Common Ground – a global meet up celebrating The Commons on Flickr will be held at the State Library of Queensland. This event will also be hosted, around the globe, by other members of The Commons.

The event in Brisbane will consist of a large projection onto the screen in the State Library’s stunning Queensland Terrace using a slideshow of content from The Commons on Flickr participating institutions that is curated by its community of users – making the Flickr Commons go ‘live’ through a connected slideshow. This special event will include images from Picture Queensland – the State Library of Queensland’s image library.

Light refreshments will be served.

When 6pm, Fri 2 Oct
Where Queensland Terrace, level 2
RSVP to marketing@slq.qld.gov.au (acceptances only Thurs 1 Oct)

  Cherry Walker modelling swimsuits at Surfers Paradise, 1951.  Image No: 181603

  Asking for Gary Cooper’s autograph, November 1943.  Image No: 105715

  Crocodile bagged on the Herbert River. ca. 1930.  Image No: 6670-0001-0034

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The dust cloud that swept across Brisbane yesterday made for some spectacular photographs. These shots were taken by the State Library’s photographer, Reina Irmer, at lunchtime yesterday, showing views of and from the State Library.

       

It is not the first time Queensland has been hit by dust storms though, as the following photographs testify.

  Dust storm approaching Boulia in Western Queensland, ca. 1926.  Image No: 164563

  Dust storm over Cloncurry, 1930.  Image No: 44719

  Dust storm between Bedourie and Boulia, Queensland, 1954.  Image No: lbp00242

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  Attendees from the John Oxley Library. From left Elisabeth Faaoso, Janette Whitehead, Dr Leanne Day, Dr Judith Mckay(JOL Fellow) and Dianne Byrne.

Following on from my colleague Leanne Day’s comments posted on the John Oxley Library Blog on 8 September I would like to offer some more observations about the wonderful two-day conference organised by the Professional Historian’s Association titled  Journeys through Queensland’s history: landscape, place and society held in Brisbane, on 3-4 September 2009.

It was difficult to choose a paper to highlight as all were pertinent to my role as a service provider engaged in helping clients access our John Oxley Library Queensland history resources. The conference was one of the best I have ever attended and I found the enthusiasm and knowledge of all the speakers to be exceptional with each providing a fascinating insight into Queensland’s history. I will restrict my comments to the paper presented by Dr Brian Sinclair:

Tracking heritage and guaging the significance: assessing heritage significance of the Etheridge Railway

Dr Sinclair spoke about the Etheridge Railway which was constructed from Almaden to Charleston (Forsayth) between 1907 and 1910 as a private railway. It was managed and later purchased by the Queensland Government. The line was constucted cheaply as a branch of the Chillagoe Railway to supply the Chillagoe Company’s underutilised smelters with copper ore.

Although the railway’s mining use was short lived its value to communities and pastoralists in the Etheridge district persuaded the government to maintain the line.

Today the Savannahlander, a tourist railmotor, is the only commercial traffic on the Etheridge Railway. It travels westwards from Cairns to Almaden before leaving the Chillagoe Railway and heading south on the Etheridge line.

In August 2008 Dr Brian Sinclair of the Cultural Heritage Branch of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) journeyed aboard the Savannahlander as part of the process of assessing the Etheridge Railway for inclusion in the Queensland Heritage Register.

  Derailed locomotive on the Chillagoe to Forsayth railway. Negative No: 31994

In the John Oxley Library we have a lot of materials documenting the history of railways in Queensland. From John Kerr’s classic text Triumph of the Narrow Gauge to a range of books, pamphlets, ephemera and photographs.

Dr Sinclair’s paper has furthered my knowledge in this area and I thank him and all the other presenters for their fabulous insights into aspects of Queensland’s unique history.

Janette Whitehead

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The Professional Historians Association (Queensland) conference was held at the Marque Hotel in Brisbane on 3-4 September.  Several staff members from the John Oxley Library attended this event, which was held to mark the sesquicentenary of Queensland.

 Dr Leanne Day

Both days provided a wonderful forum for a range of papers on the history of Queensland.  Dr Leanne Day, from the John Oxley Library, presented an excellent paper on the Johnsonian Club, a gentlemen’s literary club founded in 1878 in colonial Brisbane.   The keynote address was given by the Queensland Governor, Ms Penelope Wensley, and was a highlight of the conference, discussing the importance of teaching Queensland  history in our schools and universities and preserving our heritage.

Other papers included A”fantastic adventure’: reading Christison of Lammermoor by Mark Cryle; Conspiracy of silence: the colouring of Australian history and the killing times on the nineteenth-century Queensland frontier by Timothy Bottoms; Rivers and resorts: how rivers and sheltered waters influenced the location of the Sunshine Coast’s resort towns by Peter Osborne; and Remembering the cane: conserving the sugar legacy of far north Queensland by Joanna Wills.

The conference was a huge success and clearly shows that interest and scholarship in Queensland history is booming.

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Queensland Authors & Legal Deposit Librarian, Dr Leanne Day, will present a talk on the two Queensland novels: The Curse and Its Cure (1893) by Thomas Pennington Lucas, and Last Drinks (2000) by Andrew McGahan. Both novels were set in Brisbane during significant historical periods and both authors drew on contemporary events to shape their stories.

 The Curse and its cure

In his speech commemorating the 20^th anniversary of his corruption report, Tony Fitzgerald questioned whether anything has really changed. Leanne will stretch this question to examine not just the last 20 years, but the last century of Queensland’s history by comparing the authors’ perspectives and reactions to the events of their respective periods.

 Last drinks

The talks will be accompanied by a display of resources from the John Oxley Library’s collection, which will provide historical context to her talk.

When: Friday 11 September, 11.00am and repeated 2.00pm.

Where: Fox Family White Gloves Room, level 4, South Bank building

See the ‘Talks’  page on the State Library website for further information.

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The 10th International Congress on Medical Librarianship was held in Brisbane at the University of Queensland from 31 August - 4 September.

Conference delegates at the State Library

On Tuesday 1st September conference delegates from around the world toured the State Library of Queensland and viewed a display of medical related collection items from the John Oxley Library.

This collection comprises interesting material on the subject, including photographs under various catagories such as “Health in Queensland” or “Brisbane - Hospitals”, or “Dentistry” as well as an array of books, journals, posters and boxes of Health Department ephemera.

 Sister Kenny demonstrates her methods. Image no. 54002

Of particular interest to the delegates were archival collections such as the personal papers of the first woman to study medicine in Queensland, Dr Eleanor Bourne and original documents and reports relating to the work of Sister Elizabeth Kenny and her controversial methods for curing polio.

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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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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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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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