not considered overfished. However, there are some populations that are fished more heavily than others, and it

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Queensland State Archives posted a photo:

Designing The Country Homestead

An excellent suggestion is being discussed in building circles that Brisbane should have an annual home building exhibition, where the trends in domestic architecture could be brought under public notice.
If such an exhibition is arranged, prominence should be given to a suitable, moderately priced home for country districts.
Country requirements differ so vastly from those of the city that a separate section should definitely be provided, particularly when it is realised that approximately one-half of Queensland’s population is in the country.
It is hoped that the idea of a modern homes exhibition will be adopted and that in any such program the country homestead will receive its due share of attention.

Description source: Queensland Country Life, 5 October 1939

Image source: Queensland State Archives, Digital Image ID 4395

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Queensland State Archives posted a photo:

The Old Homestead.

Above it dark ranges are looming
Forbidding, and gaunt in the moonlight.
In the valleys the night-wind is crooning,
Awakening the voices of night.

The stars are like eyes that are seeing
The slow ruin the years will bring;
The hopes grown old are now fleeing,
Eyes once bright are now dim.

The walls that echoed with laughter
Hear only the hoot of an owl;
And the creak of a rotting rafter,
Or a far-off dingo’s howl.

The gardens were masses of roses
And sweet with the scent of the flower;
A tumble-down fence now encloses
The tall, rank grass grown sour.

And where have the folk all vanished
Who lived in this lonely home?
Why have they all been banished
And driven the world to roam?

The Drought King could tell you the reason
And flood played its part as well,
So the banks had little to seize on
But the land, and the old home to sell.

A neighbour bought runs and the ranges,
And the

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