The first European settlement in Queensland was at Redcliffe, being established as the Moreton Bay Penal Colony in September 1824.  The first Commandant was Lieutenant Henry Miller of the 40th regiment.  In the years prior to his arrival at Redcliffe, Lieutenant Miller had had a distinguished career.  He had served under the Duke of Wellington, fought against Napoleon, taken part in the unsuccessful attack on New Orleans, participated in the Battle of Waterloo as well as being part of the army of occupation in France.

After his time at Moreton Bay, Henry Miller eventually found himself in Hobart, electing to stay when the 40th regiment was moved to India.  He remained in government service in Hobart and passed away on 10 January 1866.

His son, Henry Miller (jnr.) had a distinguised and successful business and political career, predominantly in Victoria, raising a large family.

Henry Miller’s great, great, great grandson, Quentin Miller lives in Victoria and has had a long standing interest in the family’s history and the role that his famous forebear played in the early history of Queensland, however he had never visited Redcliffe.

So, it was a special event to be part of Quentin Miller’s first visit to Redcliffe.  He has been hosted by the Redcliffe Historical Society’s Paul Woodcock who has arranged various meetings and visits to some of the relevant historical sites on the Redcliffe Peninsula, in particular those connected with Henry Miller and the early Redcliffe penal settlement. The John Oxley Library’s Brian Randall also had an opportunity to meet Quentin and to explore and learn more about one of our very earliest European residents. The John Oxley Library will certainly be keeping in touch with Quentin as further research uncovers more about this early period in Queensland’s history.

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The John Oxley Library 75th anniversary white gloves tour continues with our latest trip to the Granite Belt region.  Timed to coincide with the “At Our Table” event at the Queensland College of Wine Tourism at Stanthorpe, a range of treasures from the library’s collections were on display for the day.

Amongst the items of local interest on display were an early album of images of Warwick, a register of plantings in the gardens of Talgai Station and early registers of the Allora School of Arts and the Warwick Hotel.

In line with the “At Our Table” theme, recipes were a focus in the selection of items.  The earliest known handwritten notebook of recipes and remedies was on display and will be included in all future white gloves tours.  Kept by Phillis Clark at East Talgai Station in the 1860s, it is one of our most important treasures.  Also able to be viewed was an early register kept at the Warwick Hotel, containing various recipes used by the hotel.

The tour continues on 24th and 25th August with presentations at the Stanthorpe, Allora and Warwick libraries.

  Recipe and Remedy Book by Phillis Clark

  Items on display at Stanthorpe

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You’re invited to contribute iconic photos about Queensland for Storylines – Q150 digital stories.

Storylines is a Q150 and State Library of Queensland project which captures Queensland’s unique stories and shares them with the world through 2-3 minute videos documenting and celebrating our state’s distinctive identity. We are looking for members of the public to contribute their photos towards the making of three digital stories. The themes of these stories will be:

Big things - From pineapples, to gumboots and barramundis, big things dot the Queensland landscape. This digital story will bring together our love of big things and all they have to offer.

Floods - Floods are markers in our water ways and in our lives.  Taken by those most affected, flood pictures can tell a thousand words.

Pubs - There are many pub stories and stories told in pubs.  Whether it is long gone or a firm favourite, the Queensland pub has become part of our way of life.

Club Hotel, Croydon, 1984. Image No: 44812

If you own a photograph in digital form (JPEG) that fits into one of these three themes and you would like to contribute to the making of a digital story, please send your image/s to heritage@slq.qld.gov.au by Friday 4 September 2009.

For more information, please visit the Storylines website http://qldstories.slq.qld.gov.au/home/storylines/submission

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While this year holds a number of significant anniversaries in Queensland history, one of the more poignant is that 2009 also marks 50 years since the closing of the Peel Island lazaret.

Situated in Moreton Bay off Cleveland Point, and now named Teerk Roo Ra (Peel Island) National Park, the island has a unique history.  Once a feasting and ceremonial site for the Indigenous people of the area, Peel was also used as a quarantine station in the late 1800’s, and a home for inebriates in the early 1900’s.  From 1907 to 1959, the island functioned as a lazaret, where sufferers of Hansen’s disease (or leprosy) were separated from society and isolated under the Leprosy Act 1892.

  Huts for leper patients on Peel Island, 1907.  Image No: 36682

 Caretaker’s cottage, ca. 1913.  Image No: APE-045-001-0028

Now heritage listed, the island’s historic remains are being preserved and the park is managed by the Queensland Parks and Wildlife Service.  The John Oxley Library continues to contribute to the preservation of the documentary history of the island.

Researchers wishing to delve into this past can find numerous resources available through our reading room including published items and original materials such as photographs.

A recent addition to the preservation of the island’s history is the Friends of Peel Island Association website - captured by State Library and archived in PANDORA - a national digital archive where copies of Australian websites of significance are held and available online.  Additional versions of this website will be captured over time, and these will remain as another resource available to future generations of researchers interested in Peel Island’s history.

To view the preserved versions of the Friends of Peel Island Association website, see http://nla.gov.au/nla.arc-84386

For more information about the PANDORA archive go to  http://pandora.nla.gov.au/

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We are pleased to announce that 11 new digital stories are now online at Queensland Stories.

These stories were created as part of the State Library’s Regional Apology Project, an Online Public Access in Libraries (OPAL) funded initiative. These stories record Queenslanders’ responses to the Prime Minister’s 2008 Apology to Australia’s Indigenous Peoples.

The participants involved in this project were from Cairns, Cooktown and Hope Vale. The eleven people interviewed were: Angeline Stevens, Des Bowen, Dora Gibson, Estelle Bowen, Frankie Deemal, Herman Bambie, John Wenitong, Dr Mark Wenitong, Peter Scott, Terry O’Shane and Val Schier.

You can access these digital stories online via this link: http://qldstories.slq.qld.gov.au/home/digital_stories/fnq_responses.

You can also view each digital story via State Library’s YouTube account on the following links: Angeline Stevens, Des Bowen, Dora Gibson, Estelle Bowen, Frankie Deemal, Herman Bambie, John Wenitong, Dr Mark Wenitong, Peter Scott, Terry O’Shane and Val Schier.

A total of 25 stories have now been created by the State Library, to capture a snapshot of responses to this historic occasion. You can view all 25 stories here.

A big thank you to everyone involved in this project – the participants, the community members in Cairns, Cooktown, Hope Vale and Mount Isa, and the hardworking State Library staff involved.

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The Manifesto of the Queensland Labour Party, dated 9 September 1892 (the Manifesto), held in the collections of the John Oxley Library, already registered by UNESCO for its national cultural significance has now been recorded as being of international cultural significance.

The Manifesto, one of the formative documents of the present Australian Labor Party, was written at a time of political and social upheaval in Queensland, with the labour movement seeking alternatives to industrial action to progress its aims. It provides a detailed coverage of the party’s grievances, with a focus upon the ruling class of the time, including squatters, employers, the government and others, which it saw as opposing what it aspired to in terms of working benefits. Electoral and land reform as well as social equity are specific themes.

According to labour folklore, early versions or excerpts of the Manifesto were read out or discussed under the so called Tree of Knowledge at Barcaldine following the Great Shearer’s Strike, Barcaldine being at the centre of the industrial strife that took place in the early 1890s.  The town was the centre point for contact and communication for the strikers, who were later to form the vanguard of the labour movement. Whether or not this event actually took place, the Manifesto stands as one of the planks upon which the labour movement based its aims of the attainment of political power and parliamentary representation.

Subsequently, Barcaldine has become known as the birthplace of the Labor Party in Queensland with the Tree of Knowledge surviving until recently as a physical reminder of the events of the time. The Manifesto was an important link in the chain of actions and events in Queensland that culminated in the formation of the first Labor government in the world. This was the short-lived Anderson Dawson Labor Government that came to power in 1899.

The Manifesto was written by Charles Seymour, who was heavily involved in the formative years of the labour movement in Queensland. It was signed by the party’s president, Thomas Glassey, who was also the first person to be popularly elected on a labour platform in Queensland.

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The John Oxley Library collection includes an extensive range of material relating to immigration and ships, particularly 19th century immigration vessels associated with the history of Queensland.

The collection consists of photographs, newspaper cuttings, published histories, shipboard newspapers, immigration records and original shipboard diaries. Original materials are listed on the State Library’s Manuscripts Queensland catalogue at: ww.slq.qld.gov.au/coll/qhist/manq/manqfind.

Try typing “William Smith” into Manuscripts Queensland and see an example of one of these diaries that has been fully digitised from an 1864 voyage to Australia on the ship “Young Australia”.

 William Smith Diary 1864  The Young Australia

You can also type the words “Young Australia” into our Onesearch catalogue to discover photographs of the ship and published accounts of this particular voyage: http://onesearch.slq.qld.gov.au/primo_library/libweb/action/search.do?vid=SLQ&reset_config=true

On Friday 7 August a seminar including speakers from the Queensland State Archives and the State Library of Queensland’s Reference Library and John Oxley Library was held in auditorium 1 at the State Library of Queensland.

 Stephanie Ryan, Senior Family History Librarian.

Senior Family History Librarian Stephanie Ryan provided an excellent overview of the resources held in the State Reference Library and focused on why people decided to start a new life in Australia and what it was like on the voyage out. Information Guides such as Immigration and Shipping: getting started and Immigration and Shipping: more than lists are available on the State Library’s website at:  http://www.slq.qld.gov.au/about/pub/info_guides/collections/fh#3.10

 Simon Farley, John Oxley Library.

Simon Farley highlighted the rich array of resources held in the John Oxley Library collection including original shipboard journals, shipping registers, and hundreds of photographs of ships and immigrants. The audience were interested to hear excerpts from a number of these original diaries.

 Louise Howard, Queensland State Archives.

Louise Howard from the Queensland State Archives concentrated on the fascinating public records held at QSA including immigrant’s files, photographs of new arrivals while at the immigration depot, and letters to government authorities relating to conditions on board ship during voyages to Queensland. The State Archives have a Brief Guide on this topic at: http://www.archives.qld.gov.au/downloads/BriefGuides/BG16Immigration.pdf.

Many thanks to the presenters and all who attended this interesting seminar.

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Under the guidance of Robert Zilli, Conservation Framer at the Queensland Art Gallery, staff at the State Library of Queensland are in the final stages of conservation treatment of seven gilded frames manufactured by English framer C. James in the mid to late 1800s. The frames house a series of hand coloured albumen prints of Queensland by photographer and geologist Richard Daintree (1832-1878). Once the treatment of the frames is complete the albumen photographic prints will undergo extensive conservation work.

  Richard Daintree, John Oxley Library, no. 193667

Each frame was cleaned thoroughly with special solutions and loose and damaged areas were consolidated using conservation grade adhesives. In order to stabilise the structure of the frame, animal skin glue was injected into the mitre corners before the frame was strapped to tighten the corners.

One of the frames had distorted and separated so much at the corners, that it had to be disassembled and rejoined since this was deemed to be the least damaging option.

Most of the frames had sustained losses or minor damage to the moulding. Minor losses were filled using a calcium based material. For larger losses, impressions were taken of matching areas and dental plaster was used to make “positives” that were then pared down to slot into the loss in the moulding (see image).

   Creating a mold to replicate decorative areas that have been damaged.

Gold leaf was then applied to cover the larger fills. Gouache and gold paint was used to colour match other minor areas of loss.

Jaishree Srinivasan (Exhibitions Conservator, Conservation Unit)

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Five new digital stories from North Queensland are now online, having been created as part of the Storylines – Q150 Digital Stories project.  You can view digital stories from authors Matthew Condon and Belinda Jeffrey aboard the Q150 Steam Train travelling from Townsville to Mount Isa.  As well, you can learn about the rich history of the area in the Charters Towers and Dalrymple Archives with local Archivist Michael Brumby.  

Also, listen to coral reef expert Professor Terry Hughes talk about the health and future of our reefs, and find out the real story behind the painted image of the Saint on Castle Hill in Townsville. 

Here are the links to each digital story, which are available through either Queensland Stories or the State Library’s YouTube account: 

Stories from the Q150 Steam Train - Matthew Condon

View in Queensland Stories

View in YouTube

Stories from the Q150 Steam Train - Belinda Jeffrey View in Queensland Stories

View in YouTube

Charters Towers and Dalrymple Archives Group

View in Queensland Stories

View in YouTube

Professor Terry Hughes

View in Queensland Stories

View in YouTube 

The Legend of the Saint (on Castle Hill)

View in Queensland Stories

View in YouTube

You can also view all Storylines – Q150 digital stories here. 

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Continuing our series on the history of the John Oxley Library, in this, our 75th anniversary year.

Despite limited space and funding, further important initiatives were undertaken. In 1951, the Oxley Memorial Library joined with the Australian Joint Copying Project in the microfilming of Australian records in the Public Records Office in London and in 1952 acquired its first series of newspaper microfilm (The Courier Mail).

In 1956, the microfilming of records held in Sydney relating to the early history of Queensland was commenced and by June 1957, 81 reels of microfilm had been completed. Others continued to provide assistance in building the collections. In 1965, the Queensland Agent-General in London arranged the donation of the private library of Sir Matthew Nathan (Governor of Queensland 1920-25).

 Sir Matthew Nathan. Image No: 3810

In 1964, the Oxley Memorial Library led and supported the publication of an historical journal, Queensland Heritage, which continued successfully for the next fifteen years.

The 1950s and 1960s was however a period of stringency in terms of government support and with resources limited many valuable Queensland collections were donated to or acquired by other libraries and institutions (such as the Archer family papers which was acquired by the Mitchell Library in Sydney). The Leslie family papers were however acquired in 1952 and remain one of the Library’s most important collections.

 Patrick Leslie. Image No: 9895

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