The First World War Memorial dominates the main intersection of Aramac. It is surrounded by sandstone kerbing and corner posts and then by another enclosure comprising granite corner posts linked by double metal rails. A metal flagstaff is located at the south-west corner of the enclosure.
The granite and Ulam marble memorial comprises an obelisk surmounted by a digger statue.
It sits on a square base of rock-faced grey granite, slightly higher than the surrounding sandstone wall.
The remainder of the monument is of Queensland Ulam marble. The obelisk sits on a slightly larger base comprising a single smooth-faced step with an angled top surmounted by a larger tapered smooth-faced block with cyma recta moulding to the top. The step has a leaded inscription on the front face and the larger block bears the leaded names of the 132 men who served in the First World War, including the 15 dead and 11 wounded, whose names are recorded on the front face.
Rising from the base is the obelisk, slightly tapering towards a plain cornice. On the lower front face is a leaded AIF badge and the dates of the First World War.
Surmounting the obelisk is the digger statue, which is life-sized. The soldier stands with his head bowed. His hands are crossed on top of a reversed rifle which rests on his left boot. A tree stump is located behind and to the side of the right leg for support.
","history":"The Aramac War Memorial was unveiled on 12th April 1924 by Shire Chairman, E W Bowyer in lieu of the State Governor who was unable to attend. It was designed and executed by monumental masonry firm, F M Allan and cost £700 in total; £580 for the monument and £48 for the fence. Funds were raised by the Memorial Committee, a group of mostly young women who held entertainments and collected public subscriptions. The stone memorial honours the 132 local men who served in the First World War, including fifteen dead and eleven wounded.
The memorial serviced the whole of the Aramac Shire and is located in the main intersection of the town of Aramac. It is of a comparatively large scale and dominates the small town.
The area of Aramac was first settled in the late 1850s after the area was discovered by Nathaniel Buchanan and William Landsborough. The town reserve was gazetted on 26 June 1869. Settlement was slow and sheep and cattle stations difficult to establish due to the remoteness of the area and the lack of water. By the late 1870s most land settlement had taken place.
Australia, and Queensland in particular, had few civic monuments before the First World War. The memorials erected in its wake became our first national monuments, recording the devastating impact of the war on a young nation. Australia lost 60 000 from a population of about 4 million, representing one in five of those who served. No previous or subsequent war has made such an impact on the nation.
Even before the end of the war, memorials became a spontaneous and highly visible expression of national grief. To those who erected them, they were as sacred as grave sites, substitute graves for the Australians whose bodies lay in battlefield cemeteries in Europe and the Middle East. British policy decreed that the Empire war dead were to be buried where they fell. The word 'cenotaph', commonly applied to war memorials at the time, literally means 'empty tomb'.
Australian war memorials are distinctive in that they commemorate not only the dead. Australians were proud that their first great national army, unlike other belligerent armies, was composed entirely of volunteers, men worthy of honour whether or not they paid the supreme sacrifice. Many memorials honour all who served from a locality, not just the dead, providing valuable evidence of community involvement in the war. Such evidence is not readily obtainable from military records, or from state or national listings, where names are categorised alphabetically or by military unit.
Australian war memorials are also valuable evidence of imperial and national loyalties, at the time, not seen as conflicting; the skills of local stonemasons, metalworkers and architects; and of popular taste. In Queensland, the soldier statue was the popular choice of memorial, whereas the obelisk predominated in the southern states, possibly a reflection of Queensland's larger working-class population and a lesser involvement of architects.
Many of the First World War monuments have been updated to record local involvement in later conflicts, and some have fallen victim to unsympathetic re-location and repair.
Although there are many different types of memorials in Queensland, the digger statue is the most common. It was the most popular choice of communities responsible for erecting the memorials, embodying the ANZAC myth and representing the qualities of the ideal Australian.....loyalty, courage, youth, innocence and masculinity. The digger was a phenomenon peculiar to Queensland, perhaps due to the fact that other states had followed Britain's lead and established Advisory Boards made up of architects and artists, prior to the erection of war memorials. The digger statue was not highly regarded by artists and architects who were involved in the design of relatively few Queensland memorials.
Most statues were constructed by local masonry firms, although some were by artists or imported.
The maker of the Aramac War Memorial, F M Allan was located in Rockhampton and was responsible for many war memorials in Central Queensland. This memorial and the one at Bundaberg are the two most intact digger memorials still remaining in their original settings at intersections.
","criteria":"War Memorials are important in demonstrating the pattern of Queensland's history as they are representative of a recurrent theme that involved most communities throughout the state. They provide evidence of an era of widespread Australian patriotism and nationalism, particularly during and following the First World War. The monuments manifest a unique documentary record and are demonstrative of popular taste in the inter-war period.
|Erected in 1924, the memorial at Aramac demonstrates the principal characteristics of a commemorative structure erected as an enduring record of a major historical event. This is achieved through the use of appropriate materials and design elements. As a digger statue it is representative of the most popular form of memorial in Queensland.
|This memorial is of particular significance as it is extravagant in scale and design in comparison to the size of the town. It is a dominant landmark in the area and is an uncommon example of a memorial still situated in its original and intact setting.
|The memorial has a strong association with the community as evidence of the impact of a major historic event and also with Rockhampton masonry firm, F M Allan as an example of their work.
|The memorial has a strong association with the community as evidence of the impact of a major historic event and also with Rockhampton masonry firm, F M Allan as an example of their work.
","criteria_letters":"Criterion A | Criterion D | Criterion E | Criterion G | Criterion H","criteria_definitions":"The place is important in demonstrating the evolution or pattern of Queensland's history | The place is important in demonstrating the principal characteristics of a particular class of cultural places | The place is important because of its aesthetic significance | The place has a strong or special association with a particular community or cultural group for social, cultural or spiritual reasons | The place has a special association with the life or work of a particular person, group or organisation of importance in Queensland's history"}, {"heritage_type":"State Heritage","site_id":14784,"place_ref":600009,"name":"Mt Cornish Homestead","alternate_name":"Mount Cornish Homestead","street_address":"Mt Cornish Homestead","suburb":"MUTTABURRA","lga":"BARCALDINE REGIONAL COUNCIL","register_entry_date":"1992-08-21","description":"The summary information for this place is currently under review.
","history":"Mount Cornish was established on the head of the Thomson River in 1872 as an outstation of the Bowen Downs property which was taken up by William Landsborough in 1861. The Edkins family, along with 12 000 head of cattle were sent to manage Bowen Downs Station, from which Mount Cornish was later resumed. Prior to the construction of a wooden house in 1876, the Edkins lived in a simple mud hut with a roof of bark. In 1883,a stone section was added to the wooden house. It comprised two rooms surrounded by a verandah. The white stone was quarried approximately one mile from the site and it is thought to have been constructed by two highly skilled German masons. Mount Cornish was partially resumed in 1889. The property was again divided in 1895 and this was followed by droughts which lasted until 1902. Bowen Downs was partially resumed after the lease expired in 1927 and continued to operate as a sheep and cattle run until the 1960s.
","criteria":"The summary information for this place is currently under review.
","criteria_letters":"Criterion A","criteria_definitions":"The place is important in demonstrating the evolution or pattern of Queensland's history"}, {"heritage_type":"State Heritage","site_id":14793,"place_ref":600018,"name":"Barcaldine War Memorial Clock","alternate_name":null,"street_address":"cnr Ash and Beech Streets","suburb":"BARCALDINE","lga":"BARCALDINE REGIONAL COUNCIL","register_entry_date":"1992-10-21","description":"The First World War Memorial is situated in the middle of the intersection of Ash and Beech Streets, Barcaldine and is an dominant feature in the streetscape. It stands on a concrete pad with rough hewn stone posts at each corner.
The memorial stands 12 feet high and comprises a base surmounted by a pedestal and clock.
The marble (probably Ulam) memorial sits on a stepped base of rough hewn granite. Above this is a smooth faced marble step capped with cyma recta mouldings and a leaded unveiling inscription on the front face. This is surmounted by a marble plinth carved to represent chamfered blocks and capped with a simple cornice.
Rising from the plinth is the pedestal comprising recessed square plates of a finer marble with engaged pillars at each corner. The recessed plates bear the leaded names of the 292 local men who served in the first World War, including the 38 fallen whose names are recorded on the front face.
The clock sits above the pedestal. There is a clock face on all four faces which are illuminated at night. Each face is surrounded by a laurel wreath and foliated carving is located in the bottom corners. A hood mould over each face creates a domed surface on which sits a large cable moulding. This is crowned by a smaller dome surmounted by a marble sphere.
","history":"The Barcaldine War Memorial Clock, a major regional memorial was unveiled on 21st May 1924 by the then Governor of Queensland, Sir Matthew Nathan. It was designed and executed by A L Petrie, monumental masons of Toowong, Brisbane at a cost of £524. The marble and granite memorial honours the 292 local men who served during the First World War, including the 38 fallen.
Settlement in the area of Barcaldine began in 1886 due to the extension of the Central Railway. In 1891 the town was the site of one of Queensland's most significant events, the shearer's strike which caused widespread unrest and ultimately lead to the formation of the Labour Party. Shortly after this, artesian water was discovered, causing an influx of people followed by a rush of development, including a brewery, meat processing plants and other new industries.
Australia, and Queensland in particular, had few civic monuments before the First World War. The memorials erected in its wake became our first national monuments, recording the devastating impact of the war on a young nation. Australia lost 60 000 from a population of about 4 million, representing one in five of those who served. No previous or subsequent war has made such an impact on the nation.
Even before the end of the war, memorials became a spontaneous and highly visible expression of national grief. To those who erected them, they were as sacred as grave sites, substitute graves for the Australians whose bodies lay in battlefield cemeteries in Europe and the Middle East. British policy decreed that the Empire war dead were to be buried where they fell. The word 'cenotaph', commonly applied to war memorials at the time, literally means 'empty tomb'.
Australian war memorials are distinctive in that they commemorate not only the dead. Australians were proud that their first great national army, unlike other belligerent armies, was composed entirely of volunteers, men worthy of honour whether or not they paid the supreme sacrifice. Many memorials honour all who served from a locality, not just the dead, providing valuable evidence of community involvement in the war. Such evidence is not readily obtainable from military records, or from state or national listings, where names are categorised alphabetically or by military unit.
Australian war memorials are also valuable evidence of imperial and national loyalties, at the time, not seen as conflicting; the skills of local stonemasons, metalworkers and architects; and of popular taste. In Queensland, the soldier statue was the popular choice of memorial, whereas the obelisk predominated in the southern states, possibly a reflection of Queensland's larger working-class population and a lesser involvement of architects.
Many of the First World War monuments have been updated to record local involvement in later conflicts, and some have fallen victim to unsympathetic re-location and repair.
Although many different types of war memorials were erected throughout Queensland, there are few of the clock type. The form of a clock was decided upon by public ballot held in 1922 after the Barcaldine Shire Council initiated the proposal for a memorial.
This is a particularly ornate type of war memorials. Although no others have been located in Queensland, the design is described in A L Petrie's records as clock tower number two design. The monument was originally surrounded by four granite posts, however these have been removed at some stage, as has the original street light. In 1992, the monument was damaged by a storm and the clocks were replaced by Synchronome Pty Ltd.
A L Petrie and Son were the largest monumental masonry firm in Queensland at this time and produced many memorials throughout the state.
","criteria":"War Memorials are important in demonstrating the pattern of Queensland's history as they are representative of a recurrent theme that involved most communities throughout the state. They provide evidence of an era of widespread Australian patriotism and nationalism, particularly during and following the First World War. The monuments manifest a unique documentary record and are demonstrative of popular taste in the inter-war period.
|This memorial is of particular significance as it is one of the few clock type war memorials and the only one of this style in Queensland.
|Erected in 1924, the memorial at Barcaldine demonstrates the principal characteristics of a commemorative structure erected as an enduring record of a major historical event. This is achieved through the use of appropriate materials and design elements.
|It is of aesthetic significance both as a dominant landmark in the streetscape and for its high level of workmanship, materials and design.
|The Barcaldine memorial has a strong and continuing association with the community as evidence of the impact of a major historic event and as the focal point for the remembrance of that event
|It also has special association with monumental masonry firm A L Petrie and Son as an example of their workmanship.
","criteria_letters":"Criterion A | Criterion B | Criterion D | Criterion E | Criterion G | Criterion H","criteria_definitions":"The place is important in demonstrating the evolution or pattern of Queensland's history | The place demonstrates rare, uncommon or endangered aspects of Queensland's cultural heritage | The place is important in demonstrating the principal characteristics of a particular class of cultural places | The place is important because of its aesthetic significance | The place has a strong or special association with a particular community or cultural group for social, cultural or spiritual reasons | The place has a special association with the life or work of a particular person, group or organisation of importance in Queensland's history"}, {"heritage_type":"State Heritage","site_id":14794,"place_ref":600019,"name":"Shearers' Strike Camp Site, Barcaldine","alternate_name":"The Strike Camp | Shearers Strike Camp","street_address":"Bank of Lagoon Creek","suburb":"BARCALDINE","lga":"BARCALDINE REGIONAL COUNCIL","register_entry_date":"1992-10-21","description":"The campsite is approximately 3 km north east of Barcaldine and situated on the south side of Lagoon Creek. It is lightly treed, mainly with gidgee, and the only visible evidence of its use during the Shearers' Strike is the remains of a camp oven made of ant bed, a blazed tree and a light artefact scatter, some of which is subsequent to the strike.
The strikers were not the first people to camp on this site and Egloff observed and recorded artefacts from previous Aboriginal use of the site. It has also since been used for camping by drovers.
The blazed tree, a coolabah, is on the north-eastern margin of the camp site. The main stem of the tree is dead, but it has put out a limb from the base which, when inspected in November 2000, was growing reasonably well. It received assessment and treatment from a tree surgeon in 1993. The blaze at the base of the trunk cut in 1891 has grown over to some extent but is still clearly visible although the inscription can no longer be seen.
","history":"The Shearers' Strike camp site was the focus of the 1891 confrontation between capital and labour in the pastoral industry. Although the strike was not successful and some leaders were gaoled, the event had major political consequences. In the following year the first endorsed representative of labour was elected to the Queensland Parliament and the strike was a key factor in the formation of the Australian Labor Party.
Barcaldine sprang up in 1886 as the terminus of the Central Railway from Rockhampton. The area was already settled by pastoralists and had previously been centred on Blackall. Large sheep stations were like small townships with their own working facilities, stores, workers' accommodation and tradesmen such as blacksmiths. The owners and managers of such properties had considerable power to dictate terms to an itinerant workforce recruited for the shearing season. Poor working conditions, low pay and the threat of competition from cheap foreign labour caused discontent within the industry.
Barcaldine was a natural focus for the development of unionism. As the railhead, the town drew many seasonal and casual workers. Besides shearers and hands there were navvies who had worked on the construction of the railway and carriers who had found their work reduced by it. Difficulties in finding work and financial hardship helped to build a sense of mateship and mutual support amongst sections of them. In 1887 the Central Queensland Carriers Union was formed at Barcaldine and the Queensland Shearers' Union at Blackall. Within a year it had 1300 members, indicating a perceived need for collective bargaining to obtain fair terms and working conditions. In 1888 the Central Queensland Labourers' Union was formed at Barcaldine. These three unions were the driving force behind the strike of 1891.
In Brisbane, the Trades and Labour Council was formed in 1885 and in 1889 became the Australian Labour Federation. At Barcaldine in the same year the Pastoral Employers' Association was founded and introduced reduced rates of pay. Many workers now joined unions and only severe wet weather in 1890 delayed a confrontation. By January 1891 union representatives had gathered at Barcaldine for meetings and pastoralists were trying to circumvent union rules by pressing shearers to sign freedom of contract forms. A strike was called and employers began to import non-union labour from the south. In February strikers, a number of whom were armed, gathered at Barcaldine.
Although camps were set up during the course of the strike from Cloncurry to the NSW border, the focus was on Barcaldine and the main camp on the southern bank of Lagoon Creek is said to have held up to 1000 strikers, some of whom were accompanied by their families. They were well organised and set up tents in rows with a cleared area between. Strikers were issued with food, soap, tobacco and salt and an oven made of ant bed was constructed to provide fresh bread. Provision was even made for recreation with a library tent set up and games such as cricket being played. Feelings amongst the strikers ran high and a tree was blazed on the north eastern edge of the camp and painted with the words 'United we stand. Divided we fall. A.L.F. the strike camp 1891 W. Vincent, E Car...'.
The government responded to the crisis by sending police and soldiers and the strikers drilled and staged torchlight processions in the town, where there was considerable support for them. In March 1891 the situation escalated as carriers and railway workers went out in sympathy and military reinforcements arrived. Barcaldine became the focus of the whole country's interest and armed conflict was expected. Towards the end of March an old law was used to arrest all members of the strike committee for conspiracy. With the leaders gone, heavy rain and sickness in the camp and with the shearing season underway using labour brought in under military escort, the strikers began to disperse. The strike leaders were tried and most received heavy sentences. On June 15, the strike was officially called off. Although the strike had failed, it had far reaching effects. In the following year, Thomas Joseph (Tommy) Ryan (not to be confused with Thomas Joseph Ryan, Premier of Queensland 1915-1919) became the first endorsed labour candidate to be elected to the Queensland Parliament. Because the strike unified the labour movement it was a key event in the formation of the Australian Labor Party.
The strike has retained a central place in the history and mythology of Barcaldine. In 1982 a re-enactment of the strike using townspeople was staged. In 1987 the Tree of Knowledge Committee was formed to commemorate the strike and set up a granite and bronze monument near the famous tree where workers met at the railway station. In 1988 an archaeological survey was carried out by Brian Egloff of ANU to accurately identify the correct location of the camp site. In 1991 a detailed survey and excavations were carried out. Artefacts found dating to the strike include metal containers, bottles, ammunition and horse and shearing equipment. The most visible artefact of the strike is the remains of the ant bed camp oven.
The centenary of the strike in 1991 was a major event which drew Labor politicians from around the country and saw the opening of the Workers' Heritage Centre.
","criteria":"The Shearers' Strike Camp Site was the focus of the 1891 Shearers' Strike, a confrontation between capital and labour that was a major event in Queensland's history. The strike was a watershed in the development of organised representation of labour in Australia and the formation of the Australian Labor Party.
|The Strike Camp Site has the potential to provide evidence of the material culture of shearers' lives in the late 19th century.
|The Strike Camp Site is closely linked with the cultural identity of Barcaldine and has a strong association with its people, many of whom are descended from participants in this event.
|The Shearers' Strike Camp Site at Barcaldine has a special association with the history of the Australian Labor Party and with Trades Union in Queensland. It also has a special association with the life and work of William Hamilton and George Taylor, convicted strike leaders who went on to become prominent Labor politicians, and with many of the other participants in this event.
","criteria_letters":"Criterion A | Criterion C | Criterion G | Criterion H","criteria_definitions":"The place is important in demonstrating the evolution or pattern of Queensland's history | The place has potential to yield information that will contribute to an understanding of Queensland's history | The place has a strong or special association with a particular community or cultural group for social, cultural or spiritual reasons | The place has a special association with the life or work of a particular person, group or organisation of importance in Queensland's history"}, {"heritage_type":"State Heritage","site_id":14795,"place_ref":600020,"name":"Barcaldine Masonic Temple","alternate_name":"Comet Masonic Temple | Masonic Temple Barcaldine","street_address":"24 Beech Street","suburb":"BARCALDINE","lga":"BARCALDINE REGIONAL COUNCIL","register_entry_date":"1992-10-21","description":"The Masonic temple is located on the west side of Beech Street, Barcaldine. It is a two storey, timber framed building set on low stumps with a gambrel corrugated iron clad roof with triangular dormers on the north and south sides. The exterior is clad plainly in vertical corrugated iron on the back and sides.
The most striking feature of the building is the elaborate treatment of the front, which is clad with horizontal timber boards painted to mimic ashlar masonry. The gable facing the front has scalloped barge boards and finials. The facade is divided into three bays by fluted timber pilasters supporting a scalloped entablature below the eave. It has a central entrance sheltered by a pediment porch and flanked by sash windows. The upper storey has high round arched windows to each bay. The sides of the building have large windows on the ground floor and small high openings on the floor above.
The interior is clad with tongue and groove timber boards and is very intact, retaining the original colour schemes. The ground floor, which is used as a supper room, exhibits a brown dado with hand painted floral frieze. Above this is are horizontal tongue and groove boards painted ochre yellow. The room has a series of shallow arched enclosed beams supporting the upper floor. At the rear of the ground floor there are ancillary rooms situated in either corner. Between them is a central entrance which has a section of hit and miss flooring, presumably for the clearing of mud from boots.
From here a timber stair with a simple slatted balustrade rises in an L form to the upper floor landing off which a dressing room opens directly into the lodge room. This has partially curved ceilings that rise to a boarded ceiling set between moulded ribs which spring from mock pilasters at the side walls. The ceiling between has been lined with what appears to be 'caneite' sheet. The wall panels are a mix of horizontal and diagonal boards set above a simple dado. It is lit only by small high windows down the sides and by the three semicircular windows at the front.
","history":"The Masonic temple at Barcaldine was constructed in 1901 as the second temple of the Comet Lodge, the first having been moved from Dingo Creek in stages following the growth of the railway line.
Freemasonry spread from New South Wales into Queensland in individual lodges. The first Freemason's lodge in Queensland was established in 1859, shortly before Separation from New South Wales. New lodges were formed as settlement spread and Freemasonry was carried along newly built roads and railways by Masons who were working on them. In 1876 Robert Ballard, Chief Engineer with the Central Railway pushing westwards from Rockhampton and a handful of other Masons, established the Comet Lodge No 1680 at Dingo Creek. The lodge is possibly unique in that it holds its warrant almost 300 miles (kilometers) away from the town for which it was granted. The railway workers who were members carried their building with them, dismantling it and moving it in railway trucks to be bolted together again in a new settlement as work progressed. In this manner it moved to the new railway camp at Cometville in 1878, Emerald in 1879, Bogantungan in 1881, Pine Hill in 1883 Jericho in 1885 and finally came to rest in Barcaldine in 1886. It was then refurbished.
A new and larger temple was constructed in 1900 for a cost of £720 and is said to have been based on the original. It was dedicated in 1901 and continued to make an important contribution to the life of the town as a venue for social interaction. Conservation work was undertaken on the building in the early 1980s, when the painted 'masonry' effect on the facade was reinstated.
","criteria":"The Masonic Temple is important in demonstrating the rapid growth of towns along the path of the railway and a reminder of the way in which Freemasonry was established in many western towns by the workers constructing those lines.
|It is a remarkable demonstration of adapting a classical vocabulary to a vernacular style and available materials and the painted mock stonework on the front is a very rare technique in Queensland.
|The Barcaldine temple is important as a characteristic and intact example of a regional Masonic temple, a category of building often prominent in both the streetscape and social life of many country towns.
|The Barcaldine temple is important as a characteristic and intact example of a regional Masonic temple, a category of building often prominent in both the streetscape and social life of many country towns.
|The Masonic Temple, Barcaldine, has a special association with both lodge members and with the Freemason's movement in Queensland.
","criteria_letters":"Criterion A | Criterion B | Criterion D | Criterion E | Criterion G","criteria_definitions":"The place is important in demonstrating the evolution or pattern of Queensland's history | The place demonstrates rare, uncommon or endangered aspects of Queensland's cultural heritage | The place is important in demonstrating the principal characteristics of a particular class of cultural places | The place is important because of its aesthetic significance | The place has a strong or special association with a particular community or cultural group for social, cultural or spiritual reasons"}, {"heritage_type":"State Heritage","site_id":14796,"place_ref":600021,"name":"Tree of Knowledge","alternate_name":"Barcaldine Tree of Knowledge","street_address":"Oak Street","suburb":"BARCALDINE","lga":"BARCALDINE REGIONAL COUNCIL","register_entry_date":"1992-10-21","description":"The Tree of Knowledge is a ghost gum (Eucalyptus papuana) situated outside the railway station in the main street of Barcaldine. The canopy spread shown in early photographs has been reduced by the loss of major limbs, but the tree is now in good health. At the foot of the tree is a plaque which says: This plaque commemorates the loyalty, courage, and sacrifice in 1891 of the stalwart men and women of the west from whom, beneath this tree, emerged Australia's labour and political movement.
The Tree of Knowledge is protected by a modern metal fence and the area surrounding it is bordered by a low rail composed of evenly spaced lengths of log and is landscaped with flowering shrubs. This area also contains a flagpole and a bronze and granite monument symbolising shear blades which was erected in 1991 to commemorate the centenary of the Shearer's Strike.
","history":"The Tree of Knowledge is a ghost gum located in front of the railway station at Barcaldine, under which the workers of the 1891 Shearer's Strike met. An icon of the Labor Party and Trades Unions, it symbolises the foundation of the organised representation of labour in Queensland.
Barcaldine sprang up in 1886 as the terminus of the Central Railway. The area was already settled by pastoralists and had previously been centred on Blackall. Large sheep stations were like small townships with their own working facilities, stores, worker's accommodation and tradesmen such as blacksmiths. The owners and managers of these stations had considerable power to dictate terms to an itinerant workforce recruited for the shearing season. Poor working conditions, low pay and the threat of competition from cheap foreign labour caused discontent within the industry.
Barcaldine was a natural focus for the development of unionism. As the railhead, the town drew many seasonal and casual workers. Besides shearers and hands there were navvies who had worked on the construction of the railway and carriers who had found their work reduced by it. Difficulties in finding work and financial hardship helped to build a sense of mateship and mutual support amongst sections of them. In 1887 the Central Queensland Carriers Union was formed, and discussions leading up to this are said to have been held under the gum tree which provided shade where carriers waited at the front of the railway station. At the same time, the Queensland Shearers' Union was formed at Blackall. Within a year it had 1300 members, indicating a perceived need for collective bargaining to obtain fair pay and working conditions. In 1888 the Central Queensland Labourers' Union was formed at Barcaldine. These three unions were the driving force behind the strike of 1891.
In Brisbane, the Trades and Labour Council was formed in 1885 and in 1889 became the Australian Labour Federation. At Barcaldine in the same year the Pastoral Employers' Association was founded in response and moved to reduce pay rates. Many workers now joined the unions, pushing membership of the Shearers Union over 3000 and the Labourer's Union to 2,250. Only severe wet weather in 1890 delayed a confrontation. By January 1891 union representatives had gathered at Barcaldine for meetings and pastoralists were pressing shearers to sign freedom of contract forms. A strike was called and employers began to import non-union labour from the south. Strikers, some of whom were armed, gathered at Barcaldine and set up a camp at Lagoon Creek and other places around the town.
The government dispatched police and soldiers to the area and the strikers responded by drilling and staging torchlight processions in the town. The tree in front of the station, the Tree of Knowledge, was the location of many meetings and a focus for protest. In March the situation escalated as carriers and railway workers went out in sympathy and military reinforcements arrived. Barcaldine became the focus of the whole country's interest and armed conflict was expected. However, heavy rain which limited movement and the arrest of leaders slowed momentum and strikers began to disperse. On 15 June the strike was officially called off. It had failed, but was to have far reaching effects. The following year, T.J. Ryan became the first representative of labour to be elected to the Queensland Parliament and soon after the Labor Party in Queensland was formed.
Because the area beneath the Tree of Knowledge was the scene of actions and decisions which had a profound effect on the future of labour and politics in Australia, it has become an icon of the Labor Party and Trades Unions. It is also important to the people of Barcaldine as a symbol of the town's identity and historical importance. This is reflected by the name chosen for the commemoration committee formed in 1987, the Tree of Knowledge Development Committee, and by the care given to the tree. In 1990 it was discovered that the tree was infested by termites and other insects and had severe health problems. Treatment by a tree surgeon, pest control and flushing of the root system with thousands of litres of water gave the tree a new lease of life. This treatment was completed in late 1993.
In 1991, there were major celebrations at Barcaldine to mark the centenary of the Shearers' Strike. In preparation for this, the area around the tree was landscaped and a memorial to the strikers erected within the enclosure.
","criteria":"The Tree of Knowledge was a key site during the Shearer's Strike in 1891, a confrontation between capital and labour that was a major event in Queensland's history. The strike was a watershed in the development of the labour movement and the formation of the Australian Labor Party.
|The Tree of Knowledge is closely linked with the cultural identity of Barcaldine and has a strong association with its people.
|The Tree of Knowledge has a special association with the history of the Australian Labor Party and with the Trades Union movement in Queensland.
","criteria_letters":"Criterion A | Criterion G | Criterion H","criteria_definitions":"The place is important in demonstrating the evolution or pattern of Queensland's history | The place has a strong or special association with a particular community or cultural group for social, cultural or spiritual reasons | The place has a special association with the life or work of a particular person, group or organisation of importance in Queensland's history"}, {"heritage_type":"State Heritage","site_id":14797,"place_ref":600022,"name":"St Peter's Anglican Church and Hall","alternate_name":"St Peters Anglican Church and Hall","street_address":"85 Elm Street","suburb":"BARCALDINE","lga":"BARCALDINE REGIONAL COUNCIL","register_entry_date":"1992-10-21","description":"St Peter's church is located on the southern side of Elm Street and is parallel to the road, running on an east-west axis. It is a timber building, rectangular in plan with an apsidal sanctuary at the eastern end. To the western end is a baptistery flanked by small porches. It has a steeply pitched gable roof clad with corrugated iron which extends to cover the vestry on the southern side. The roof is crowned with an octagonal louvred turret and spire and the eaves are supported by curved timber brackets. The external walls are clad in narrow weatherboards. There is a bell tower at the south east corner between vestry and sanctuary.
The internal walls of the church are lined with painted tongue and groove boards and the roof is ceiled with 'caneite'. The flooring is 1½" wide tongue and groove hardwood.. Separating chancel and nave is an open timber rood screen composed of six timber posts supporting the rail and rood and linked by Gothic tracery. The posts are decorated with shields bearing heraldic devices.
Windows to the side walls are narrow and rectangular. There are a number of stained glass memorial windows including five above the altar depicting the Ascension and scenes from the life of St Peter installed in 1918, a Resurrection from 1918 and that in the baptistery donated in 1913. The fittings are original and include a stone font inscribed ' An offering to the Glory of God from the children of the church of St Peter, Jarrow to the church of St Peter, Barcaldine'. The lectern is a copy of that in Exeter cathedral and was carved and donated by Mr G. Lloyd-Jones of Ilfracombe in England. The richly embroidered altar frontal dating from the 1900s was also an English gift.
The hall is located a short distance from the eastern end of the church and at right angles to it. It is a rectangular timber framed building clad in fibre-cement sheeting with a weatherboard pattern and with a corrugated iron roof. The western side has been extended by a lean to and the original double hung windows have been replaced with louvres. The double timber doors of the entrance facing Elm Street are sheltered by a gabled porch. This building has narrow timber floor boards and a caneite ceiling similar to those in the church and the wall between the hall proper and the extension has exposed studs.
","history":"St Peter's Anglican Church is a substantial timber church located prominently in Barcaldine and was dedicated on 28 October 1899.
Barcaldine was established in 1886 with the arrival of the railway, although the area had previously been settled as a pastoral district centred on Blackall. For three years Barcaldine was the railhead, bringing a large number of workers, carriers and businesses to the town. Although two blocks of land between Yew and Elm Streets were shown as church land on the first town plan, there was no church built and in 1892 the whole district was still under the care of a single priest living at Blackall. A Mission was opened in 1893 based on Longreach and the priest from this or from Springsure visited Barcaldine from time to time, using local halls for worship or visiting stations in the area. Because of the difficulty of finding priests to serve in areas away from major towns, religion had little place in everyday life.
The Brotherhood of St Andrew, known as the Bush Brothers, was established by the first Bishop of Rockhampton to address the problem of supplying pastoral care to a huge, sparsely settled and poor diocese. In 1897 he attended a conference in London for bishops serving abroad. Since 1883 a 'mission' scheme had operated in Bethnal Green, a poor part of London, and he thought of adapting this idea for Queensland. St Andrew's Mission House was set up as a base in Longreach to provide practical and spiritual support for the Brothers who travelled where they were needed and remained unmarried during their term of service. Their first charges were the towns of Aramac, Ilfracombe and Barcaldine. Some well-known Brothers served the area including the famous 'fighting parson' Rev. Frederick Hulton-Sams, known for his boxing skills. He was killed in France in 1915 when taking water to the wounded. A memorial to him and to Guy Roxby, a young Brother who died while serving the community, are in St Peter's church.
At first, services at Barcaldine were held in the court house. In 1898 a handsome bequest from England, known as the Marriott bequest, contributed £250 to the cost of a church and a committee was formed to begin the work. Plans were draw up with input from Archdeacon Halford, by Edwin Hockings of Rockhampton who had also designed the Mission House at Longreach. The cost of construction escalated as a severe fire in Longreach in October 1898 raised the demand for labour and materials. Work began in mid 1899 and the contractors for the building were Messrs. Meacham and Leyland of Barcaldine. St Peters was dedicated on 28 October, 1899, the feast of St Simon and St Jude, although the building was not quite finished. To reduce costs, the church was built in two stages. The first stage included sanctuary, chancel and a short nave. An unusual feature is the open rood screen, uncommon in Queensland churches and believed to be the only one in western part of the State.
A number of the furnishings for the new church came out from England including a lectern copied from that in Exeter Cathedral. The font was a gift of the children of Archdeacon Halford's old parish of St Peter, Yarrow-on-Tyne in England. Halford became the Bishop of Rockhampton in 1901 and was the first bishop consecrated in Queensland. The church was served by Brothers who travelled from Longreach and spent a month at a time in Barcaldine, living in the vestry and eating at the hotel.
A parish hall had been built by 1909 although church records do not record the exact date of construction. It was used between 1909 and 1911 for the privately operated Barcaldine High School, the first secondary school in western Queensland and one which catered for both boys and girls. While the venture did not last, it was succeeded by the Barcaldine Grammar School in 1915, which was run by the Church and which also used the hall for classes. The school closed in 1918 for want of a teacher, but the ideal of a church school to serve the western districts was not abandoned. In 1922, St Peter's School opened with boarding facilities for both boys and girls and an extra classroom built beside the hall. Its peak enrolment of 62 children was reached in 1923 and the school struggled financially during the hard years of the twenties finally closing in 1932. The buildings constructed for it were used during World War Two for girls evacuated from St Faith's, Yeppoon, but have not survived.
In 1913 the church was completed by extending the nave and adding a baptistery, porch and turret. At this time the church was also painted, improvements were made to the pulpit and a stained glass window was placed in the baptistery. The extension cost £400 and Meacham and Dryer were the contractors.
It was considered that the pastoral care provided by the Brothers was preparatory to the formation of a parish and in 1914 Barcaldine became a parish in its own right.
St Peter's church has associations with many local families who raised money, acted as Sunday School teachers, helped to organise events and participated in them as well as attending services. Particularly in the era before modern transport and communication made social contact easier, the church provided a social as well as a spiritual focus for its congregation and had a number of clubs to cater for different ages and interests. Events such as balls, picnics, bazaars and an annual flower show were well supported. Schemes to sustain church finances even included the purchase of cattle which were given the church registered brand and then raised on various stations in the area before being sold. An Anglican Far Western Mission was run from St Peters from 1964-1969 by Rev. Frank Neubecker who was able to visit outlying places for one week a month by flying in a light plane, named the Saint Michael.
Numbers of communicants began to fall in the 1980s, exacerbated by a downturn in the rural economy. In 1990 the church could no longer afford a parish priest and the Archdeacon came over from Longreach to hold services on a monthly basis. Worship is now led by an honorary deacon and two unordained women. Changes to the church have been minimal. A new porch and entry was constructed in 1961 and a new rectory was built in 1977.
","criteria":"St Peter's church and hall, which was also the venue for the first secondary school in western Queensland, illustrate the growth of Barcaldine and the way in which communities in the west worked to build and sustain places of worship.
|The rood screen in St Peter's church which separates nave from chancel is thought to be the only screen of its type in western Queensland.
|St Peter's Church demonstrates the principal characteristics of a regional timber Gothic Revival church and retains its original furniture and fittings. The hall is also a characteristic example of a timber church hall of its era.
|St Peter's Church has aesthetic significance as a picturesque Gothic church on a prominent town site.
|St Peter's Church and hall have a strong association with the people of Barcaldine and the surrounding area for spiritual and cultural reasons having provided pastoral care and developed social contacts in the region for over a hundred years.
|As one of the earliest charges of the Bush Brotherhood, St Peter's church has a special association with the life and works of many members of that important institution.
","criteria_letters":"Criterion A | Criterion B | Criterion D | Criterion E | Criterion G | Criterion H","criteria_definitions":"The place is important in demonstrating the evolution or pattern of Queensland's history | The place demonstrates rare, uncommon or endangered aspects of Queensland's cultural heritage | The place is important in demonstrating the principal characteristics of a particular class of cultural places | The place is important because of its aesthetic significance | The place has a strong or special association with a particular community or cultural group for social, cultural or spiritual reasons | The place has a special association with the life or work of a particular person, group or organisation of importance in Queensland's history"}, {"heritage_type":"State Heritage","site_id":15937,"place_ref":601172,"name":"Aramac Tramway Museum","alternate_name":"Aramac Tramway Station","street_address":"Boundary Street","suburb":"ARAMAC","lga":"BARCALDINE REGIONAL COUNCIL","register_entry_date":"1999-11-26","description":"The principal elements of the Tramway Museum are the goods shed, six other buildings, other structures and relics of the Tramway, rolling stock, the local history collection housed in the goods shed, and machinery and vehicles in the open air.
\nGoods Shed
\nThe most substantial relic of the tramway is the goods shed, built at the time the line opened in 1913, and used for the entire period it operated. The goods shed is rectangular in plan, about 30 metres long and 10 metres wide. It is timber-framed with a corrugated iron roof, and clad with chamferboards externally. The roof is unlined, and there is an air gap of about 20 centimetres between the roof and the tops of the side walls. The interior walls have been lined with opened-out wool bales, displaying the station brands of the Aramac district that once travelled on the tramway. The interior of the building is quite dark, lit only by the doorway, some fluorescent lights on the overhead beams, and a small amount of light that comes in over the tops of the side walls. On the railway side of the goods shed, a concrete platform four metres wide runs the entire length of the building, and extends 10 metres further at the southern end.
\nThe interior of the goods shed is dominated by the railmotor 'Aunt Emma', which is positioned in a cage of steel pipe and wire mesh running down the central axis of the building. As the cage is about three metres wide and 24 metres long, it leaves little space inside the building. Around the railmotor cage is a corridor a little more than a metre wide, fenced on both sides. Historical material is displayed between the fenced corridor and the walls of the goods shed.
\nAt the northern end of the goods shed, an area three metres wide running the width of the building has been set up as the Tramway Office, with a safe, desks and cupboards, some from the goods shed and some removed from the demolished railway station. Most of the collection in this area is directly relevant to the tramway: there are original tickets, waybills, reports. rubber stamps, and some important memorabilia preserved from the tramway closure, including a handwritten feltpen notice advising: \"Due to the closure of this tramway all goods and parcels will have to be collected from goods shed, office and railway wagons before 4.00 pm Wednesday 31-12-75\". On the wall is a photocopy of the cheque from the Australian Sugar Producers Association for $262 400, dated 10 June 1976. There are some historic photographs of the tramway on display, and two interpretation signs, one about the closure and one about 'Aunt Emma'. There are also rate assessment books and other Council documents on display in this area.
\nHoused along the walls on the other three sides of the goods shed is a general collection of historical material, very little of which is connected with the Aramac tramway. There are a wide range of household items, including clothing, chinaware, shaving gear, electrical appliances, musical instruments, typewriters, slide projectors, gramophones, sewing machines, trophies, and a large collection of glass bottles. There is a telephone exchange, workshop tools, stock bells, a wool press, a wheelchair, rocks pumps and watering cans. A number of books, photographs, medals and smaller items are housed in a glass case near the entrance. Several books are lying loose, some of general interest such as a home medical textbook, others of great relevance and value to the tramway such as an original manual for the railmotor's Gardner diesel engine.
\nOther buildings
\nThere are six other buildings on the site, but not all are related to the tramway, and only two are buildings that existed on their present sites while the tramway was functioning. The locomotive shed at the very end of the line is the second or perhaps third shed in that position. This very small steel-framed corrugated iron clad building dates from the tramway's last years of operation, and was probably built in 1958 to house the first diesel locomotive. The doorway appears to have been rather crudely raised in height, suggesting that the second diesel engine may have been slightly higher.
\nThe cold store is the only other surviving building of the tramway station complex. A small building clad partly in asbestos cement sheeting and partly in corrugated iron, it was built in the 1950s and stands near the southern end of the station platform. It is still in use as a Council-owned public facility for storing refrigerated goods.
\nParallel to the goods shed on roughly the former alignment of the main line is an open shelter shed, consisting of a low-pitched gabled corrugated iron roof supported on tubular steel posts, enclosed with cyclone wire mesh. It houses a passenger carriage and two small motorised railcars.
\nNear the southern end of the shelter is a small toolshed or workshop, timber-framed and clad with corrugated iron, which houses a maintenance trolley, a blacksmith's forge and other tools. The trolley sits on a short section of track which runs at right angles to the main line.
\nBeside the shelter shed is a three-sided hut of corrugated iron on a bush timber frame, containing a wood stove and a bedframe.
\nAt the northern end of the goods shed, and the first building encountered by visitors entering the museum, is a police lockup, measuring about seven metres by three metres in plan. It is built of timber, weatherboard clad, and consists of two cells side by side with a narrow verandah in front. It was brought to the site from the Aramac police station.
\nOther Structures and Relics of the Tramway
\nOn the site of the demolished railway station, about 80 metres north of the goods shed, the concrete platform runs for about 45 metres alongside the alignment of the main line. The cold store stands near its southern end. At the northern end of the platform are a row of four lengths of steel rail put upright in the ground as posts. These marked the site of the taxi rank, and were to stop cars encroaching onto the pedestrian area of the passenger platform.
\nFurther north along the main line, near the locomotive shed, are the concrete foundations of the diesel fuel tank. There is no sign of the coal bins or the station master's house.
\nThe remains of the cattle yards are on a side line about 100 metres east of the station platform. There are modern yards on the site, but these are completely different in their layout from the tramway yards. A cattle dip was located to the south, of which a small section of the concrete floor and an intact drain remain. A few disturbed pieces of broken-up loading ramps are still on the site. Near the cattle yards there are some timber pieces of the railway station building lying loose, including the base of a 30 centimetre diameter post set in concrete.
\nThirty metres south of the goods shed and parallel with the goods line is the wool loading platform, a raised concrete-faced earth platform 45 metres long, nearly identical with the platform at the station building.
\nMidway between the goods shed and the wool platform is a steel gantry straddling the goods line.
\nFour hundred metres south of the goods shed, the main line crosses the two channels of Aramac Creek. There are two low bridges, each about 30 metres in length, built to a standard Queensland Railways trestle design. The rails have been removed, but the timber structure appears more or less intact, although not capable of supporting a load.
\nRolling Stock
\nThe Tramway Museum still has six intact rail vehicles on site, and the partial remains of two more. Pride of place in the collection is the railmotor 'Aunt Emma'. One passenger carriage is still attached to the engine carriage.
\nIn the open shelter shed is a timber passenger carriage which was designed to be hauled by a steam locomotive. Most of the seats had been removed when fittings for a mobile fettler's camp were installed. Two refrigerators remain.
\nThe Tramway Museum also has two Fairmont light motorised trolleys. One Fairmont is in the open shelter shed, the other in the enclosed toolshed.
\nAlso in the open shelter shed is an even smaller motorised track inspection car, barely big enough for two people. It is enclosed with a glass windscreen, and is equipped with a stretcher to act as an ambulance in emergencies.
\nAbandoned near the end of the main line outside the locomotive shed are the remains of Engine No 1 and its tender. The tender is reasonably intact, although missing its wheels and bogies, but the locomotive consists of simply the chassis and boiler mounts, with the boiler, cylinders and driving mechanism, wheels, bogies and cabin all missing.
","history":"The Aramac Tramway Museum was constructed as the Aramac Tramway Station in 1912-1913, funded by the Aramac Shire Council. It closed on 31 December 1975.
\nWhen Queensland separated from New South Wales in 1859, the new administration was quick to throw open land for grazing, and a great wave of pastoral settlement swept across western and northern Queensland in the early 1860s.
\nThe establishment of towns in the west soon followed, for example Tambo, Blackall and Aramac which developed as commercial centres to service the pastoral industry. Aramac Town Reserve was gazetted on 26 June 1869 and the first businesses were established in the town that same year. On 6 April 1880, local government commenced when the Aramac Divisional Board, established under the Divisional Boards Act 1879, held its first meeting in the Court House.
\nNineteenth century Queensland development was further influenced by the pattern of building railway lines west into the hinterlands from the major ports, first from near Brisbane in 1865, then the Central Line from Rockhampton in 1867 and the Great Northern Railway from Townsville in 1880. The Central Line reached Barcaldine in 1886 and was extended to Longreach in 1892. These towns were founded when the railway arrived, and had the immediate effect of taking business away from the nearby well-established towns of Aramac and Blackall.
\nThroughout Australia, the early twentieth century heralded a time of rapid railway expansion, and competition between towns for services was fierce. Aramac had first asked for a railway extension in 1896, without success. Ten years later, in 1906, a deputation of Aramac Councillors visited the Premier, William Kidston, seeking his support for the railway. It also failed. Despite these disappointing responses, the Aramac Shire Council persevered with their plans. In 1908 Council asked the State Treasury for a special loan of £1 375 to finance a survey of the route of the proposed line. With some reservation from the Railways Department, Council was granted its survey loan, and employed George Phillips to peg out the route from Aramac to Barcaldine. When the survey was completed, Council moved in March 1906 to borrow £66 500 to build the tramway. The State Railways Department responded by commissioning two reports on the best commercial link between the Central and Northern lines. The second of these recommended the shortest and least expensive method of connecting the lines was by the Longreach - Winton route, and the Railways Commissioner decided in favour of this route.
\nAlthough it was to be another eighteen years before the Longreach-Winton line opened, the Aramac Shire Council committed itself to the courageous decision to construct a tramway for which the Council would be financially responsible. In March 1911, Treasury approval was given for a loan to Aramac Shire Council to build the Barcaldine-Aramac tramway. George Phillips was appointed Engineer in charge of construction.
\nAnother question for Council was exactly where the tramway station was to be located. In June 1911 Council fixed the station site \"at the Eastern End of Gordon Street about 100 yards before the bore drain\". That point was to become the end of the track, where the locomotive shed was built; the station building was actually built about 200m to the south, near the end of McWhannell Street.
\nConstruction from the Central Line commenced at Lagoon Creek, a mile west of the Barcaldine railway station, on 14 February 1912. The construction standard that Phillips adopted was the minimum acceptable to the Queensland Railways Commissioner; although the tramway belonged to the Council, it needed to conform to Queensland Railways specifications because government rolling stock would be using it. The line was to be 3' 6\" gauge, with very light 42lb Moss Bay rails. For most of its length, the line had no ballast, with the sleepers simply laid on levelled earth. This was a technique Phillips had pioneered on the Croydon-Normanton railway, and while it was frowned on by most railway engineers, it was satisfactory under light loads on level going. As most of the route extended over open grassed plains, simply following the gentle rise and fall of the ground, there was very little earthwork to do. There were only about 12 bends on the line, one cutting and no embankments, and 24 wooden trestle bridges, most of them over small creeks. Because the route ran through grazing country, the whole line was stock-fenced.
\nDespite this cheap and simple construction, there were to be long delays in building the line. Only six miles of line had been laid by April 1912. Unusually heavy rain on the blacksoil plains held up progress, and the workers struck for higher pay. The late delivery of sleepers was a constant problem throughout the project. In August the line reached the halfway point, and on 12 September the 21 miles of track to Mildura siding were officially opened to traffic. These delays meant that construction expenses had been heavier than Phillip's estimates, and in November the money ran out. Council was forced to go to the State Treasury for another loan of £10 000 to complete the work. The total cost of the completed tramway was £88 983, one third more than Phillips' estimate.
\nBy May 1913 the bridges over Aramac Creek were being built, and the tramway was approaching town. Final preparations were underway as the construction phase neared completion. The station buildings were being built by O'Brien and Company, and a contract was signed with Blair Athol Coal Company for the supply of coal. Phillips was to be kept on as Supervising Engineer after the line opened. The first locomotive to work the line was already in use during the construction work. It was an elderly Avonside Engine Company B12, built in 1877, which had spent many years in Queensland Railways service as Engine No 31 before being purchased by Aramac Shire Council to become Aramac Tramway Engine No 1.
\nThe official opening of the tramway took place on 2 July 1913. It was expected that the work would be completed by then, but unseasonal rain had again delayed construction, so the line was still a few hundred metres short of its objective. As the date had been chosen to coincide with the festivities of the annual race meeting, the opening went ahead regardless. The ceremony was held at the end of the completed line, which at that time was between the two channels of Aramac. The Honourable William Paget, Minister for Railways, performed the opening.
\nDespite the official opening, there were still two more months of construction work ahead. Building the 41 mile line tool 19 months in all, and it was not until September 1913 that the bridge over Aramac Creek was completed, and the first train steamed into Aramac Tramway Station.
\nThe station at the Aramac terminus of the line was the place where passengers and goods from all over the district converged on departing trains, and dispersed from arriving ones. The activities at the tramway terminus were spread out over a distance of about 400 metres running up the eastern side of the town, with the three east-west streets of the town grid all terminating at the tramway yards.
\nTrains arriving in Aramac crossed the bridges over the creek channels and steamed up the grade into the station. The main line led directly into the passenger station, and the train stopped under a large timber-framed corrugated iron canopy covering the line, an unusual and prominent building. The station master's office, ticket office and waiting rooms were in the weatherboard station building alongside the canopy, and when a train was due a row of taxicabs stood waiting in the street outside. Ahead of the train, built over the end of the main line, was the locomotive shed, and near it were the coal stage and the station master's residence.
\nWhen passengers had alighted, the train was reversed onto a side line which led to the goods shed and the wool loading platform, back in the direction of Aramac Creek. Here goods and parcels were unloaded into the shed which still stands, and a row of trucks and wagons lined up on the other side of the concrete platform to collect merchandise for the town's businesses. The Aramac yard had four tracks for shunting, and a triangle running east from the main line for turning the locomotives. That line also led to the sheep and cattle loading ramps and yards, east of the station.
\nImmediately it opened, the tramway had a beneficial impact on the economy of Aramac. Wool, the staple product of the district, was carried to market faster and more efficiently. From places all over the shire, goods, passengers and business which had once gone by road to the government railway stations at Longreach, Barcaldine or Jericho now all converged on the town of Aramac. The whole town took on an air of bustle and excitement with the arrival of every train, and all its businesses benefited. The tramway offered four regular passenger services each week, with additional trains for goods and livestock as required. In 1915, the second full year of operation, the tramway carried over 4000 tons of wool and 4000 tons of general goods, over 250 000 sheep and nearly 7000 passengers.
\nThe graziers and shopkeepers who made up the Aramac Shire Council found themselves in the unfamiliar business of running a railway, and it was to form a prominent part of their agenda for the next 62 years. The tramway was a financial success, but only marginally so; even in the busy year of 1915, total revenue was only 8% greater than expenditure. Running expenses had to be watched very closely, and many Council meetings became largely concerned with tramway management issues such as timetables, claims for delayed goods, locomotive maintenance, mail contracts and coal purchases.
\nExperience showed that the old Engine No 1 was not sufficiently powerful to operate the line, and in November 1914 Council resolved to call tenders for a second larger B15 steam locomotive. Engine No 113 was leased from Queensland Railways for a time, but proved unsatisfactory and was returned to State service. Then in late 1915 Council bought B15 class engine No 308 second-hand from the Railways Department for £2002. It had been built by Walkers Limited at Maryborough in 1897, and now became Aramac Engine No 2. The older engine remained in service for light work until it was scrapped in 1939. The engine shed was lengthened to take the second engine in 1915, and the bridges on the line were strengthened to take the extra weight.
\nSomewhat surprisingly, a Council meeting in November 1915 passed the motion offering the tramway to the Government and that the Minister for Railways be now written asking the Government to take it over as a State line. This may be the first indication that Council had doubts about the future viability of the tramway, or it may simply have been part of the plan from the beginning. There is no record that any reply was ever received from the State government.
\nThe initial success of the tramway was not to last. Drought, industrial unrest, and the economic slowdown brought on by the departure of volunteers from throughout the district to the First World War all combined to reduce traffic on the tramway. Between 1914 and 1918 Council brought in severe cost cutting measures. George Phillips was dismissed as engineer when it was believed the government would take over the line, and no other engineer was ever employed. Half the maintenance gang was laid off, and staff were withdrawn from the sidings along the line. In 1918 the station master's cottage at the Mildura siding was moved into Aramac and rented to the Aramac station master. Previously, employees had been paid the same rates as their Queensland Railways equivalents; now their wages were reduced by a third. Timetabled services were reduced to two a week, and freights and fares were raised.
\nThe Council managed to keep the operations of the tramway running profitably during this difficult time, but only at the twin costs of making the service less attractive to customers, and reducing maintenance on the line. After the first few years, the condition of the track began to suffer. Phillips' cheap construction methods had a serious downside, for the un-ballasted track was very difficult to maintain. It quickly deteriorated, giving passengers a rough ride, and leading to frequent derailments. The heavier B15 locomotive in use after 1915 exacerbated the problem.
\nThe decision to dispense with engineering advice and reduce track maintenance to only the minimum level of necessary repairs was a critical moment in the Aramac tramway's history. While successfully cutting operating costs in the short term, it meant that the tramway would have to carry smaller loads at slower speeds, giving customers a declining level of service over the years. The progressively deteriorating track would eventually doom its operations altogether.
\nBusiness picked up in the post-war era, services were increased again, and the tramway held its own and continued to run at a small profit each year. The accumulated reserve was sufficient to encourage Council to seek a Treasury loan of £7 500 to buy a new locomotive in 1924. The new engine was a PB15 built in the Ipswich railway workshops, and the first locomotive to be purpose-built for the Aramac line, unlike the two second-hand government ones already in service.
\nTraffic steadily declined as the 1920s advanced, and although the tramway continued to provide an economic benefit to the Aramac district, Council struggled to break even financially in most years. The service was never again as popular or as successful as it had been at the outset, and drought and rural depression continued to keep business down. There was increasing competition from road transport as private motor cars and trucks became cheaper and more popular in the 1920s. Operating perilously close to the edge of viability, the tramway faced a catastrophe in 1928 when cyclonic rains flooded the district. The damage to the line stopped all traffic for weeks, and the lost revenue combined with the cost of repairs sent the accounts for the year heavily into the red. Council had to levy a special rate to pay the tramway's expenses, and was unable to meet its loan repayments that year; there was no option but to go to State Treasury and negotiate a three-year suspension of payments.
\nThe tramway's prosperous heyday was over, and it was to be many years before things improved. The deepening depression made the situation even worse, and saw staff retrenchments and the withdrawal of concession fares and freight rebates for primary producers. The onset of the Second World War brought further austerity; there were constant labour and material shortages, and it was difficult to buy coal. By 1944 the tramway was offering the bare minimum of service to customers, and Council had exhausted almost every trick it knew to keep it running. Scheduled services had again been cut back to twice weekly, and track maintenance was reduced to only the most urgent and necessary repairs. The two old engines had both been scrapped, and the only locomotive left in service was now 20 years old. Treasury had been waiving interest and loan repayment for years, and had written off a part of the debt; effectively the State was subsidising the Aramac tramway because it was cheaper to do so than to provide an alternative service to the Aramac district at State expense.
\nFor three generations the tramway station was the main focus of Aramac's economic and social life. It was a very busy but also a very intimate enterprise in a small tight-knit community.
\nThe layout of the Aramac station changed over time, brought about by changes in the operation of the line. The locomotive shed, for example, was built in 1913 to house one locomotive, then doubled in length in 1915 to house two. It was apparently not lengthened again after 1912; Engine No 1 sat outside for the remainder of its life. The shed was shortened again after 1943, when there was once more only one locomotive in service. Then in 1958 when the tramway went over to diesel power, the old shed was demolished and a new and even smaller shed was built to house the much shorter engine.
\nThe other two major buildings - the station and goods shed - had no need for any such functional changes and remained virtually unaltered during the tramway's period of operation. The station was demolished in 1976 following the closure of the line, but the goods shed was retained .
\nIn the post-war era, the Aramac tramway faced its greatest challenge ever as its principal competitor, road transport, became stronger and more popular. From 1945 the face of Australian transport was completely transformed by ever bigger and more powerful trucks operating on much better roads. If the tramway had been faced with this challenge in its enfeebled condition of the 1930s, it would have been defeated very quickly.
\nThere were two important changes ahead for the tramway. The first was brought about by a dramatic boom in the post-war rural economy, which saw the price of some agricultural products increase by as much as ten to twenty times between 1939 and the early 1950s. Small outback towns such as Aramac experienced a sudden return to a level of prosperity not seen for decades. Traffic on the tramway picked up steadily from 1945 onwards, and while there was still a large burden of debt to overcome before the Council could think about declaring a profit, operations by the early 1950s were again running at a more comfortable level.
\nThe second change was a complete transformation of the tramway, by means of both long-overdue repairs to the track and the purchase of a new engine. Years of neglected maintenance had left the railway line in a deteriorated condition. In 1957 the Railways Department gave Council an ultimatum that unless the track was substantially upgraded, it would no longer permit State-owned rolling stock to be used on the Aramac run. The increased prosperity of the district enabled Council both to increase freight charges and levy ratepayers, raising £30 000 which was spent on the first major repairs to the line in many years, including rebuilding of the bridges.
\nThere was also a major upgrading of the motive power driving the tramway. In 1957, Council ordered a 150 horsepower Comeng diesel-hydraulic locomotive to replace its 33 year old steam engine. It was cheaper to run and easier to maintain, and weighing only 16 tons, it was much less subject to derailment and bogging. The old PB15 steam locomotive was sold to Queensland Government Railways, and the new diesel engine commenced service on 17 January 1958.
\nAfter fifty years of service with four locomotives, the tramway in 1963 finally hit upon the ideal vehicle for the line. To supplement the little diesel engine, Council bought a second-hand railmotor, RM 28, from the State service for £100. The railmotor remained in service for as long as the tramway operated. It was much lighter than a conventional locomotive, and its weight was spread more evenly over its length, so it performed much better on the rough track. Derailments became almost unknown, and in wet weather the locomotive sat in its shed while the railmotor was pressed into service.
\nCouncil bought still another new diesel locomotive in 1968. The 1958 locomotive was a little under-powered for heavy loads, and was supplemented by a slightly bigger 19 ton diesel-hydraulic locomotive built by Walkers Limited. For a time the two engines could be coupled together and operated as a single unit, but in January 1970 the State bought the old diesel locomotive.
\nThese developments and improvements of the 1950s and 1960s kept the tramway going into the post-war era, but they could not change the economic circumstances in which the service operated. Road transport was becoming faster and more efficient year by year, and the tramway simply could not compete. Passenger traffic dwindled to virtually nothing by the 1960s because nearly everyone travelled by car. Wool and livestock increasingly travelled by truck in dry weather. The tramway was only eking out an existence, and Council's aim was simply to keep the financial loss down as low as possible.
\nThe losses remained acceptable until 1970, when there was a sharp drop in income as competition from road transport really began to take hold. The condition of the track, reconditioned over ten years before, was again becoming a big problem, and there was industrial trouble with the workforce. The government agreed to subsidise the tramway service until the road was sealed from Aramac to Barcaldine. A Tramways Undertaking Fund was established, and State Treasury began to pay the annual shortfall. While this arrangement was in force, the great floods of January 1974 caused major damage to the line, and the cost of repairs dramatically increased the debt.
\nThe progressively increasing debt to the State added to the money owed to Treasury over the entire life of the tramway, since the original loan of 1911. By 1975, the accumulated size of the government loan was $225 000, and there was no longer any prospect of reducing it. The road was already sealed about halfway from Barcaldine, and the likelihood was that traffic on the tramway would soon shrink to nothing. No longer an asset to the Shire's economy, the tramway had become simply a burden on the ratepayers. In November 1975, the Permanent Way Inspector gave a gloomy description of the state of the track. In the face of this report, Council decided to close the Tramway. It was decided that the service would terminate on 31 December 1975, and tenders would be called for the sale of 150 tons of steel rails and the diesel locomotive.
\nThe tramway ran its last service at some time in the days just before New Year 1976. In February 1976, four tenders were received for the purchase of 82 miles of steel rails and the eight year old locomotive. Council accepted the tender of £262 400 from the Australian Sugar Producers Association, and the tracks were torn up and trucked away over the next few months. The bitumen-sealed road arrived in Aramac a few months after the tramway closed.
\nThe closure of the tramway left the Council's financial situation unresolved, for there was uncertainty about the status of the Tramways Undertaking Fund, and whether it had been composed of outright grants, or loans which had to be repaid. State Treasury took the view that the Aramac Shire should use the tramway sale money to repay the State's contribution to the Fund. The State Treasurer wrote to the Aramac Shire Council accordingly, however politics were to intervene in the Council's favour when the State Treasurer, Sir Gordon Chalk, Leader of the Liberal Party in Queensland, retired from Parliament after 29 years in politics on 13 August 1976. Aramac Shire kept the surplus tramway money.
\nAfter the tramway closed, its few remaining assets were dispersed. The railway station building was in poor condition because of termite infestation, and was demolished in 1976. The goods shed remained standing, as did the cold store near the station, which remained in service as a Council facility. The railmotor and its carriages, two maintenance trolleys, and some other passenger carriages that the tramway had acquired over the yars were placed in a steel mesh cage on a short length of the main line near the goods shed. In 1986 a group of railway history enthusiasts requested a railmotor carriage and with Council's approval removed it to a museum at Kunkala.
\nThe next wave of interest in the conservation of the remaining relics of the tramway came from two schoolteachers who galvanised community members into organising a local historical museum based at the goods shed. This involved housing the railmotor inside the goods shed by means of the major operation of demolishing and later rebuilding the end wall. The Aramac Tramway Museum opened on 29 September 1994, and the Aramac Tramway Museum Association was incorporated in 1997.
\nThe Tramway Museum has also become a focus for local historical activity generally, and in recent years people have donated a number of items which have been stored in and around the goods shed. There has also been a proposal put forward to reinstate a section of track to run the railmotor as a tourist attraction, and Queensland Rail has donated sleepers and rails for a kilometre of track.
","criteria":"The Aramac Tramway Museum is important in demonstrating the pattern of Queensland's history, forming part of a tramway built during the rapid expansion of railways in Queensland in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. The Aramac Tramway was funded by the local council as a branch line of the Winton - Longreach line, and remained under the control of the Aramac Shire Council for the entire period of its operation. It was the last of such locally-controlled tramways operating when it closed in 1975.
|Aramac Tramway Museum demonstrates a rare and unusual aspect of Queensland's cultural heritage as an example of a railway service operated by a local community.
|The place has a special association with the Aramac community through their efforts to have the tramway constructed and maintained over a 62 year period. For many years the tramway provided an important economic and social link to Barcaldine and the Central Line running to Rockhampton. In times of flood, the road between Aramac and Barcaldine would be closed and the tramway provided the sole transport link between the towns.
","criteria_letters":"Criterion A | Criterion B | Criterion G","criteria_definitions":"The place is important in demonstrating the evolution or pattern of Queensland's history | The place demonstrates rare, uncommon or endangered aspects of Queensland's cultural heritage | The place has a strong or special association with a particular community or cultural group for social, cultural or spiritual reasons"}, {"heritage_type":"State Heritage","site_id":16037,"place_ref":601274,"name":"Barcaldine Shire Hall & Offices","alternate_name":"Barcaldine Council Chambers | Barcaldine Shire Hall and Offices | Barcaldine Memorial Gates","street_address":"71 Ash Street","suburb":"BARCALDINE","lga":"BARCALDINE REGIONAL COUNCIL","register_entry_date":"2003-04-29","description":"The Barcaldine Shire Hall and Offices are built of timber with a corrugated iron roof, with the official rooms of the council at the front section, with the hall behind. The building lies in the administration precinct of Barcaldine, fronting Ash Street and bounded by Beech Street. It shares the town block with other government buildings, including the Court House; while the Post Office sits on the opposite (south-western) corner of Ash and Beech Streets. The hall and offices structure is well set back from both streets, and is centrally located within the government reserve. The site contains significant plantings which also line the street boundaries. Memorial gates dedicated to those who enlisted and those who died are located in front of the main entrance to the building.
In fabric, scale, and design, the building has not changed since the completion of the 1950s renovations. Much original joinery in the building survives basically intact, as does much of the original interior linings, including the stamped steel ceilings and beaded tongue and groove wall boards.
","history":"The present Barcaldine Shire Hall was built in 1911-12 and is the second official building used by the Council for the administration of the shire. The building was designed by Alfred Mowbray Hutton. Major alterations were made to the building in 1952.
The town of Barcaldine developed almost 'overnight' in 1886 with the extension of the Central Railway west from Rockhampton. The railway was a vital factor in opening up the central western regions of Queensland to European settlement in the mid to late nineteenth century. The original site of the terminus was to have been the pastoral station of Barcaldine Downs, established by pastoralist Donald Cameron in 1865. It was eventually decided to locate the terminus at Lagoon Creek however.
Barcaldine rapidly grew to prosperity, on a permanent scale, unlike most of the other railway townships on the central line. The town was surveyed by Victor Desgrand, the Government Surveyor, in July 1885 and sales of town lots were held in December. The town was laid out on a rectangular grid, parallel to and south of the railway line. A town reserve of 100 square miles was gazetted in June 1886, when further allotments of land were sold. The railway was not officially opened until December 1886, by which time the town had already 'assumed formidable proportions'. After a year of official European settlement, the population of Barcaldine in 1887 was estimated at 1500
The Divisional Boards Act of 1879 brought local government into the outback of Queensland. The Kargoolnah Divisional Board was created in this year and centred on Blackall, an early pastoral township. The geographical area serviced by this board covered a great area in western Queensland, taking in the future towns of Tambo, Barcaldine and Jericho. With Barcaldine developed rapidly from 1886, the residents formed the Barcaldine Progress Association, and began agitating for their own municipal representation. In 1893, a Divisional Board at Barcaldine was instituted, which was to evolve into the Barcaldine Shire Council.
At first the Barcaldine Divisional Board met in a building in Oak Street, but the building was burnt down during a fire in the town in 1896. It was decided to construct a hall to the design of the Rockhampton architects, Eaton and Bates. Completed in May 1898, the hall was located on the south-eastern corner of Ash and Beech Streets in the Divisional Board Reserve. This building served the community more than adequately into the twentieth century, witnessing the administrative changeover from Divisional Board to Shire Council in 1903. By the early years of the new century however, it was apparent that the hall was too small for the administration of the shire.
In 1911 the council commissioned the architect A.M. Hutton to design a new building for the Shire Hall and Offices. Hutton died shortly after completing the plans. The design was then taken over by Frederick Boddington, Hutton's partner. Robinson & Freeman, builders of Rockhampton, submitted the only tender, which was accepted with a price of £2675.
The new hall was planned to be completed to coincide with the silver anniversary celebrations of the settling of the town. Delays were encountered in its construction before the hall was completed in February 1912. It appears it was constructed adjacent to the former hall, which was then purchased by the Aramac Shire Council for £500 and removed.
The 1912 building was constructed largely as designed by Hutton although there were a number of slight modifications. It was built of timber with a corrugated iron roof, with the official rooms of the council at the front section, and the hall behind. The offices were designed as a separate but linked pavilion, with a single skin wall. They were surrounded by verandahs at the front and sides, with a six feet (1.8 metres) wide passage separating them from the hall. The main entrance to the building was identified by a large triangular pediment which capped an archway. The clock tower rose above the entrance in the centre of the building. Pediments were installed each end of the front verandah. Between these and the entrance, the verandah was divided into four bays with a lattice valance forming complimentary arches across the face of the building. Side verandahs to the office section were also treated similarly.
The council rooms opened out to the verandah on all sides with the french doors and casement windows. The Council Chambers and Shire Chairman's office were to the right of the central passage, and the offices for the Shire Clerk and a solicitor to the left. The floors of these rooms were generally covered in linoleum, with green or grey walls and white pressed metal ceilings. At the end of the central passage through two sets of double doors was located the hall. The hall featured a flat floor with a raised stage, and an upstairs gallery. The hall opened sideways onto the subsidiary verandah spaces. On the eastern verandah was a supper room, on the western were smoking rooms and toilets. The hall was of large proportions, measuring 80 feet (24.3 m) by 40 feet (12.2 m), and was well ventilated with vents and louvres, and fanlights which acted as a clerestory providing light and ventilation over the adjoining verandah roofs.
The gallery of the hall was reached through a staircase in the front section of the building. A passageway provided access from this gallery, out to the clock tower and along a viewing deck which sat above the verandahs of the office section.
The Barcaldine Shire Hall was the principal public building in the town. The hall was used by most citizens of the shire in some capacity, for fundraising activities, as a public venue, to attend meetings, for the associated operations in the efforts of two world wars, for the health and welfare of the people, and many other events.
In 1952 the Shire Hall underwent some rather major alterations, documented by the Brisbane architect C.W.T. Fulton with A.H. Job & J.M. Collin architects in association. The major change involved the demolition and removal of the clock tower and the promenade deck. The decorative front and side verandah to the office was also removed, and replaced with a new verandah design. The east verandah of the hall, which contained the supper room, was also partially rebuilt. New toilet facilities were added within the west verandah, which was also enclosed. The hall was also repainted, a new ticket office was installed, and memorial gates at the entrance were later built. These gates were planned by the Barcaldine War Memorial Committee and included plaques bearing the names of those from the district who enlisted and those who died.
In 1993 a conservation study of the Barcaldine Shire Hall was prepared for the Barcaldine Shire Council. In the mid-1990s, two new freestanding buildings were erected, one either side of the 1911-12 building at the front, and linked to it, providing new shire council offices and a new shire library.
","criteria":"The Barcaldine Shire Hall and Offices is significant as it demonstrates the growth and development of Barcaldine. It is significant as the major public building in the town for more than 80 years. The building is on the original Divisional Board Reserve, surveyed when the town was set out in 1885, and helps to define the town's original surveying. The Barcaldine Shire Hall and Offices is also important in demonstrating the modernising influence of the 1950s, with its extensive additions and alterations of that time.
|The building is significant as a rare surviving example of a late nineteenth/early twentieth century timber shire hall, many of which were constructed but few of which survive.
|The site is significant for its architecture, particularly its interesting plan form.
|(Criterion under review)
|The place has a strong association with the Barcaldine Community, being the centre for local government and the central social venue of the town, and having been used by most of the citizens of the shire in some capacity. The site has further significance to the Barcaldine community as it contains memorial gates erected by the Barcaldine War Memorial Committee following World War II.
","criteria_letters":"Criterion A | Criterion B | Criterion E | Criterion F | Criterion G","criteria_definitions":"The place is important in demonstrating the evolution or pattern of Queensland's history | The place demonstrates rare, uncommon or endangered aspects of Queensland's cultural heritage | The place is important because of its aesthetic significance | The place is important in demonstrating a high degree of creative or technical achievement at a particular period | The place has a strong or special association with a particular community or cultural group for social, cultural or spiritual reasons"}, {"heritage_type":"State Heritage","site_id":33999,"place_ref":602842,"name":"Aramac State School","alternate_name":"Aramac Provisional School","street_address":"69 Porter Street","suburb":"ARAMAC","lga":"BARCALDINE REGIONAL COUNCIL","register_entry_date":"2014-10-10","description":"Aramac State School is located on a level site on Porter Street on the southern side of township, near the intersection of the Barcaldine-Aramac Road and Aramac Creek. The complex comprises significant early school buildings and residence, as well as a secondary school and later facilities with grounds extending between McWhannell and Drury Streets that incorporate an oval and cricket pitch.
The three early school buildings are linked by verandahs to form a U shape. Fronting the school but concealed by a heavily vegetated western boundary is the original 1880 Stanley teaching building. Behind and perpendicular to it is the 1928 Sectional School to the south and the 1935 Vocational building to the north. The 1919 residence is separately fenced and located a short distance to the north of the school along Porter Street, while the secondary school and other structures are located to the south.
The Stanley teaching building is a timber framed building, highset on concrete stumps and clad in weatherboards, with a metal clad gable roof and verandahs to the west and east. Attached to the centre of western verandah, which has a sheeted raked ceiling and weatherboard balustrade, is the 1928 teacher's room addition, which is of similar construction with a hipped roof and original joinery. The eastern verandah with bag racks forming the balustrade, extends to the north and south connecting to the verandahs of the Sectional School and domestic science buildings. The understorey is open, except at the southern end, where a workshop area is located. There is a set of stairs leading from the eastern verandah with one of two sets of stairs from the western verandah remaining. The interior walls of the school building are lined with v-jointed tongue-and-groove boards and the coved ceiling with wider beaded boards contains a lattice ceiling vent. A timber cover strip conceals the junction between the original building and its 1900 addition. The gable end windows have been infilled with lining boards and there are two pairs of French doors between two large windows housing four fixed lights above eight banks of louvres in both the east and west elevations. The original door opening has been enclosed with weatherboards.
The Sectional School is a timber framed, weatherboard clad building, highset on concrete stumps with a corrugated metal clad gable roof, north-facing verandah, large window openings in the north and south walls and an open understorey. Fixed glazing is located above the windows in the northern wall where double hung sashes have been replaced with sliding aluminium. Door openings retain their fanlights above single-light flush panel doors which have replaced French doors. Windows in the south wall have sheeted-in fanlights over four banks of sliding aluminium sashes which have replaced timber casements. The school building comprises two rooms interconnected through a large opening in the partition wall. Walls and the coved ceiling are lined with v-jointed tongue-and-groove boards, and the verandah and internal partition wall are single-skin. Lattice ceiling vents and metal bracing ties are located in the centre of each room.
The domestic science building is a timber framed, weatherboard clad building, with a corrugated metal clad half-hipped roof, highset on concrete stumps with a partially walled, open understorey. Its south facing verandah is enclosed at its eastern end to form a library and the western end has a bag rack balustrade. The entrance to the domestic science room from the verandah has a fanlight over a pair of panelled French doors. The interior is lined with v-jointed tongue-and-groove boards, and a lattice ceiling vent and metal bracing tie are located at the centre of the coved ceiling. Original cupboards are located in the southeast and across the southwest corner and the workspaces have a c1960s fitout. Flanking rooms to the east and west, house a sewing room and laundry respectively. Both have raked ceilings and are accessible from the domestic science room. Window sashes in both these rooms have been replaced with aluminium sliding windows. The laundry retains an early cupboard across the northeast corner and early door joinery to the verandah. There are later access stairs to the eastern elevation and southern verandahs.
The teacher's residence is highset on concrete stumps with later panels of wide horizontal battens enclosing the understorey. It has a hipped roof clad in corrugated metal sheeting without soffits and its verandah is supported on timber posts with recent lattice panels above a dowel balustrade. The external walls are clad in weatherboards and the verandah and internal partitions are single-skin lined with v-jointed tongue-and-groove boards. Original joinery includes four panel doors, three-light low waisted French doors onto the verandahs with fanlights (external walls) or fixed fretwork (internal walls) and double hung windows with recent hoods. The interior layout comprises three bedrooms, living room and hall in the central core, with verandahs to the west and north and a dining area, bathroom and kitchen on the eastern verandah. The timber frame is generally lined on one side with vertical v-jointed tongue-and-groove board. The living room ceiling, rear verandah and kitchen are lined with flat sheeting. Original front and rear stairs have been replaced.
The other buildings and structures on the site are not of State cultural heritage significance.
","history":"Aramac State School (1880-), established as a Provisional School in 1878, is located in the rural town of Aramac, in central western Queensland. It is important as a school complex which includes significant pre-World War II buildings - a Stanley teaching building (1880), a teacher's residence (1919), a Sectional School (1928), and a domestic science building (1935).
\nWilliam Landsborough and Nathaniel Buchanan explored the area around Aramac in 1859 and established pastoral leases in the district from 1862. The town of Aramac arose after John William Kingston erected a store in 1867, and later a hotel, beside Aramac Creek. The settlement was declared a town site in 1869 and surveyed in 1875.[1] Thereafter, Aramac acted as a service town for the sparse but growing rural population of the district.
\nSchooling commenced at Aramac with a temporary provisional school conducted in a rented building, between January and December 1878, with an average attendance of 20 children.[2] In August 1878, the Department of Public Instruction decided to establish a state school at Aramac.[3] Contractors McMahon and Cowper commenced construction of the teaching building and separate teacher's residence on a five acre (2.02ha) site in 1879. After delays obtaining materials the school finally opened on 14 June 1880.[4]
\nThe provision of state-administered education was important to the colonial governments of Australia. In 1848 the New South Wales Government established National Schools. This was continued by the Queensland Government after the colony's creation in 1859. The Education Act 1860 established the Queensland Board of General Education and began to standardise curriculum, teacher training, and facilities.[5] The State Education Act 1875 provided for the further key initiatives of free, compulsory and secular primary education and established the Department of Public Instruction to administer the Act. This move standardised the provision of education and, despite difficulties, colonial educators achieved a remarkable feat in bringing basic literacy to most Queensland children by 1900.[6]
\nThe establishment of schools was considered an essential step in the development of early communities and integral to their success. Locals often donated land and labour for a school's construction and the school community contributed to maintenance and development. Schools became a major community focus for social interaction, a symbol of progress and a source of pride with enduring connections formed with past pupils, parents and teachers. The inclusion of war memorials and halls used for community purposes reinforced these connections together with fetes, markets, public holiday celebrations, school break-up days, fundraisers, polling days, sporting events, reunions, and dances, all held within the schools' buildings and grounds.[7]
\nFrom the 1860s until the 1960s, Queensland school buildings were predominantly timber framed, taking advantage of the material's abundance in the state and the high number of builders skilled in its use. This also allowed for easy and economical construction and enabled the government to provide facilities in remote areas. Due to the standardisation of facilities, schools across the state were developed in distinctly similar ways and became complexes of typical components. These components included: teaching building/s, school yard, sports oval, head teacher's residence, and a variety of landscape elements such as sporting facilities or play equipment, playsheds, gardens and trees.[8]
\nThe new Aramac state school comprised a timber school room and separate residence, built to a standard design by Colonial Architect Francis Drummond Greville (FDG) Stanley, who was then responsible for all government school designs. During his prolific career he was also responsible for many important government and private buildings. For his schools, Stanley became the first to develop standard designs and produce ‘classes' of buildings that would later evolve into ‘types'. The vast majority of subsequent school buildings in Queensland were built from standard ‘type' designs.[9]
\nStanley's school designs remedied the weatherproofing problem of preceding single-skin school designs by cladding the exterior with chamferboards or weatherboards as well as providing an interior lining.[10] Other distinguishing Stanley design characteristics were: classroom width; the location, size and detailing of windows and central stairs to the verandah aligned with the central entrance door. These were employed throughout the colony as the first deliberately ‘standard' plans. Although many Stanley school buildings were constructed, few remain and extant examples are rare.[11] Known examples survive at the former Carbrook State School (QHR 600661), Tallegalla State School (QHR 601687), former Hemmant State School (QHR 602382), Kalkie State School (QHR 600971) and Petrie State School.
\nThe Stanley teaching building and residence were both lowset timber framed buildings on stumps with gable roofs and verandahs, front and back. The school room, with two three-tiered galleries measured 34 x 18ft (10.36 x 5.49m) with an 11ft 9in (3.58m) high coved ceiling and a tie beam 10ft (3.04m) above the floor. Three narrow windows were housed in each gable end with a door and four pairs of windows to each side elevation.[12] The residence contained two rooms separated by a hall. Its gable ends were clad in corrugated iron and its weatherboard front wall contained a large double-hung window, either side of the front door.[13]
\nUnder the stewardship of the Department of Public Works which retained responsibility for schools until 2013, and through the involvement of some of Queensland's most innovative architects, school buildings became more advanced and diverse. This was the outcome of years of systematic reform and experimentation.[14]
\nAchieving an ideal or even adequate level of natural light in classrooms, without glare, was of critical importance to educators. After 1900 the virtues of maximum natural ventilation and controlled, high-levels of natural light in teaching buildings were extolled and became a primary determinant of the design concept and layout of all school buildings. Architects experimented with different combinations of roof, ceiling and wall vents, larger windows, dormer windows and ducting. Roof ventilators became fleches which grew larger as the experimentation continued.[15]
\nIn c1909 highset timber buildings were introduced, providing better ventilation as well as further teaching space and a covered play space underneath. Windows were rearranged and enlarged to provide a greater amount of gentle, southern light into the room. Desks were rearranged so that the light would fall onto students' left-hand sides to avoid throwing shadows onto the pages; this presupposed that all students would be right-handed. The change in philosophy often meant a complete transformation of the fenestration of existing buildings. Interiors became lighter and airier and met with immediate approval from educators.[16] This was a noticeable new direction and the better lit and ventilated form became a characteristic of Queensland schools.
\nAs a service town to its pastoral district, Aramac was subject to the same vicissitudes as those it served. During the 1890s it suffered the economic consequences of depression, drought, insecure markets, low wool and meat prices and the spread of cattle tick. The town's population fell from 398 in 1881, to 389 in 1891, then 361 in 1901. Aramac did however gain more reliable and rapid transportation via the Central Railway line opened in 1886, and a reliable water supply from the establishment of artesian bores.[17]
\nEven though the population was in decline, the introduction of compulsory school attendance saw the Aramac State School enlarged in 1900. The Stanley teaching building was extended by 20ft (6.08m) and included a lavatory and hat room on the southern corner of the rear verandah to a standard design by the Department of Public Works. The southern gable end wall was relocated to form the gable end of the new extension and the new interior walls were unlined. Two new windows were added to the east and west elevations and a fleche to the roof.[18] In 1916, interior walls were lined, the building painted and fly screens were installed on the verandahs and boxed out over the windows.[19]
\nIn Australia, only Queensland offered free accommodation to teachers, the government policy applying to male teachers (only) from as early as 1864. This was partial recompense for low wages; an incentive for teacher recruitment in rural areas and provided onsite caretakers. Refinement of the standard residence design occurred over time, with each modification responding to teacher complaints and Teachers' Union agitation. Following World War I, teacher shortages were blamed on the inadequacy and shortage of teachers' residences. Consequently, many new teacher residences were constructed across Queensland in the 1930s and again following WWII.[20]
\nFrom the outset, teachers' residences were built to standards regulated by the Board of General Education rather than to specific designs which varied according to architects responsible.[21] Initially, residences were most often attached as annexes to the classroom building, but from the 1880s were built as detached residences. These residences were very similar in design to the vernacular Queensland house with few, if any, education-specific requirements or features.
\nResidences designed by the Department of Public Works' architects, and constructed to the high standard demanded by the state, were typically of a higher-quality in design, materials and construction than most similarly-scaled private residences. The detached teacher's residence was located within the school grounds at a distance from the teaching buildings, usually with a separate, fenced yard with gardens and trees. The designs ranged from one to four bedrooms and evolved simultaneously with the teaching buildings to keep up with modern needs and styles.
\nIn 1919 a new teacher's residence was constructed at Aramac. Plans for the new teacher's residence show a highset, timber residence with a core of four rooms under a hipped roof, and wide verandahs to three sides under a lower pitched roof, with a dining area, kitchen and bathroom on the rear verandah. The external walls were clad in weatherboards and the internal frame was single skin, lined with v-jointed tongue-and-groove boards. Joinery included double hung windows without hoods.[22]
\nDuring the 1920s and 1930s alterations were made to the vast majority of older school buildings to upgrade their lighting and ventilation. In 1921, the fenestration at Aramac State School was altered for improved lighting and ventilation. New 18-light windows (three pairs of casements with fanlights over) replaced the gable end windows with sunshades and flyscreens retained. The gauze to the verandahs was removed to railing height and replaced with tongue-and-groove hardwood boards. In addition, the school was raised on stumps and concrete paving laid to provide additional shaded play space beneath in 1922. Part of the understorey area was enclosed in 1923 to create a domestic science room.[23]
\nAramac experienced a revival after the breaking of the Federation drought in 1903. Selection in the Aramac district resumed and the town's population increased to 639 in 1911. In 1913 Aramac Shire opened a tramway connecting Aramac with the Central railway line to Barcaldine and Longreach, which benefitted the shire and the town. Economic slow-down occurred between 1914 and 1919 due to drought, industrial unrest and the departure of men to war. Post-war, the population increased again to about 400 in 1923 but Aramac Shire continued to struggle economically until about 1933.[24]
\nImprovements to achieve an optimum classroom culminated in 1920 with the Sectional School type, a highset timber structure. This fundamentally new design combined all the best features of previous types and implemented theories of an ideal education environment. It proved very successful and was used unaltered until 1950. This type was practical, economical, and satisfied educational requirements and climatic needs. Most importantly, it allowed for the orderly expansion of schools over time. By late 1914, in accordance with the accepted principles, buildings were optimally orientated to maximise natural light from the south. Before the Sectional School, solar orientation was not a key consideration and all school buildings were positioned in relation to the street and property boundaries. The Sectional School type had only one verandah typically on the northern side, allowing the southern wall, with a maximum number of windows, to be unobstructed. The building was designed so that the blank end wall could be detached as the school grew and the building extended in sections, hence the name. This led to the construction of long narrow buildings of many classrooms - a distinctive feature of Queensland schools.[25]
\nIn 1928, a Sectional School building was constructed at Aramac State School providing accommodation for an extra 80 pupils. It comprised two rooms, 21 x 18ft (6.40 x 5.49m), with a north facing verandah and was located southeast of, and at right angles to, the existing school. There were double hung windows in the northern wall of the classrooms and large banks of casements in the southern walls. The classrooms were lined with vertical boards and the coved ceiling was braced with metal ties. A teachers' room was also added to the western verandah of the Stanley building as part of these improvements.[26]
\nVocational education was a Queensland Government priority to support the development of primary industries; this evolved after World War I into a variety of subjects. Vocational training within primary education began in 1895 with drawing classes and expanded to include domestic sciences, agriculture, and sheet metal and wood working classes. The subjects required a variety of purpose-built facilities and were initially gender segregated.[27] Standard, purpose-designed vocational buildings were first introduced in 1928. In 1936 the Minister for Education permitted students to take vocational subjects in lieu of geography or history in the Junior Examination, increasing the subjects' popularity.
\nAramac State School received its domestic science classroom building in 1935. The highset timber framed structure, clad in weather boards, with a half-hipped roof clad in corrugated iron was built to the northeast of the original school and contained a cookery and dressmaking room 21ft x 18ft (6.40 x 5.49m), lined with vertical boards, with a coved ceiling and metal tie rod. Its south facing verandah was flyscreen lined, and return wings on the east and west sides accommodated a fitting room and laundry respectively. As part of this program of works, the back verandah of the teacher's residence was also enclosed and the kitchen extended.[28]
\nBetween the 1960s and the 1980s Queensland education was reformed and the teaching buildings at Aramac State School were altered as a result. The Education Act 1964 was a turning point and the first major update of Queensland education's governing legislation since 1875. Effectively, a new era of state education evolved, requiring new architectural responses. The Department of Education (as it had been renamed in 1957) continued to give the responsibility of building design to the architects of the Department of Public Works. With new educational philosophies, government policies and functional requirements combined with new architectural styles, materials and technologies, the evolution of standard designs became more fragmented. Rather than ‘improving' on the previous designs, architects began to design with inspiration drawn from new precedents. Fundamentally, timber construction was no longer favoured and buildings were no longer predominantly highset.[29]
\nPost-World War II, was a period of growth for Aramac with the town's population peaking in 1961 at 654.[30] Plans for enlarging the school grounds were produced by the Land Administration Board in 1948,[31] and in 1964-5 a high school opened at Aramac State School.[32] The new secondary department was built to the south of the original school in 1964 and a new general purpose classroom and commercial classroom was built in 1966. An additional classroom was as added to the eastern end of the Sectional School in 1969 and the domestic science building received a new fitout.[33]
\nOther school improvements dating from the the 1960s included the replacement of the casement windows on the Stanley teaching building with louvres in 1963 and a partition wall was added which required the removal and relocation of the door. Hat and bag racks were added to the verandah and the eastern end of the domestic science building was enclosed for a library. The Sectional School building was extended by 8 ft (2.43m) for a new staff room.
\nThe school continued to expand in the 1970s with the construction of the two storey masonry building to the east of the domestic science building in 1973. The original Stanley school building was converted to an activity centre in 1976 - the gable windows were infilled and the central partition was removed.[34]
\nAramac State School has been a focus for the local community as a place of important social and cultural activity. Centenary celebrations were held by the school between 30 March and 2 April 1978. With the general downturn in the rural economy the town's population has declined to 428 in 1981 and 299 in 2011.[35] In 2014, the primary and secondary school continues to operate from the site and the primary school retains the Stanley teaching building as an activity centre, the Sectional School building as classrooms, the domestic science building for home economics, and the residence continues to be used as teacher's accommodation.
\nThe school is important to the town and district having operated since 1880 and educated generations of Aramac students. Since establishment it has been a key social focus for the Aramac community with the grounds and buildings having been the location of many social events over time.
","criteria":"Aramac State School is important in demonstrating the principal characteristics of an early Queensland state school complex, comprising: a Stanley teaching building (1880) with an extension (1900), a Sectional School building (1928); a teacher's residence (1919) and a domestic science building (1935) constructed to standard designs by the Queensland Government. Standing on a landscaped site, the buildings are positioned to allow natural ventilation and daylighting of the interiors. Each of these buildings is highset, of timber framed construction, clad in weatherboards and have interiors lined in tongue-and-groove boarding.
In particular, the standard designs represented at Aramac are:
the Stanley teaching building, with its gable roof, front and rear verandahs, centrally placed stairs and coved ceiling;
the Sectional School building with gable roof, northern verandah, large south-facing windows, coved ceiling with metal tie beam and subsequent classroom duplication;
the domestic science building, an intact pre-World War II vocational building with large, airy classroom and flanking sewing and laundry rooms;
and the teacher's residence comprising a four room core, front and side verandahs and rear dining verandah with bathroom and kitchen.
Changing philosophies in state primary education are evident in the modifications made to these buildings, including attached teacher's rooms, enlarged windows and verandah bag racks.
|The Stanley teaching building at Aramac State School is rare as one of six known surviving examples of this once common type.
|Aramac State School, opened in 1880 (initially established in 1878 as Aramac Provisional School), is important in demonstrating the evolution of state education, and its associated architecture, in Queensland.
The place retains excellent, representative examples of standard government designs that were architectural responses to prevailing government educational philosophies. The teaching building designed by architect FDG Stanley is an early standardised design; the teacher's residence resulted from a government initiative to address the state's post-WWI teacher shortage; the Sectional School building demonstrates the culmination of many years of experimental timber school design providing equally for educational and climatic needs; and the domestic science building reflects the Queensland Government's focus on vocation education as a way of ensuring the state's economic prosperity.
|Queensland schools have always played an important part in Queensland communities - as a venue for social interaction, volunteer work, and as a source of pride, symbolising local progress and aspirations. They typically retain a significant and enduring connection with former pupils, their parents, and teachers. Aramac State School has a strong and ongoing association with the Aramac community. It was established through the efforts of the local community and has educated generations of Aramac children. The place is important for its contribution to the educational development of Aramac and is a prominent community focal point and gathering place for social events with widespread community support.
","criteria_letters":"Criterion D | Criterion B | Criterion A | Criterion G","criteria_definitions":"The place is important in demonstrating the principal characteristics of a particular class of cultural places | The place demonstrates rare, uncommon or endangered aspects of Queensland's cultural heritage | The place is important in demonstrating the evolution or pattern of Queensland's history | The place has a strong or special association with a particular community or cultural group for social, cultural or spiritual reasons"} ]}