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Multicultural Brisbane, the 1920s

Posted on 26 Jul 2012| by Joan Bruce |

Muses Magazine, August 1928

Muses Magazine only lasted for 14 issues, but from November 1927 to January 1929 it reflected a surprisingly cosmopolitan Brisbane. Describing itself as a monthly review of the musical, artistic, literary and intellectual life of Queensland, it reported on the activities of cultural organizations such as the Dickens Fellowship and also a variety of ‘ethnic’ organizations which had sprung up at around the same time. They included the Brisbane chapters of L’Alliance Francaise and La Societa Dante; Spanish, Polish, German, Greek, Israeli groups and even an Esperanto Society.

The driving forces behind Muses Magazine were Henri Alexis Tardent and Luis Amadeo Pares. Tardent was Swiss born, but Pares grew up in Mareeba, before leaving for Sydney to study music and then moving back to Queensland in 1923.

Muses Magazine, September 1928

The magazine was well-produced and contributors came from the cultural and intellectual elite of Queensland. At the end of its first year it was going strong. The October/November issue for 1928 reported circulation penetrating to almost every part of Queensland, to every capital of the Commonwealth and to fifteen countries abroad.

After only three more issues, however, Pares was bankrupt and it was gone.

More information

Buckridge, Patrick. Harmonising the City: Music, Multiculturalism and The Muses’ Magazine in Brisbane. Queensland Review. 2011: 18: 26-41.

Evans, Raymond. A History of Queensland. Melbourne: Cambridge University Press, 2007.

New Podcast: “On Our Selection and beyond: Queensland’s literary heritage”

Posted on 19 Jul 2012| by Myles Sinnamon |

On 18 July the State Library of Queensland and the Department of Environment and Heritage Protection presented “On Our Selection and beyond: Queensland’s literary heritage” as part of its bi-monthly Out of the Port lecture series.

Guest speakers, Professor Patrick Buckridge (Griffith University), Dr Jessica Gildersleeve (Griffith University and University of Southern Queensland) and Dr Maggie Nolan (Australian Catholic University), discussed diverse aspects of Queensland’s literary history. The session was compered by ABC Radio National’s Dr Kate Evans.

A podcast of this lecture and others in the Out of the Port series are available on the State Library of Queensland’s website.

An information guide [MS Word] to resources of the State Library of Queensland related to this theme is also available.

The next lecture will be – Saving our soil: Soil conservation in Queensland since the 1930s

Myles Sinnamon – Project Coordinator, State Library of Queensland

Tin and sandalwood : an early 20th century resources boom in the writings of Ion Idriess and Jack McLaren

Posted on 16 Jul 2012| by Simon Miller |

In the first decades of the 20th century, as in the 21st, miners were digging wealth from the ground and Queensland’s natural resources were being shipped to China. The miners were digging for tin rather than coal and the Chinese exports were not gas and coal but sandalwood. Two men who spent time in North Queensland in the years before World War One were novelists Ion Idriess and Jack McLaren.

Ion L. Idriess was born in Waverley N.S.W. in 1889. He was educated in several New South Wales towns before attending the Broken Hill School of Mines. At the age of sixteen he began a twenty-five year period of travel around most regions of Australia, working in a variety of jobs, including miner, rabbit-exterminator, boundary-rider, rouseabout, opal miner, crocodile hunter and drover. He served at Gallipoli and in the Sinai and Palestine in World War I. He was badly wounded in 1918. After the war, he continued his nomadic lifestyle, but in 1928 he settled in Sydney to begin a career as a freelance writer.

Ion Llewellyn Idriess

Jack McLaren was born in Fitzroy, Victoria in 1884, the son of a Presbyterian clergyman. He studied at Scotch College, Melbourne before running away and travelling widely throughout the Pacific. McLaren worked his passage back to Australia around 1901-1902. He spent time in North Queensland as a miner, pearl and beche-der-mer diver. McLaren also worked in Malaya, the Solomon Islands and Fiji. He managed copra plantations and acted as an overseer. McLaren returned again to Australia in 1911 and settled on Cape York until 1919 when he moved to Sydney. In 1924 he married novelist Ada Moore before travelling to London in 1925. McLaren remained largely in the U.K. for nearly thirty years. McLaren published over 30 books and was a frequent contributor to the Bulletin.

Jack Mclaren

Both men wrote autobiographical works and novels based on their experiences in North Queensland in the 1910s. McLaren’s 1921 novel The savagery of Margaret Nestor : a tale of Northern Queensland and Idriess’ autobiography The tin scratchers, first published in 1959, both deal with the subjects of tin mining and sandalwood cutting on Cape York.

McLaren’s novel centres on “Toff” Hammond, a sandalwood-getter, who comes across Tony Nestor, an old tin prospector, in the grip of the D.T.s and chasing imaginary snakes after an ambitious binge at the hotel at Port Landing where he is taking his load of sandalwood to be shipped out. He subdues the old man and carries him on a pack horse back to the Port where the hotel is the only building. As Hammond helps nurse the old miner back from his near fatal binge he learns that the cause of Nestor’s drinking spree is the expected arrival of the daughter that he has not seen for 19 years.

Margy Nestor arrives a few days later on the boat from Cooktown and Hammond agrees to accompany the old man and his daughter back to Nestor’s tin claim as he has had word of a large patch of sandalwood in the same area. They stop off at Hammond’s camp to collect his horses and equipment and also his band of aboriginal workers and they all make the several days journey to Nestor’s mine. On the way they run into a stranger who they believe to be notorious claim jumper Henry Martin. They arrive at Nestor’s claim where he is keen to explain the workings to his daughter.

Tin miners at Stannary Hills, 1909

Nestor led the way to the mine. Most of the workings were on the other side of the rise, and in a few minutes Margaret and Hammond were standing with Nestor beside the main shaft. All down the slope and across the hillsides were trenches and shallow holes. Here and there a heap of mullock larger than usual told of deeper shafts.

“I thought I had the pocket in that hole,” Nestor said, pointing to one of the heaps. ”I put in two months there and got down seventeen feet – and all for nothin’.”

“That would almost break most men’s hearts,” Margaret said.

“It’s all in the game,” her father said. ”You’ll find things like that by the dozen on any minin’ field. I know plenty of blokes who spent their last bean and nearly busted their hearts with the hard toil of sinkin’ through the Lord-knows-how-many feet, chasin’ a leader that duffered on ‘em. Most of ‘em had run into dept, too, and they had to go workin’ for wages after to get clear. Prospectin’s a great game!”

“It seems to me to call for unlimited perseverance, ability to bear hardship and suffering, indifference to isolation and loneliness, hard work, and a great deal of technical and practical knowledge,” Margaret said thoughtfully. ”A prospector is a man of parts, indeed.”

The main workings consisted of a narrow shaft over the mouth of which was a crude windlass. The windlass was merely a length of tree-trunk about a foot in circumference, with a convenient fork at one end, resting in the crutch of two crossed sticks firmly embedded in the ground at either side of the shaft. Two sticks lashed together to form an “L” and thrust through the fork, formed a handle. Over the windlass was a rough framework, on top of which were some withered branches that cast an indifferent shade. A few yards to the right was a tiny bark shed that served as tool-house and blacksmith-shop. Inside was a forge constructed of ant-bed pounded and mixed with water into a kind of cement. The bellows were made of pieces of packing-cases and untanned wallaby-skin. An oil-drum for holding water for cooling and tempering drills and other tools stood near the forge, and beside it was an anvil that was merely the back of an axe firmly fastened in a stump. A few pieces and strips of hide, a shovel, a single headed pick, a prospecting dish, and a few miscellaneous tools lay scattered about.

After the theft of their horses by the claim jumper Martin, the death of the old man after he tries to throw Martin down a mine shaft, the capture of Martin, Martin’s punishment by being made to work cutting sandalwood with the aborigines, Martin is ultimately redeemed as he dies saving Margaret from the flooded creek as the wet season takes over. Hammond wins the heart of the strong-willed Margaret and a fortune in tin and sandalwood is theirs for the taking.

Shipment of sandalwood at a wharf in Townsville, 1929

Ion Idriess’ book deals with many of the same themes as McLaren’s novel although without the obvious romantic elements. It contains a wealth of descriptions of tin mining operations of many types and the many colourful characters involved. Here a group of men compare the hardships and benefits of tin mining and sandalwood cutting.

“There’s 400 tons of sandalwood stacked on the wharf awaiting a China-bound boat,” remarked Harry Ashford the tentmaker. They’re expecting the Empress of China.”

“A patch of sandalwood is as good as a patch of tin these days,” said a tin scratcher from Mt Poverty longingly, “even better, if you’ve got a good plant.”

“A hundred horses and their packs take some getting together,” Shipton from Shipton’s Flat said good naturedly. “After all, all we want is water and our few tools and a hut, and to be in good with the storekeeper.”

“All the same, I’d like to have the value in tin that came in on that eighty-horse team from the west coast this morning,” drawled Ted Parsons

…

A wiry looking chap from the Mitchell, hunched up on the form, shifted a short clay pipe from one corner of his bearded mouth to the other.

“I’ve ridden past many a patch of sandalwood,”, he muttered, “… Never gave a thought that I was riding past yellow gold. One thousand, one hundred and twenty golden sovereigns growing up out of the ground in grubby-looking little trees right under me very eyes. Many a time – phew!”

“You’re not the only one,” Shipton said. ”I’ll admit I’d like to find a patch of the yellow wood, but I’d rather find a patch of eight tons of tin. The sandalwood-getters come up against plenty of knock-backs, same as we do – more so! First, those two boys who came in this morning had to risk their entire capital, plant and tucker bill; then they had to scout over a lot of hard country, risky in parts too, on the chance of finding a good patch. They found it. Admittedly to cut the wood it cost them only three months’ labour, and the cost of the tucker and presents for the natives. Then they packed the wood into port – say six months from go to whoa. They lost one of their blackboys, and a good horse boy he was too, speared on the Kendall. Lost five horses: three were speared, two rolled down a gully and broke their necks. Jim’s mate near perished of maleria; a blackboy had to ride beside him and hold him in the saddle for the last hundred miles. Still, it was worth it!”

Biographical information on Ion Idriess and Jack McLaren is from AustLit, one of the databases available throughout Queensland through the State Library.

We are hosting a Queensland literature talk - On Our Selection and beyond: Queensland’s literary heritage on Wednesday 18th July at 12:30 pm.

Innocent victims : the harrowing introduction to Sarah Campion’s 1941 novel ‘Mo Burdekin’

Posted on 31 May 2012| by Simon Miller |

In this series of extracts from Queensland fiction dealing with floods, coinciding with our Floodlines exhibition, we now move away from Brisbane and visit the Burdekin River in North Queensland.

Sarah Campion ( born Mary Rose Coulton, 1906-2002) was an English novelist who spent six months in 1939 on the Atherton Tableland. This visit to Queensland inspired a trilogy of Queensland novels, Mo Burdekin (1941), Bonanza (1942) and The Pommy Cow (1944) and three other novels set in Australia. She was keen to return to Australia in the 1940′s but was not able to do so and eventually settled in New Zealand in 1952.

Mo Burdekin is a story of pioneers on the Burdekin River in the 1880′s. It is the story of an orphan who comes floating on flood waters to be found by Reuben, a store keeper, who raises him and naturally names him Moses. The prologue of the novel describes the dire predicament of a group of children forced to flee the rising flood waters on their own and the tragic fate that befalls all but the youngest.

Pioneer camp consisting of a shelter made of timber slabs and poles with a tent attached at the rear. A post and rail fence is visible behind the shelter. There is a large open fire with cooking utensils. A mother, father and baby are present.

Pioneer family outside a bush camp 1880s. Negative number: 18247

Two men standing near the edge of a river. A mountain range is in the background.

Looking at a river and a mountain range, Burdekin River. Negative number: 111727

On the second day of the flood when the river was no longer a meandering landmark but a stretch of dirty water paddocks wide and still rising, the Irishman fossicking in the abandoned workings of the Old Glory struck camp. His family had gone hours before, knowing their parent too well to wait on his sense of caution. Gathering together a meager heap of household goods, they had pattered sturdily off, across the narrow arm of the creek that still had a blue gum laid across it for bridge, off and away and up into the streaming bush. The rain had ceased for a few hours, though the sky was still heavy with it: there was time before the next storm to cross the far river to Red Pinch and shelter. So they went on, silent. Remembering that she had left her only needle sticking in the canvas of the tent-flap, that her mother lay dead on the stretcher beside it, that the baby was not a year old, Janey the eldest groaned in spirit, squared her narrow shoulders, and urged the little troupe upwards with a flood of oaths violent even for her. Pa couldn’t be trusted to see to anything, not even the burying: seeing him, as they had left him, staggering drunkenly about the disused workings and picking feebly first at this heap of tailings, then at that, her shrewd soul despised him. But she would not go back to see that a body got its last rites: she drove her living flock relentlessly on, cursing them, cursing the weight of the sagging baby. …

The children have climbed over the first ridge and unwisely stop for a rest in tall grass near a second creek, before Janey tries to find a way across.

She rose, twitched her dirty sugar-bag garment, yawned, stretched, kicked at a darting lizard, and stared upstream. Stared in horror, gaped wider still. For there was a new roar above the voice of the Burdekin: now there was no getting across this creek nor any other, now it was too late. Now, swollen with the waters of a dozen rushing creeks, the new dam by Jabiru has burst its banks, the water comes roaring out in a solid curve to overwhelm the flimsy humpies of the workman’s camp below it, sucking up a dozen gaping workmen in its first breath, taking them in as a tit-bit before pounding down the swollen creek, pounding, smashing, roaring downwards, onwards through Jabiru, lifting the bridge like a snapped match, engulfing thirty head of prize cattle in the yard by the depot, going on remorseless, its appetite merely whetted, down the valley past the tin-workings. …

The wave had parted roaring at the junction of the creeks and raced down both, blood-red with the tin-rich soil, foaming, spuming, tossing, thundering, with a wild lacy pattern of uprooted pandanus palms, sword grass, bottle-brush bushes and all the arboreal jetsam of any Queensland creek over its romping surface. On, on, to the children crouching like young quail in the deep grass, and gaping Janey looking for a way to cross. She saw first a dark casuarina cast sportively ten foot above the grass then dropping like a shot bird back into the flood: she saw the tree, she heard the roar, she saw the red tide of the wave heave up against the rainy sky, she leapt to the children, she caught her foot in the bright grass, she fell with her temple cracking against the cradle’s edge, and lay senseless with a punctured skull.

Janey was quickly dead, the children were less lucky. Had they raced for the bush instead of staring at their dropped elder lying bleeding beside the cradle they might have been saved, for they were not in the line of wave but in a little hooked-out backwater up which the tide seeped more slowly. But leaderless, disorganized, frantic, they fell to crying and screaming, ran hither and yon in the thick grass as the wave went by, tripped in the lush, green, glorious grass, struggled up bemused and made off with one accord, like stampeding sheep, towards the rising tide. Up came the water in the wake of that towering wave: now their dusty little feet were ankle-deep, now their dirty little knees, scored and scratched by a hundred encounters with their mother the Bush, were wet and slimy with the flood: now, wrapping tepid and horrible round the waists, the armpits, the shoulders of these bush babies, the flood surged up. The smallest sister was first engulfed, tripped among the rampant grasses, gasping her little lungs full of flood-water as she dropped. Fiercely over her the water rose, one by one the cries died, the bobbing heads sank, soon even the grass had gone. Now there was nothing in the whole wide river but tossing water, uprooted trees, a few bandicoots and kangaroo rats feebly struggling still, and an old wooden cradle carved with grapes and acanthus leaves in which a dirty brown baby sat drooling with bubbles at his mouth, snatching at the twigs and floating grass-heads as he floated onwards, southwards, on the broad tossing breast of the Burdekin.

Driftwood after flood, Burdekin River, ca. 1891. Negative number: 46936

Other articles exploring literary responses to past floods in Queensland -

Land speculation, advertising and flood : an extract from ‘The Dis-Honourable : a mystery of the Brisbane floods’ by David Hennessey (1895)

A daring rescue! : an extract from ‘The Dis-Honourable : a mystery of the Brisbane floods’ by David Hennessey (1895)

Visions of decay: the 1974 Brisbane flood in Manfred Jurgensen’s novel ‘The eyes of the tiger’

Bett : a tale of old Breakfast Creek by Mary Guthrie

Reluctant rescue : an extract from Flood Children by Thomas Shapcott

Also don’t forgot our Queensland literature talk - On Our Selection and beyond: Queensland’s literary heritage in July!

Simon Miller – Library Technician, State Library of Queensland

Reluctant rescue : an extract from Flood Children by Thomas Shapcott

Posted on 24 May 2012| by Simon Miller |

To coincide with the Library’s Floodlines exhibition I have been exploring literary responses to past floods in Queensland. Today we look at a novel by Thomas Shapcott based on elements of the 1974 floods.

Thomas Shapcott is one of Australia’s most distinguished poets. He was born in Ipswich, Queensland, and attended the Ipswich Grammar School with his twin brother. He left school at 15 to work in his father’s accountancy business, but completed an accountancy degree in 1961. In 1967 he graduated in arts from the University of Queensland.

His first artistic impulse was to be a composer, but he turned away from music when he discovered a string quartet he had written unconsciously plagiarised another work. He then worked as a tax accountant, a profession that he pursued for 27 years. He published his first poem in 1956 and his first book of poems in 1961. By the time he sold his accountancy practice in 1978, he had published seven collections of poems, edited four anthologies, written a book on painter Charles Blackman and a number of libretti for composer Colin Brumby.

His prizes and awards include an Order of Australia for services to literature and arts administration (1989); the 1867 Sir Thomas White Memorial Prize for best book by an Australian; and the 2000 Patrick White Award. He also has a major poetry award, the Arts Queensland Thomas Shapcott Poetry Prize, named in his honour. He has published 15 collections of poems, as well as eight novels and over 20 libretti.

Flood Children, first published in 1981, was his first novel. Aimed at a Young Adult audience, the novel traces the adventures of 12 year old Peter, his younger sister Michelle and older sister Janni during the 1974 floods in Brisbane. The three youngsters have been left alone overnight in the care of 16 year old Janni, but in the morning they discover that rising flood waters have transformed their neighbourhood. They join Janni’s 18 year old boyfriend Don in assisting with the rescue effort in Don’s boat.

In this extract they are trying to rescue the headmaster of the local school and his family who are reluctant to acknowledge their danger from the rising waters. It is after this rescue that their adventure turns to danger when Don’s outboard motor fails as they are trying to cross the river to safety.

Cover of Flood Children by Thomas Shapcott

“Hey look, you kids.” Don swerved the boat towards the headmaster’s residence, an old Queensland house-on-stilts set in the middle of a bare allotment behind the main school buildings. It had always looked bare, but seemed even more so on this new brown horizon which, at this point, had raised the surface of the already flat brown paddocks by over a metre, submerging the few scrawny shrubs that had survived a succession of boisterous schoolkids and uninterested headmasters’ wives.

“There’s somebody in there still. Let’s go across and check it out.”

“Surely they would have moved out by now. The water goes right round them. They must have seen the creek rising days ago ; they’d be the first to see what was happening.”

But, to their amazement, they saw that the house was certainly occupied. Don quite enjoyed manoeuvring the boat up the front path, just fitting in between the posts of the near-vanished gate. They pulled up at the steps. The headmaster and his wife greeted them. They had been sitting down to breakfast and he was still holding a piece of toast with dribbly marmalade which he absentmindedly licked from his wrist as they talked.

“Mr Minnis? Gee, we thought you’d have moved out ages ago! Have you been listening to the news on the radio? They expect the flood waters to rise another five metres and we’ve been sent to warn people.”

“We saw it rising yesterday, and this morning here it was under the house. But it’d have to go a long way before it actually gets inside.”

“A lot less than five metres.”

“But the water here runs off very rapidly. We’ve often had flooding in the creek and it gets away in no time. Always does.”

“But there’s nowhere for it to get away to, now. Only into the river, and it’s pushing the water back up here – look, you can see it. This current isn’t even going downstream, it’s being pushed back up.”

“By George, I believe the boy’s right.”

“Come on, dear, your bacon will be getting cold.”

“No Mabel. The lad’s right. Perhaps we should think about what to do if the water does get higher.”

“Frank, don’t be ridiculous, how can it? I’m sure it hasn’t moved a bit since we got up this morning. After the first surprise …”

“But it is rising now.”

…

Boats in flooded Edward Street 1974

They eventually persuade them to evacuate.

“Let’s get as many on board this trip as we can.” Don sounded ominous, though he tried not to be.

“Shall Michelle and I stay here until you come back?” Peter offered. Michelle was delighted, as the prospect would give her a longer time with the cats.

“Good idea. Janni, perhaps you could stay too. I’ll come back as quickly as possible.”

…

As the sound of the motor died away across the long flatness of the water, Janni felt a terrible pang of aprehension. Peter and Michelle were happily making friends with the animals. Janni mooned through the strangely deserted rooms, crowded with all the signs of immediate and sudden departure – clothes littered everywhere, toys, the unfinished meal in the kitchen. The feeling aroused by the water beneath them at this moment was of a malicious and evil presence, waiting to swallow them up, waiting to swallow everything up, gardens, trees, park benches, litter bins, cars, animals, houses – a flood that had silently devoured perhaps one-eighth of this town already – and who knew how many other towns? – and was still hungry, filled with a hunger that would not be satisfied until it had consumed everything.

A gust of cold air blew in the open door. Beyond was the flat horizon. Wherever she looked, Janni faced the flatness of brown rising water.

Aerial view of flooding at Indooroopilly Reach 1974

Other articles exploring literary responses to past floods in Queensland -

Land speculation, advertising and flood : an extract from ‘The Dis-Honourable : a mystery of the Brisbane floods’ by David Hennessey (1895)

A daring rescue! : an extract from ‘The Dis-Honourable : a mystery of the Brisbane floods’ by David Hennessey (1895)

Visions of decay: the 1974 Brisbane flood in Manfred Jurgensen’s novel ‘The eyes of the tiger’

Bett : a tale of old Breakfast Creek by Mary Guthrie

Also don’t forgot our Queensland literature talk – On Our Selection and beyond: Queensland’s literary heritage in July!

Simon Miller – Library Technician, State Library of Queensland

Bett : a tale of old Breakfast Creek by Mary Guthrie

Posted on 16 May 2012| by Simon Miller |

During our Floodlines exhibition I have been exploring Queensland floods as represented in novels published from 1895 to 2005. Today we look at ‘Bett’, a novel published in serial form in The Queenslander between 5 February and 11 June 1931. The author, Mary Guthrie, had some 20 stories published in The Queenslander between 1918 and 1932 of which ‘Bett’ is the most substantial, being of novel length. She seems not to have had any works published in book form. The Queenslander has been digitised and is available through Trove. The serial novel can be found on page 5 of each weekly issue. More information about the digitisation of this important newspaper can be found in this previous blog.

Illustrated front cover from The Queenslander, March 5, 1931

The Queenslander introduces the upcoming serial novel in the 29 January issue at the conclusion of the previous serial.

A fine picture of olden days in Queensland is drawn in our new serial story, “Bett,” to begin publication in “The Queenslander” next week (February 5). The author, Mary Guthrie, a Queensland lady, is already well known to readers, and they will find that her serial story is just as enthralling as her previous works. “Bett” is a tale dealing with old Breakfast Creek, life on a Downs cattle station, the early mining days, and life amongst the aboriginals, and the authoress has taken great pains to ensure the accuracy of her account of those distant times. There is plenty of incident, and the characters in the story are admirably portrayed.

The author does not give us a date but the novel seems to be set in the 1860s. It opens with a description of Breakfast Creek.

BREAKFAST Creek, even now a secluded place, in spite of the electric trams that flash past at all hours, was quite a rustic spot when Jim Aland was in the habit of mooring his fishing cutter to its banks; when the only-wheeled vehicles that passed along the white, dusty road bordering the creek were the woodcutter’s cart, the infrequent, horse-drawn omnibus, the vegetable waggon from the mission station called German Station, but now called Nundah; and the schoolboys’ billygoat carts. Motor launches, the last word in luxury, anchor in midstream today, but when Jim Aland, fisherman, tied his boat to the big bloodwood gum on the- north bank, and looked up and down the creek, and across to the townward side, he saw only fishing boats, which depended for their motive power on sails and wind. It was a site wholly given over to the fishing fraternity for the mooring of their boats, and to those amphibious creatures who let out rowing boats at so much per hour. Many of the small wooden cottages on the opposite side of the road had benches outside their doors, on which were displayed fishing tackle for sale or for hire, and prawns for bait. A goodly number of the residents seemed to depend on the creek in some way or other for their livelihood, and about the whole place there hung “an ancient and a fish-like air.”

Entrance to Breakfast Creek from the Brisbane River, ca. 1891

The novel’s main character, Bett, is engaged to Jim, the fisherman already mentioned, but decides to take a job on a cattle station to pay for her trousseau. While she is away her mother and less good-looking sister trick the fisherman into marrying the sister. Bett meanwhile has met Pat, a handsome Irish migrant and they eventually marry but complications lead to the couple being separated and Pat being detained with an aboriginal group. Bett returns to Breakfast Creek and here Jim is murdered by his fishing partner during a flood. We rejoin the novel in Chapter 17, published in the issue of 28 May 1931.

It rained and rained and rained. The fleet went out, battling against south-easters all the way, and driven home before the squalls next day. Visibility was bad. The boats seemed to feel, or rather smell, their way to the fishing grounds.

At last it grew too bad to go out. Volumes of yellow water rolled down the broad river into the Bay and across to the islands and the mud banks. The salt in the water was overcome by the rainwater brought down by the current. The fishermen gave it up and came home while it was still safe to do so.

And it rained and rained, as it is said in the Bible. Jim and Mr. Scrutty, standing on the creek bank, eyed the roiled water rushing out to meet the water of the river. It was awash with the banks, and creeping in among the mangroves.

“Tom, I don’t like this- It’s full moon to-night, and the tide is making, and backing up the water coming down from the hills. I think I’ll get the missis to her mother’s while there’s time.

“I don’t think they’ll be safe even there. The old woman lives in a low cottage on low ground, and they’ll set it over the roof before it comes halfway up your back steps,” replied Mr. Scrutty.

”We’ll be prepared, Tom. Let’s get the boat up here – the flattie, not the dingey. My wife would swamp that little thing. We’ll have to row her to some place of safety, and her mother, too, and very likely some of the people of the Flat.

“All right. Jimmy, come along.”

They brought the boat up to the back steps and tied it there. Jim told Kate to be in readiness, in case she had to move. She, as well as most of the women living roundabout, was unwilling to move while there was a chance of remaining at home.

They all went to bed in their clothes, Mr. Scrutty lying on a settee in the kitchen, for the lower story of the boathouse was already swamped. About 12 o’clock there came a knocking at the Alands’s bedroom door. Jim got up at once.

“Time to move!” announced Mr.Scrutty.

Jim went to the back door and looked out. The rain had ceased, and the full moon, high in mid-heaven, breaking through a rift in the clouds, looked down on a weird scene. The creek had disappeared and a broad lake had taken its place – a lake of greyish-yellow water, queer looking in the light of the big moon. It spread among the mangroves and the tea-trees on the farther bank, up the rudimentary streets, obliterating garden fences, and leaving the few and far-between cottages marooned, the water having reached their floorings.

It was the same on their own side of the creek. A lake of muddy water stretched across the once white, dusty road, and was over the Flat, the site of the present Albion Park Racecourse. It was already on the veranda of the Werners’ little house.

Flooded street at Breakfast Creek Brisbane 1890

Simon Miller – Library Technician, State Library of Queensland

Visions of decay: the 1974 Brisbane flood in Manfred Jurgensen’s novel ‘The eyes of the tiger’

Posted on 03 May 2012| by Simon Miller |

Continuing our series of literary responses to Brisbane’s floods of the past, in conjunction with the Floodlines exhibition, we jump from 1893 to 1974. Manfred Jurgensen is a prolific award winning poet and author in both German and English. After holding a Personal Chair at the University of Queensland in German Studies, he now lives in Brisbane and the United States as a full-time writer. His 2005 novel ‘The eyes of the tiger’ uses the 1974 flood as a backdrop to explore “evil as a seductively demonic power of rampant decomposition, generating from the realm of personal intimacy to the corruption of civilized society”.

Flooded houses and debris at Fairfield 1974

Flooded houses at Fairfield 1974

The presence of death announced itself in echoes of biblical prophecy.
Why was nature intent on devouring Queensland’s subtropical capital? What had its inhabitants done to deserve such a cruel fate? On weekends a handful of doomsday prophets gathered at King George Square, proclaiming their apocalyptic vision in self-righteous triumph. While the flood lasted, their terrible prediction prompted more than a few passers-by to give the possibility some thought. What if this were indeed the beginning of the End?
The threat of death manifested itself in many forms.
The mere act of looking out from the assumed safety of one’s home could prove an unsettling portent of one’s own decomposition. Owners of luxury apartments and houses featuring rooftop gardens watched with horror as an avalance of worms slithered down their windows in search of terra firma. Residents directing their sight out of the window found themselves confronted with reflections of their own face covered in maggots. Their image was coated in slime, droppings and mire.
In half-abandoned riverside suburbs home owners began to take up arms. The self-styled citizens’ militia carried rifles in order to protect the houses against looters. The sanctity of property was defiled by theft and plunder.
An elderly couple drowned trying to salvage their possessions of a lifetime.

Submerged homes at Yeronga during the 1974 Brisbane flood

Flooded homes at Yeronga 1974

A few old Queensland houses, built on stilts, lost their balance and collapsed into the river. With their white iron lace verandas they looked like old-time paddle-steamers as they were borne away by the current of the raging flood.
Barely completed, expensive display homes were left deserted by real estate agents and prospective buyers. Rabbits took refuge in luxurious double garages not yet fitted with doors. Designer pools turned into cesspools of green slime claimed by legions of copulating cane toads, while landscaped gardens dissolved into runny watercolours.

Frogs shelter on a wall at Albion Park during the 1974 Brisbane flood

Frogs take refuge at Albion Park 1974

Most of the building industry came to a complete halt.
Under the weight of the continuing torrential downpour the guttering of many older houses gave way, either tumbling to the ground or hanging in the air like skeletal remains of suspended paratroopers.
Large cracks in the foundations of suburban homes, collapsed brick fences, falling roofs and broken driveway surfaces gave the appearance of earthquake damage. The fractures and lacerations looked like an imprint of the city’s veining.
Brisbanites no longer walked on firm ground. The very foundation of their lives had shown itself to be brittle.

Men, women and children with shovels clean up piles of mud on the Brisbane Corso Fairfield 1974

Flood clean up Brisbane Corso Fairfield 1974

Floodlines continues in the SLQ Gallery on level 2 and the Philip Bacon Heritage Gallery on level 4 at the State Library of Queensland until 19 August.

Simon Miller – Library Technician, State Library of Queensland

A daring rescue! : an extract from ‘The Dis-Honourable : a mystery of the Brisbane floods’ by David Hennessey (1895)

Posted on 26 Apr 2012| by Simon Miller |

To coincide with the Library’s Floodlines exhibition we present a further extract from the 1895 novel ‘The Dis-Honourabe’. The novel’s author, the Reverend John David Hennessey, had what was described in his obituary as a varied career. He came to Queensland in 1875 as minister to a Methodist church in Stanthorp. After stints in churches in Tenterfield, Toowoomba and Brisbane he switched to the Congregational ministry in 1884 and started a paper called the Christian Messenger. This paper prospered, and as The Australian Christian World after 1886, became one of the most widely read religious papers in Australia. His career as a writer and publisher continued in parallel with his work as a minister and eventually led to the publication of twelve novels. ‘The Dis-Honourable’ was written while Hennessey and his family were living in Wynnum attempting to grow pineapples and the colourful descriptions of the floods of 1893 that form the background to the novel are based on his own experiences.

The hero of the novel, George Jackson had travelled by train to the Melbourne Street terminus which “had been transformed into a pier head, surrounded on every side by over twenty feet of water.” Jackson crosses the river in the dead of night on a mysterious mission with an old boatman named Joe Stunner. Next morning the two men attempt the rescue of a young man trapped by the rising water. After they row across the flooded river Stunner tosses a rope to the young Golliker and uses the rope to turn the boat into calmer waters.

Raging flood waters in the Brisbane River in 1893

Brisbane River in flood 1893

Joe now hauled the boat back with the rope. The “Mary Jane,” however, swayed about as she was caught again by the violence of the current, and it became clear to Stunner that it would be dangerous to go nearer, and that Golliker would have to scramble somehow down the rope, in imitation of the wrecked seamen on the Goodwin Sands. The youngster was not deficient in pluck, and soon swung himself on to the rope over the boiling tide. The rope, however, failed to bear the additional strain (either it broke or had not been strongly enough fastened), and in a moment the boat was swept adrift, and Golliker was sinking in the flood. A heart-rending, blood-curdling scream, was heard on the other shore.
It was the young man’s mother. Jackson’s boots, coat, and hat, were off in a moment, and he had sprung into the current in the direction of the drowning man.
Jackson saved him—how, he never could explain; like many another daring and heroic deed, it baffled description. Stunner took in the situation at a glance, and catching hold of the oars, pulled with a will toward where the forms of the two men were visible. Jackson had managed to catch hold of Golliker’s hair, and was keeping his head above the water. Within three minutes, by some means or the other, Joe had helped the two men into the boat. As he did so, however, it was caught in an eddy and whirled round like a straw.
To his dismay, as Jackson wiped the water out of his eyes, he saw the oars slip from the rowlocks into the river. The crowd saw it too, and a groan involuntarily escaped from scores of lips.
Like a bubble on the mighty torrent, the boat now swept toward Victoria Bridge, and for a moment the three men sat in the boat—oarless, helpless, and hopeless; seemingly on their way to certain death.

Spectators crowd on the shore to watch the endangered Victoria Bridge

Victoria Bridge threatened by flood 1893

The water was level with the flooring of the bridge, and a great mass of wreckage stretched like a barrier on the north side—in some places heaped high in the air—against which the river foamed, and ever and anon flung up its waters in great showers of spray. The people followed the boat, running along the North Quay, mingling with horsemen; all hurrying to see the end. Escape seemed impossible. The hearts of the beholders sank within them—paralysed! The boat would be crushed like an egg-shell, against the iron sides and girders of the bridge!
Jackson recovered himself in a few moments. He measured with his eye the distance between them and the bridge, pulled his hat on to his dripping head, put on his boots, picked up his coat, shook it, and put it on. He had a large sum of money in notes in the breast pocket, and he put in his hand to feel that it was right. He had formed a plan of escape.
“Cut off a long end of rope Joe, and lash it round your waist.”
“Aye, aye, sur.”
Allowing a yard or two over Jackson wrapped and tied the middle of it under Golliker’s arms, who sat in the middle of the boat half insensible, then he fastened it firmly round his own waist. The boat was hurrying along with the current broadside on, toward a part of the bridge less blocked with wreckage. In another half-minute it would strike and their fate would be decided.
“Now, Golliker, old fellow,” said Jackson, kindly, “stir yourself up and we’ll save you yet.”
“Be ready to jump Joe” he said in the same breath.
“Aye, aye”—but Stunner never finished it. A crack like a pistol-shot was heard above the hoarse roar of the flood—the Mary Jane was smashed into fragments, and two men, bruised and battered, were clinging with bleeding fingers to the iron lattice-work of the bridge, and between them was suspended the inanimate body of a seemingly dead man. …

Victoria Bridge threatened by flood 1893

The following morning at four o’clock the massive bridge, which for days had gallantly resisted the enormous weight of flood water and accumulated wreckage, at last gave way. The rain had ceased, and bright moonlight gleamed upon the seething waters, which still roared and foamed as though eager to devour their prey. The middle span of the great thoroughfare, built at a cost of one hundred and fifty thousand pounds, gave way first, with a crash that shook the earth, and made the buildings on the banks tremble to their foundations. Another crash followed, and another; and another, as span after span collapsed, while the waters heaved convulsively, and spouted upward in great floods of moonlit foam-capped water. On the north side not a single vestige of the bridge remained.

Having completed its work of destruction, the remorseless river swept on again, unstemmed by barrier, as with the irresistible march of a triumphant army, bearing upon its bosom destruction, woe, and death. And yet, let it be said as we close this chapter, not without a blessing scattered upon its awful and desolating pathway. For it is out of the fires of trial and disappointment that there comes the gold of a nation’s purity; and out of the flood and earthquake the still small voice of a nation’s strength.

View of West End under the floodwaters in 1893

West End inundated 1893

Floodlines: 19th Century Brisbane continues in the Philip Bacon Heritage Gallery on level 4 of the State Library until 19 August. The 1895 edition of ‘The Dis-Honourable’ is on display where you can read another of Hennessey’s evocative descriptions of the flooded Brisbane. More information on the destruction of the Victoria Bridge in the 1893 floods can be found here and about the 1893 floods in general here.

Simon Miller – Library Technician, State Library of Queensland

THE ANZACS FAVOURITE AUTHOR : NAT GOULD

Posted on 23 Apr 2012| by Myles Sinnamon |

What did the ordinary soldier do while he sat in the trenches, enduring the mud and rats and waiting for the command to go over the top? He read whatever he could get his hands on and the supreme favourite, according to writer Beatrice Harraden, was Nat Gould. Practically unknown today, Gould was at one time one of the most widely read novelists in the world. He produced more than 130 yellowbacks combining elements of horseracing, detective stories and romance.

Nat Gould was an Englishman who travelled to Australia in 1884 and stayed for 11 years. He wrote for newspapers such as for the Brisbane Telegraph and the Sportsman and was turf editor for the Sydney Referee. He even met his wife here, at Redcliffe.

More than three dozen of his novels are set in Australia. Bred in the Bush (1898), one of the best, features a Brisbane bank clerk, Edward Burden. The action starts in Brisbane, moves to London and ends with a thrilling climax on Ascot racecourse.

State Library of Queensland has 68 books by Nat Gould in its collection, including his autobiography, The Magic of Sport.

More information:

- Trench Literature: reading in WW1
- Nat Gould his life and books
- Australian Dictionary of Biography – Nat Gould

Joan Bruce – Queensland Literature Coordinator, State Library of Queensland

Land speculation, advertising and flood : an extract from ‘The Dis-Honourable : a mystery of the Brisbane floods’ by David Hennessey (1895)

Posted on 19 Apr 2012| by Simon Miller |

The State Library’s current exhibition Floodlines looks at contemporary and historical memories of Queensland’s floods. Floodlines: 19th Century Brisbane is open in the Philip Bacon Heritage Gallery on level 4 of the library until 19 August.

‘The Dis-Honourable’ is a novel first published in 1895 and set in Brisbane in February 1893 during the disastrous floods of that year. The library holds editions from 1895 and 1896 as well as a Queensland University Press reprint from 1975. There is a digitized version available from the University of Sydney here or you can buy your own e-book version from Amazon for 99 cents. The 1895 edition is on display in the Floodlines: 19th Century Brisbane exhibition.

The book opens with the discovery of the body of The Honourable Constant McWatt floating in a punt near the mouth of the Brisbane River. Our hero, George Jackson, who discovered the body, appears to have had some unfortunate financial dealings with the Honourable McWatt. Jackson boards a train headed to Brisbane as the flood waters rise and meets a talkative auctioneer who describes a dodgy land deal in which McWatt made a great deal of money. His description gives an insight into the rampant land speculation that preceded the depression of the 1890s and the methods used to inflate the prices of inferior blocks of land. It is also an opportunity to showcase some of the library’s extensive collection of estate maps.

Bulimba Bridge Estate map

“Our firm was to have the selling of the estate, and it was old Catchall who suggested that it should be called Westmead. Remarkable man he was, and still is,” said Fielding, reflectively. “Never met with a man his equal at drawing up an advertisement for the sale of land.” …

“Well, the Honourable went down with me and the boss to look over the land. It was pretty rough in places, but M‘Watt was very cheerful; he said it would look quite different when it was cleared and the undergrowth burnt off, and said that as far as possible the streets and principle roads must run along the swamps and gullies.‘We shan’t be at the expense of making them into good roads,’ he said, ‘and such things never show on the plans.’ ”
“Our firm then called for tenders for the clearing—paid a good price for it, and had it done to rights. There was a lot of ti-tree on it, but everything was cleared level with the surface, and carted to one corner of the ground, where it was burnt off. Then he actually had the grass eaten close down by a mob of horses. It had been very dry weather, but there was a shower or two of rain a fortnight before the sale, and to see the place pegged out when the surveyors had done with it was a picture. … The lithographs were really works of art, printed in colours, by a leading Sydney firm, regardless of expense.”
“There was a fancy picture of the estate, with several nice-looking houses near at hand. The artist must have drawn a little upon his imagination, for one place, that certainly looked like a villa residence in the picture, proved on inspection to be an old cow shed attached to an adjoining dairy farm. There was a distant glimpse, too, of the river, meandering placidly through sylvan glades. I nearly forgot to mention the railway line and station, by the way, which the artist inserted by express order of the Hon. Constant M‘Watt. He said‘the Minister had pledged himself to put it on the estimates.’ ” …

Wellington Point Estate map

“Well, we had matchless weather, and Catchall was in splendid fettle. There was a string of two-horse waggonettes and omnibusses and cabs, placarded with announcements of the sale, and invitations to ride to the ground free of charge, which reached half way down Queen Street. At 12.15 a four-horse drag, with brass band and big placard, went round the city to remind the people of the great event. The syndicate worked well, too; most of them were present themselves, and came, bringing friends with them, in spanking turnouts with high-stepping pairs. …

There had been a large tent rigged up at one corner, with flag flying, and a spread laid out on long tables, such as many of them had never clapped eyes on before—fowls and turkeys, and hams, and great rounds of beef, and tongues; bottles of beer and wine, spirits with fancy gilt labels, unlimited fizz; and soft drinks for the teetotalars in any quantity. Well, Catchall, in his free and easy gentlemanly way, invites the whole crowd into lunch, and even pressed the Bishop to go and have a glass of wine and biscuit after his ride. How they did crowd the long tables, and swallow down the eatables and drink. …

Lewis Estate map showing illustration of a horse drawn tram packed with exited buyers

Lewis Estate map Woolloongabba

“After a while, old Catchall, who had a good tuck-in himself, looked at his watch and announced that it was time for starting, and that the luncheon booth would now be closed. His partner had the sales-book, and myself and another clerk stood on the corner pegs, to show the size of the allotments. After reading the terms of sale, which scarcely anyone could follow or understand, the auctioneer led the crowd to a twenty-eight perch corner allotment, on rising ground. It was, of course, the pick of the whole estate; and there he made, ‘pon my word, quite an eloquent little speech. He compared Australia to the United States, and spoke of the rapid rise and growth of some of the great American cities. He, in imagination, pictured the Brisbane of that day, side by side with the Brisbane of the future, and told how land which they could then buy by the perch, would in a few years be sold by the foot. Then he complimented them on their evident shrewdness and farsightedness, in having attended this highly important sale. He predicted that the allotments they would buy that day for a few pounds, on most advantageous terms, would, in a few years, realize tremendous prices. …

“The sale never once flagged, and what with excitement and drink, there’s no doubt lots of purchasers gave double what they would have done for the same allotments if they had been sold privately. I remember, by the way, that Wright bought two allotments at the sale, and I believe they were in the worst part. But then, who thought anything about floods in those days. It’s true one chap living in the neighbourhood did suggest it at the sale. But Catchall sat on him in a moment; said he had evidently been drinking too much of the vendor’s beer, or he would never have thought of such a thing. I must confess, though, that I had my own misgivings, and so, I believe, had Catchall. But it was a splendid sale, and everybody, except the purchasers, made a pot of money out of it. …

As Fielding concluded his story the train swept suddenly round a curve and then ran down a rather steep decline, and in a moment, before them and all around, was a great sea of surging water, upon which several boats were busy rescuing the half drowned and, in many cases, wholly ruined residents.
“Good Heavens!” ejaculated Fielding. “It’s awful, isn’t it? Thank God, none of that money went into my pocket. Look there! I believe that child yonder is drowning. It may be Wright’s child! It is near to his house—I remember it now. Ah! that boat has saved it. Is it possible!” and he groaned as he said it. “Under that water lies the land of the Westmead Estate.”

: Flooded houses Milton 1893

: Flooded Estate, New Farm, 1893

Simon Miller – Library Technician, State Library of Queensland

John Oxley Library

John Oxley Library

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A daring rescue! : an extract from ‘The Dis-Honourable : a mystery of the Brisbane floods’ by David Hennessey (1895)

THE ANZACS FAVOURITE AUTHOR : NAT GOULD

Land speculation, advertising and flood : an extract from ‘The Dis-Honourable : a mystery of the Brisbane floods’ by David Hennessey (1895)