The three free-standing silo structures known as Silos Nos 2, 3 and 4 stand prominently on Haly Street, Kingaroy, within the larger Peanut Company of Australia peanut processing plant which occupies a truncated rectangular block bounded by the streets Haly, Jarah and Alford Street East and the Kingaroy/Kilkivan railway line formation. The plant within the silo structures is not considered to be of cultural heritage significance. For effective operation of the silos this plant is replaced and upgraded from time to time.
Extending over eight levels (boot pit, six floors and a gallery), each silo structure consists of nests of storage bins to the north, an elevator tower to the south and accommodates plant associated with the receipt, sorting, feeding, storage and despatch of peanuts. Silo No. 2 incorporates a working house to the south of its elevator tower. Silos Nos 2 and 3 are linked by an overhead enclosed walkway at gallery level. This walkway accommodates a conveyor plant to transport peanuts between the two silos. Elevated loading/despatch platforms sheltered by suspended steel framed awnings stand to the base of the elevator towers to Silos Nos 3 and 4 and to the east and south sides of the working house to Silo No. 2. The railway tracks of the former siding run between Silos Nos 2 and 3 and are not considered to be of cultural heritage significance.
The white painted concrete and brick silo bins stand on a reinforced concrete floating slab and consist of round bins 20 feet (6.2 metres) in diameter and 85 feet (26.35 metres) to the top of the cone and interstitial star shape bins 75 feet (23.25 metres) to the top of the cone. Peanuts are dropped in from a conveyor belt at the gallery level and released from the hoppered base at the ground floor. Silo No. 2, with a capacity of 4372 tons (3966.21 tonnes), has 24 round and 14 star shape bins, Silo No. 3 has a capacity of 5200 tons (5283.44 tonnes) in 27 round and 16 star shape bins and number four has a capacity of 2200 tons (2235.3 tonnes) in 12 round and 6 star shape bins.
The bins in each silo are crowned by a steel- and timber-framed shed clad with metal sheeting and are distinguished by high narrow gabled ridge roofs. Each shed accommodates the gallery space which houses the conveyor belt and associated plant that drops the nuts into the storage bins. A timber-floored platform runs along each side of the conveyor and the space is lit by steel-framed windows to the east, west and north. Hoppers at the base of the bins empty onto conveyor belts that transport the peanuts for despatch.
The elevator towers are steel- and timber-framed, clad with metal sheeting and lit by steel-framed windows to each level. The towers accommodate flights of steel and concrete stairs and the elevator plant associated with hoisting the peanuts from the boot pit to the gallery conveyor belts.
The working house of Silo No. 2 is constructed of reinforced concrete, sheltered by a hipped roof clad with metal sheeting. Banks of steel-framed 12-light windows light each of the five levels. Square in plan, the working house accommodates plant, flights of steel and concrete stairs and a passenger lift with a handsome decorative metal door housed within a weatherboard clad lift shaft.
Many original steel-framed 12-light windows with a fixed louvre vent and a pivoting central section have been retained, notably in the working house and the elevator towers.
","history":"The Kingaroy Peanut Silos located in Haly Street, Kingaroy are a group of three concrete silos (Nos 2, 3 and 4) that were constructed between 1938 and 1951 by the Queensland Peanut Marketing Board for storage of peanuts before their processing and marketing. These large structures dominate the skyline of Kingaroy and the surrounding landscape. They are widely recognised symbols of the peanut growing and processing industry in Queensland that developed as a commercial enterprise in the South Burnett centred upon Kingaroy and which has been managed from this town since the 1920s.
Although initial pastoral settlement in the Kingaroy area commenced in the 1840s when Taabinga station [QHR600647] and Burrandowan station [QHR600967] were taken up, the town of Kingaroy owes its establishment to the arrival of the Kilkivan branch railway in 1904. In 1898 the only resident in the vicinity of Kingaroy was Daniel Carroll who had selected a 160 acre block abutting the 3430 acre (1388.07 ha) Kingaroy Paddock selection in 1891 and built a hut and yard for his horses. By 1900 he had erected a cottage and had selected further blocks of land adjoining his original portion. In 1902 a provisional school opened in Kingaroy with about twenty pupils. Once the Kilkivan branch railway reached the 56 mile peg near the corner of the Kingaroy Paddock in 1904, the railway terminus was the impetus for the establishment of Kingaroy township. Both Carroll and Arthur Youngman, owner of the Kingaroy Paddock, auctioned town blocks at public auction during 1904. When the first train arrived, there were only three buildings - Carroll's new hotel, the Carrollee, FC Petersen's store and Carroll Cottage [QHR601901]. After the arrival of the railway Kingaroy quickly developed as a service centre with the establishment of commercial premises such as shops and hotels. These were soon followed by public buildings, churches and schools. The seven years during which Kingaroy was the railhead were sufficient for it to establish a lasting dominance over neighbouring townships.
Peanuts have been grown in Queensland since Chinese cultivators planted them on the Palmer River goldfield in the 1870s. Small acreages were grown by several farmers in the South Burnett from about 1901 and these peanuts were sold to confectioners and shops in Brisbane, Maryborough and Rockhampton. From circa 1920 significant acreages in the South Burnett became devoted to peanut growing.
A major boost to the peanut growers was the establishment of the Marrickville Margarine Company's oil expression plant at Marrickville, New South Wales in 1921. The company purchased almost the entire 1921-1922 crop in the South Burnett and may have created the demand which made the establishment and growth of the industry possible. Further stimulus was provided by the establishment of other companies, such as Nut Foods Pty Ltd in 1924, to produce peanut products such as peanut paste and salted and roasted peanuts that entered this business around this time.
Subsequently, more farmers in the South Burnett began peanut-growing. In 1922, 61 tons were produced, rising to 75 tons in 1923 and to 231 tons in 1924. This increase in peanut growing coincided with a fall in the price received by farmers for maize, which had been their primary cash crop. However, in 1924 merchants were not prepared to pay what growers considered a reasonable price for the increased quantity of peanuts claiming there was a glut and offering prices as low as ½ pence/lb. Consequently growers refused to sell at a price insufficient to meet the costs of production. A meeting of growers held at Memerambi decided to approach the Minister for Agriculture and Stock to obtain approval for the formation of a Peanut Board under the Primary Products Pools Act 1922. Board members were elected and a strategy for marketing the current crop was established.
This strategy involved transforming the crop into a marketable condition to supply quality lines and deliver the product throughout the year as the market required it. The Board did this by deshelling, grading, culling and storing the peanuts. Meanwhile, the establishment of the Queensland Peanut Marketing Board was gazetted on 23 August 1924. The result for the first year of operations was satisfactory with growers paid approximately 4 pence/pound.
During the period 1919 to 1924 production for the whole of Queensland increased from 57 to 448 tons. The other areas in Queensland producing peanuts were Moreton, Port Curtis, Edgecombe, Rockingham, Cape York Peninsula and the Darling Downs/Maranoa divisions. Peanuts were grown in areas such as the North Coast region where fruit farmers grew 1-2 acres (0.4-0.81 hectares) of peanuts as a side-line to their fruit production. Over time the peanut industry became concentrated in three areas of Queensland. The South Burnett, with Kingaroy as the headquarters of the Board, storage and treatment facilities, was the main area. A second area was in Central Queensland, especially along the coast, with Rockhampton as its centre. The third centre was on the Atherton Tableland with the Board's depot being located in Atherton.
Storage was one of the main needs of the South Burnett peanut growers. Silos were necessary to hold the nuts in dry storage, treat them if affected by damp, protect them from pests and allow controlled distribution so that the market was not flooded one year and short the next. Initially, the Peanut Board leased local barns and nuts were treated in the Railway's Grain Shed in the Railway Yard at Kingaroy. Realising that more permanent arrangements were required it was decided to build a block of silos, complete with treatment plant and machinery. The Board imposed a levy of ¼pence/pound on peanuts delivered to the Board to cover the cost. In order to build the silos the growers formed the Queensland Peanut Growers' Cooperative Association Ltd. The Association issued shares to the growers in lieu of the levy received from the Board. In this way the growers themselves became the owners of any assets bought or built with the proceeds of their levy.
The Association was formed and registered under the Primary Producers' Cooperative Associations Act 1923 to 1926. Between September 1926 and August 1928 land fronting Haly Street and the railway line to the south was acquired as a site for operations. Located near the commercial centre of the town and adjacent to the railway line, the future headquarters of the Peanut Board was well sited for loading and unloading of produce. Accordingly a timber-framed and -clad silo (No. 1) was constructed in 1928 together with a long shed which housed machinery for cleaning, grading and shelling peanuts. A long shed built at the same time, called the 'Dump', had a storage capacity of a further 1,200 tons.
The industry continued to develop steadily with regulation by government and growers alike. Lobbying of the State and Commonwealth governments by the Board resulted in embargos against the importation of peanuts and supportive legislation. In August 1930 the Queensland Government issued an Order-in-Council constituting a Peanut Marketing Board for 10 years to control all sales of peanuts produced in Queensland. Marketing problems were overcome finally with the passing in 1939 of The Peanut Industry Protection and Preservation Act by the Queensland government which ensured that the Board held control over the planting, grading, treatment and marketing of peanuts in Queensland through the health provisions of the Federal Constitution.
Continued expansion of the peanut industry necessitated the building of additional storage space at Kingaroy. By 1937 the crop was in excess of 4000 tons and the chairman of the Board estimated that in the following year it would be around 7000 tons. This was an enormous increase from Australia's peanut production in the early 1930s, which was 800 tons per year. In 1937 additional land bounding the Queensland Peanut Growers' Cooperative Association Ltd's original purchases was acquired. Plans for the proposed set of modern concrete and brick silos were drawn in September 1937. A meeting of the Board and growers in the following month approved their construction. The silos, estimated to cost approximately £50 000, were to be ready for the next peanut crop. The engineers were Thomas Robinson & Son Consulting Engineers, Sydney in association with Macdonald Wagner consulting Engineers Sydney and Brisbane. They were built by Kell and Rigby, which also constructed the Kingaroy Council Chambers, located opposite, at the same time. No 2 Silo consisted of 38 silo bins in total: 24 round bins each 20 feet (6.1m) diameter and 85 feet (25.91 m) high (to top of the cone) plus 14 star shape bins being 75 feet (22.86 m) high (to top of the cone). This silo was constructed and opened during 1938 at a cost of £57 750 of which £46 000 was advanced by the Commonwealth Bank under State Government guarantee.
The outbreak of war marked the beginning of a period of rapid development. The Commonwealth initially planned to commandeer the whole peanut crop for oil making purposes. However, as peanuts could be and were being imported in sufficient quantities for oil production, the Board challenged the acquisition order by recommending that Queensland peanuts be used mainly for edible purposes and only diverted to oil production should the need arise. This was accepted by the Commonwealth Government and from 1943 until the end of the war the crop was sold by the Board under the control of the National Security Regulations.
By 1947 peanut production had reached a new peak with 1116 growers planting 52 000 acres which produced 23 164 tons of peanuts valued at £1 048 965 14s 7d. This rapid expansion of the peanut industry in the 1940s again created storage problems. To solve this, two new silos were planned. The first of these (No. 3 Silo) was completed late in 1948 at cost of between £100 000 and £110 000 and with a capacity of 5200 tons. It was built on lot 138 (3 roods 26 and 6/10 perches), which had been created from a road closure, the Deed of Grant for which was issued to the Queensland Peanut Growers' Cooperative Association Ltd after it was acquired for £216 4s 8p on 6 August 1928.
The second block (No. 4 Silo) was completed by 1951 although its machinery was not installed until June that year. Its capacity was 2200 tons and its cost upon completion was approximately £54 000. The loan for the construction of both silos was guaranteed by the Queensland Government.
On 6 February 1951 fire destroyed No 1 Silo and the Dump, while No 2 Silo and No 4 Silo were damaged. No 2 Silo was repaired and the workhouse of No 4 Silo was repaired and re-equipped with treatment machinery. A bag shed and general purpose shed were later built on the site previously occupied by the Dump.
Between 1959 and 1980 Queensland produced almost the entire Australian peanut crop with the South Burnett producing just over half the State's production in 1979-80.
In 1992 major changes took place in the peanut industry. The marketing of peanuts in Queensland was de-regulated and the Peanut Marketing Board, which was a statutory marketing authority, was wound up on 27 May 1992. At that time the Board transferred all its assets, property and liabilities to the Queensland Peanut Growers' Co-operative Association Ltd. The Peanut Marketing Board became PMB Australia Ltd and later, in 1997, became the Peanut Company of Australia (PCA).
Since then, the PCA has remained the leading supplier of peanuts in Australia, engaged in researching, growing, storing, processing, value-adding and marketing the product.
The Kingaroy Peanut Silos have been a long-standing symbol, not just of South Burnett and Kingaroy but also of the Queensland peanut industry. Images of the silos have been promulgated since as early as 1938 and remain an easily recognised image in Queensland.
","criteria":"The Kingaroy Peanut Silos are important in illustrating the large-scale development of the peanut industry in Queensland. Since the 1920s the South Burnett district has been the headquarters of the Queensland peanut industry, a major agricultural industry for the State.
These silos were built in 1938, 1948 and 1951 and reflect the constant growth of the peanut industry in that period.
The Kingaroy Peanut Silos are a striking physical manifestation of the Peanut Company of Australia and its precursor organisations, with the headquarters of the company located in Kingaroy, since 1927. These organisations have controlled and developed the peanut industry in Queensland and Australia since its inception.
|The intactness, integrity and magnitude of the Kingaroy Peanut Silos, configured in cylindrical and star-shaped bins, and their proximity to the railway line make them an exceptional example of storage silos.
|Standing tall above the Kingaroy skyline these 42 metre high silos dominate the townscape and the landscape of the South Burnett as a landmark visible from great distances. Lit by the rising and setting sun they glow dramatically at dawn and dusk transforming their appearance from functional structure to monumental sculpture.
Their recognition as an aesthetic landmark for the region is evidenced by the use of artistic images of the silos for tourism promotional purposes.
The Kingaroy Peanut Silos are important for their symbolic quality and aesthetic contribution to the South Burnett landscape. The silos are a long-standing and an easily recognised symbol of Kingaroy and have value to the people of south-east Queensland as a distinctive symbol of Kingaroy, the headquarters of the Australian peanut industry.
","criteria_letters":"Criterion A | Criterion D | Criterion E","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"}, {"heritage_type":"State Heritage","site_id":27,"place_ref":602809,"name":"Kingaroy Butter Factory (former)","alternate_name":null,"street_address":"67 William Street","suburb":"KINGAROY","lga":"SOUTH BURNETT REGIONAL COUNCIL","register_entry_date":"2012-11-09","description":"The former Kingaroy Butter Factory complex stands at the northern end of William Street, Kingaroy north west of the CBD of Kingaroy and adjacent to the formation of the Kilkivan/Kingaroy railway line. The complex comprises the main butter factory shed, 1940s cheese factory, ice works shed, former office, amenities and cold stores shed, modern cheese making facility and a number of other sheds and structures.
An early engine (maker's plate LG Terne Engineers of Glasgow) stands near the front gate and the entrance forecourt accommodates carparking. The site works off a road running centrally through the complex with an ancillary road to the west side. The roads and carpark are bitumened and concrete drains and edges run along the spine road.
The significant structures are the Main butter factory shed, 1940s cheese factory (east and west sheds), ice works shed and former office, which are described individually below.
Main butter factory shed
The main building is a rectangular timber framed and chamferboard clad building with a slab on ground concrete floor throughout. The timber frame stands on a low concrete upstand that runs around the perimeter of the shed. A moulded timber cornice runs around the parapet that screens the sawtooth roofs behind. The sawtooth roofs are clad with corrugated metal sheeting and have south facing clerestory windows; most are glazed, some house fixed timber louvres or are clad with corrugated metal sheeting. An additional narrow rectangular raised gable roof with glazed windows to the east and west sits over part of the centre of the shed.
The south, east and west elevations are notable for full height pilasters marking out bays which to the southern part of the building are punctuated by smaller pilasters which terminated in a lower cornice that is now removed. The smaller pilasters define the loading dock openings - three to the west, five to the south and six to the east. A continuous concrete ledge projects around the southern third of the building below the dock openings. Eleven original large timber braced-and-ledged vertical sliding doors remain to these openings providing access to the dock within. Rainwater heads and downpipes run down these elevations.
The south elevation is distinguished by four sets of timber framed upper windows with glazed and fixed timber louvres to the upper face. The west elevation is punctuated by a number of openings including timber framed casement windows to the mezzanine office. Reflecting the receipt/despatch activities of the factory processing, the east elevation accommodates a number of hatch openings at various points along the length of the building. A number are now boarded over. Hooded exhaust vents protrude along the northern end of the elevation. The blank north elevation is clad with horizontal chamferboards and metal sheeting.
The building accommodates substantially intact functional spaces reflecting the various stages in the handling and processing of milk products including engine, plant and machinery rooms, testing rooms, chill rooms, cold stores, salt room, packing rooms, cream platform, churn room, main room, receiving and despatch docks and a mezzanine office.
Throughout the main building linings generally are vertical or horizontal tongue and groove boarding or fibrous cement sheeting with cover strips. The roof is generally framed with timber trusses supported on corbelled timber posts.
The southern end accommodates the receiving and despatch docks, main room, cream platform, churn room, chill and cold rooms, salt room, packing rooms, testing rooms and the office mezzanine. Concrete platforms, approximately 700mm above the level of the main room, run along the east, south and west sides and form the receiving and despatch docks. These docks service the former railway siding to the east and vehicle loading area to the south and west. The deck of the cream platform is formed by the concrete ceilings of the chill and cold stores, salt room, packing and other rooms below. A fibrous cement sheeted partition runs part the way down the west side and stout timber posts continue around the perimeter. The posts to the west side carry large metal brackets that supported the pulleys and belts once associated with the motors for the churns which stood on the floor below. The main room now accommodates machinery and equipment for the current oil pressing business. The chill/cold stores, salt room and packing rooms retain original features including hatches, doors and doorways, concrete upstands and floor drains.
The office mezzanine, supported by the structure of the storage spaces below, is timber framed and partly screened by partitions clad with vertical tongue and groove boards. The ceiling to the southern end is lined with fibrous cement sheeting ceilings and accommodates lattice ventilation screens to the cream platform.
The northern end, formerly accommodating engine, plant and machinery areas, has exposed roof framing (some unpainted) and horizontal unpainted chamferboard linings to the interior walls. Some spaces are lined with insulation panels, have new fittings and there is new concrete screed to some floors. Some floors show evidence of tracks and plant and machinery fixings.
1940s cheese factory
The 1940s cheese factory stands to the northern end of the site and is comprised of two sheds each clad with fibrous cement sheeting and sheltered by gabled roofs clad with corrugated metal sheeting. Three circular roof vents project from the west shed and two inverted tubular exhaust vents protrude from the east. The west shed and the southern third of the east shed have a painted perimeter concrete upstand, approximately 450mm high. Both sheds have fixed timber louvre vents to the north and south gable ends.
West cheese factory shed
Lettering, The Cheese Factory 1941-1946, is painted to the upper part of the south elevation of the west shed. A slab on ground concrete floor runs throughout with an elevated concrete dock to the south end. Sash windows punctuate the east, west and north sides and a horizontal sliding braced and ledged timber door opens from the south dock. Horizontal sliding metal doors open to the west and north. The interior has exposed painted timber roof trusses. The ceiling and upper walls are unlined and the lower walls are lined with fibrous cement sheeting with cover strips over the joins. A narrow band of wire mesh runs along the upper west and part of the east walls. Approximately mid-way along the east wall, a solid timber framed and lined door with a robust handle and latch provides access between the two sheds.
East cheese factory shed
This is the smaller of the two sheds, the southern third has a slab on ground floor and the rest of the shed stands on low timber stumps and is accessed by a recent ramp to the north side. The cavities in the walls are filled with sawdust for insulation. The east elevation is distinguished by three mid-height small square windows; and a low hooded hatch and a horizontal sliding metal door at the south end. The shed has a suspended timber floor and dark honey-coloured horizontal unpainted pine lining to the interior walls on which lighter shadows reveal the locations of vertical supports for the storage shelfing that once lined the room. A solid timber framed and lined door with a robust handle provides access to the south end of the shed. A concrete drain runs along the east side of the shed.
Ice works shed
Standing to the middle of the site, the former ice works shed is a small rectangular structure with a painted perimeter concrete upstand, timber framed walls clad with chamferboards and is sheltered by a gable roof clad with corrugated metal sheeting. A timber door and a set of timber framed casement windows are accommodated to the west elevation, there are doorways to the middle of the east and south elevations and the shed butts against the new cheese making facility to the north. The interior has a concrete tank to the west and an elevated concrete dock to the east side. Equipment and machinery associated with the ice works remains in the shed including the ice block moulds.
Former office
A small square timber framed building standing on low timber stumps, clad with timber weatherboards and fibrous cement sheeting and sheltered by a hipped tiled roof, the former office building stands to the south of the complex. Notable features include the front porch entrance and cantilevered timber framed window hoods.
","history":"The Kingaroy Butter Factory, a large timber clad building located in William Street, Kingaroy was built by contractors Waugh and Josephson in 1926, replacing an earlier factory established in 1907, on behalf of the Maryborough Co-operative Dairy Company.
From the late 1800s, a number of critical factors enabled the expansion of the dairy industry into one of Queensland's principal primary industries by the interwar period. These included: government resumption and repurchase of land from pastoralists for the purpose of agricultural selection; the introduction of mechanical cream separators in the 1880s; Babcock testing to accurately measure cream content in milk; The Meat and Dairy Encouragement Act 1893 which made provision for government loans to construct butter and cheese factories; and the Department of Agriculture and Stock's use of a ‘Travelling Dairy' to demonstrate techniques and equipment to potential dairy farmers throughout Queensland. This period also saw the introduction of sown pastures such as paspalum and Rhodes grass and the cultivation of fodder, to improve milk yields and to provide adequate feed during the less productive months of winter.
Effective transport infrastructure was essential for dairy products to reach their desired markets. The extension of Queensland's rural railway network enabled more efficient transportation of dairy produce, facilitating the establishment of local butter and cheese factories in close proximity to railway lines. The first shipment of butter to Britain occurred in 1895 and from 1903 government subsidisation of a fortnightly shipping service to the United Kingdom improved Queensland's butter exporting capabilities.
The arrival of the Kilkivan branch railway to the ‘56 mile peg' in 1904 was the impetus for the establishment of the township of Kingaroy and a catalyst for the rapid expansion of dairying in the surrounding district, then an emerging but relatively small scale industry in the South Burnett. Within two years of opening, Kingaroy Station was sending 10 tons of cream weekly to Maryborough, while some farmers were also sending cream to Nanango.
By the early 1900s, co-operatives, where groups of local producers banded together to establish factories, were becoming the dominant form of ownership of cheese and butter factories, a pattern that defined the Queensland dairy industry for much of the 20th century. The Maryborough Co-operative Dairy Company (MCDC) was producing butter and ice at its Maryborough factory from February 1901, with the decision to form a co-operative made in 1898. During 1905, a group of local Kingaroy dairy farmers met with directors of the MCDC and lobbied for the establishment of a branch factory at Kingaroy. The directors of the company entered into agreement to build a factory in early 1906, with 1525 shares in the company allocated to dairy farmers and other shareholders from the Kingaroy district. Company representatives selected a site in June of that year along the railway line on the northern outskirts of Kingaroy. The owner of the property, Tom Reen, donated one acre for the factory site, with the company purchasing another nineteen acres at £10 per acre. By October construction had begun on the building, a railway siding and a 12,000 gallon well, with the factory producing butter by March 1907.
The Kingaroy Butter Factory soon became an essential component of MCDC's operations, reflecting the suitability and productivity of the South Burnett district for dairying. The 1913 half yearly report of the MCDC noted 465,887 lbs (211,766.8 kg) of butter had been produced at Kingaroy in the first half of the year, almost twice as much as at Maryborough and nearly 100,000 lbs more than at Biggenden (built by the MCDC in 1911). The MCDC also opened factories in Mundubbera (1916) and Wondai (1931). Throughout its history, the Kingaroy Butter Factory was the largest producer of the MCDC's five factories. By 1929, the Wide Bay district, in which the South Burnett was included, was second only to the Moreton district in Queensland milk production.
In May 1925 the directors of the MCDC visited Kingaroy to announce plans to construct a new factory building with modern machinery. At an estimated cost of £18,000-£20,000, sourced from butter profits, local shareholders expressed their dissatisfaction with this arrangement, as the decision had been made without their consultation. The company directors argued that the new factory would increase productivity and increase returns to suppliers. While some shareholders voiced intentions of separating from the company prior to, and following the announcement of the new factory, this ultimately did not occur and the building proceeded.
The building was constructed by Brisbane contractors Waugh and Josephson, with the final cost of £47,000 more than doubling the original estimate. The construction of the building was not put out to tender and a later inquiry into secret commissions in the dairy industry implicated former Maryborough Co-operative Dairy Company Director WA Shultz in receiving payments from Waugh and Josephson for the award of the contract.
The new factory was officially opened 7 October 1926 by William Forgan Smith, Minister for Agriculture and Stock. The factory was opened for inspection and a marquee was erected on the factory grounds, with a large crowd in attendance.
The building of the new Kingaroy factory occurred during a period of modernisation for butter manufacturers. By the end of the 1920s, most Queensland butter factories had been remodelled or were new buildings of brick and concrete, replacing earlier timber structures. The emphasis on producing high grade butter saw the need for more churns within factories to maintain outputs, as the lower temperatures required meant churns were turning longer than previously. In addition to upgrading buildings and equipment, greater attention was paid to ensuring butter was of a high standard, through stricter grading and by employing processes of pasteurisation and neutralisation. Increasing numbers of trained staff were working in factories.
The manufacture of butter followed a fairly typical process at factories throughout Queensland. Once cream cans were received at a loading dock and weighed, the cream was tested to determine its grading (choice, 2nd or 3rd), before the cans were emptied into vats and cleaned for return to the supplier. The cream was then pasteurised, cooled and pumped to storage vats, before being sent to the churns. The resulting butter was refrigerated, parcelled into butter boxes and forwarded by rail for export or distribution into local markets.
In order to preserve butter during storage and transportation, the production of ice was a necessary component of operations. This process occurred at Kingaroy in a small timber building adjacent to the main building. In addition to the factory's needs, ice was also sold for other commercial and domestic uses.
In the years following the construction of the new factory, butter production increased markedly, from 50 tons per week during 1926-1927, to 98 tons per week during 1928-1929. The factory reached its peak weekly production of 99 tons and 12cwt during 1929-1930, then a record for Queensland butter production. In 1931, it was Queensland's largest butter factory in terms of production, a time when close to 1000 suppliers were selling cream to the factory. In 1932-33, Kingaroy exported a higher average grade of butter than any other Queensland factory. Throughout the 1930s, the factory won numerous awards in Australia and England for the quality of its butter. During 1938-9, a record year, almost a third of all Queensland's butter was produced in the Wide Bay-Burnett, with Kingaroy the fifth largest producer in the state.
In the 1930s Kingaroy Shire had a burgeoning peanut industry and was a well established centre for maize production, but it was dairying that was the principal primary industry. As a measure of the industry's growth, the payment to Kingaroy factory suppliers in its first full financial year was £5723. By 1934 this had grown to £157,785. At the end of 1933, cream suppliers to the factory were being paid eight pence per pound for first grade cream, seven pence for second grade.
The interwar period saw the dairy industry expand greatly in Queensland. Between 1927 and 1937 the total number of dairy cattle rose by 50%. By the 1930s, dairying was Queensland's most widely spread agricultural industry and the state's second most profitable export industry from 1936 to 1941, accounting for 20% of primary production. By the late 1930s, around one in eight Queenslanders were living on dairy farms. In 1938 there were five co-operative butter factories in the South Burnett: located at Nanango, Kingaroy, Murgon, Wondai and Proston. While butter factories enabled the production and export of dairy products, numerous small farms reliant on family labour to milk herds twice daily for generally modest returns, were the backbone of the industry.
During World War II, butter factories throughout Queensland were engaged in the production of cheese. The Kingaroy, Nanango and Murgon factories all produced cheese during this period. Varying sources give the commencement date for production of cheese at Kingaroy as 1941 or 1942, ending in 1946. Between March 1942 and November 1944, 1.135 million pounds of cheese was produced. An annexe was built to the rear of the main building, containing two rooms; the larger for production and the lesser for maturation and storage, with walls lined with hoop pine timber, infilled with sawdust for temperature control. After cheese production ceased the annexe was used to produce buttermilk powder.
By 1950 the farms of the South Burnett were stocked with 130,000 dairy cows, ten percent of the Queensland total. The Kingaroy Butter Factory maintained an average production of 75 tons of butter per week until the early 1950s. Factory improvements in this period included the purchase of a new butter wrapping machine for £2000 in 1950, and the installation of stainless steel equipment for treating cream in 1956. Such improvements, however, were not enough to protect the factory from the beginnings of a wider decline of Queensland's dairy industry, as demand and prices for butter began to drop. The downturn worsened in the 1960s, with a reduction in cream suppliers diminishing output. The transition towards the production of milk rather than cream, requiring larger herds and new equipment, saw many smaller scale farmers leaving the industry. In Kingaroy Shire cream suppliers fell dramatically, from 265 in 1965 to 155 in 1969. Correspondingly, between 1960 and 1968 the number of dairy cows in the Shire fell from 23,885 to 12,225. Export opportunities also became restricted, culminating with the end of preferential trade agreements with Britain following its entry into the European Common Market in 1973.
The late 1960s saw the beginning of closures of butter factories in the Burnett region. The Proston Butter Factory, a branch of the South Burnett Dairy Co., closed in 1967. The Maryborough Co-operative Dairy Company closed their branch factories at Wondai and Biggenden in February 1969. By 1976 dairy farmers in the South Burnett numbered under 400 and of these, 211 were bulk milk suppliers. The average age of a dairyman was 55 and two dairy producers were leaving the industry per week.
While Kingaroy's supply benefited in the short term from Wondai's closure, ultimately it was not enough to sustain the business. In May 1977 it was announced that both Nanango and the Kingaroy butter factories would close and that all cream supplies would be diverted to Murgon. With a large number of suppliers leaving the industry, and manufacturing and other costs dramatically increasing, it was no longer economically viable for the factories to stay open. By the time of Kingaroy Butter Factory's closure, there were only 38 suppliers and only one and a half tonnes of butter produced a week, a far cry from its interwar heyday.
For a time after closing, the factory operated as a milk collection point for the Maryborough Co-operative Dairy Association. In 1989 the market milk operations and the factory was sold to Suncoast Milk, a subsidiary of Queensland United Foods. For a period during the 1980s a rear section of the building leased by Kidd's Cabinet Makers. From November 1986, Graham Helmhold began leasing the front of the building for the operations of his company Proteco, one of Australia's major cold pressed oil processors. Proteco purchased the property in 1995. This business has since changed ownership. From 2002-2009, dairy processing returned to the site, with Kingaroy Cheese using part of the main building for cheese making. This business was taken over by Kenilworth Country Foods. Also on site is a peanut roasting operation. The former detached office (c1950) functions as a sales outlet for South Burnett produce.
","criteria":"The former Kingaroy Butter Factory (1926) is important in demonstrating the growth of the dairy industry in the Wide Bay-Burnett, one of Queensland's most important dairy producing regions during the twentieth century. Replacing an earlier factory built in 1907, the Kingaroy Butter factory was among Queensland's largest and most awarded butter producers during the dairying boom of the interwar period.
The former Kingaroy Butter Factory illustrates the evolution of Queensland's dairy industry during the interwar period, when most butter factories were remodelled or rebuilt in response to a rapid expansion of cream production and the need to adopt modern manufacturing processes.
The cheese making annexe (1941) is important in demonstrating the accelerated programme of cheese production that occurred in Queensland during World War II.
|The former Kingaroy Butter Factory complex is important in demonstrating the principal characteristics and processes of a butter factory, a significant type of industrial activity in Queensland's history. The place is situated adjacent to a railway line, formerly served by a siding to enable transportation of its products. The intact internal arrangement of the main factory building incorporates a loading dock, storage platform, testing, churn, cold storage and packing areas, original mezzanine office and the provision of rear space for the factory's plant. Adjacent associated buildings, including the cheese annexe (1941), office (c1950) and ice manufacturing shed, illustrate activities interconnected with the production of butter on the site.
","criteria_letters":"Criterion A | Criterion D","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"}, {"heritage_type":"State Heritage","site_id":3969,"place_ref":602763,"name":"St Michael and All Angels Church","alternate_name":"St Michael and All Angels Anglican Church","street_address":"2-6 Alford Street","suburb":"KINGAROY","lga":"SOUTH BURNETT REGIONAL COUNCIL","register_entry_date":"2010-09-17","description":"St Michael and All Angels Church, Kingaroy is a very intact example of an early twentieth century timber-framed church and is positioned on a largely flat site to the east of Kingaroy's main retail street. Its grounds are triangular in shape and are bound to the east by the former Kingaroy-Nanango railway easement and by Alford Street to the south. The church is oriented along an east-west axis with the entry porch to the west. The towering silos of the Peanut Company of Australia stand to the north of the church grounds and form a dominant backdrop to the place.
The church building is laid out in a typical cruciform plan with a central nave formed by a long, steeply gabled roof. This main roof is dissected by another gabled roof slightly lower in height which forms the north and south transepts. The northern transept contains a side-chapel and southern transept contains a vestry. Aisles are formed to the north and south of the nave by lower lean-to roofs running along its length. A gabled entry porch with hipped returns provides a protective covered entrance to the church from the west.
The roofs to the church are clad with recent terracotta roof tiles and external walls are clad with weatherboards. It is supported on a mixture of timber and concrete stumps approximately one metre from the ground. Gutters are formed in metal with a quad-profile and drain to recent square profile downpipes.
The main elevation (facing west) of the church is symmetrical in form with the entry porch projecting out from the main gabled structure. A timber-framed bellcote crowns the ridge of the main roof above the entry porch and is clad to match the main roof. Bracing fixed between the roofs' bargeboards form decorative ends to each of the projecting gable roofs. The entry porch is accessed via steps from the south and by a recent timber-framed ramp from the north. Decorative post brackets form arched openings on the porch which is enclosed to handrail height with weatherboards.
Windows with frames decorated at the top to make an arch and filled with leadlighting illuminate the length of the nave. Stained glass windows are positioned in the side chapel and chancel walls. The shapes of the arches formed by carved frames in windows throughout vary depending on the width of the opening. Clerestory coloured leadlight windows are located on the northern and southern walls above the chancel. Crosses are fixed to the top of the bellcote and to each apex of the gabled roofs. Timber-framed steps lead from the southern side of the building to the vestry and on the northern side to the side-chapel. A pair of simple, ledged, double doors provide access into the church from the double entry porch via the ramp and stairs. The interior timberwork is unpainted.
The building's exposed timber framing dominates the interior of the building. Scissor-braces fixed to pairs of rafters supporting the roof cross the width of the nave and the north and south transepts. Metal tie-rods are located at regular intervals in the ceiling space which is lined with unpainted v-jointed boards. The aisles are divided from the nave by a colonnade of timber arches supporting the main roof formed from timber posts and decorative timber brackets. The chancel is separated from the nave and crossing by a timber framed chancel arch with a variation of a rood screen formed in timber supporting a wooden crucifix. All timberwork is unpainted.
The chancel is slightly raised and contains the altar which is formed from carved English oak. Early inset panels of paintings of angels have been relocated behind the altar to the eastern wall where dark timber panelled wall linings with lightly coloured cover strips are located. Intricately detailed candlesticks and an altar cross rest on the altar and timber communion or altar rails are located in front of it.
A baptistery is located to the west of the side chapel with an intricately carved marble font. An early pulpit (located to the north of the chancel) and early pews positioned in the nave and the crossing are made from red beanwood. Organ pipes are located near the southern transept facing towards the nave. A timber hymnal board is fixed to the wall at the western end of the nave near the entry. The floor is carpeted.
Garden beds planted with roses lie to the west of the church where a large, timber cross has been positioned. A spray of trees follows the boundary of the site creating a barrier to the railway siding. A simple timber framed entry arch is located on the Alford Street boundary where a recent concrete path leading from the street to the entry porch and vestry has been constructed.
","history":"St Michael and All Angels Anglican Church, located in Alford Street, is an elegant timber building designed by architect Colin Deighton and erected between December 1910 and 1911. Its intact timber interior exhibits superior craftsmanship. The land on which the church is sited was donated by Arthur Youngman of Taabinga [QHR 600647] who also contributed to the church's building fund.
Settlement in the Kingaroy area commenced in the 1840s when Taabinga and Burrandowan [QHR 600648] stations were taken up, and was followed by agricultural land selection from the 1880s. Selectors grew maize and raised pigs, which were sold at Kilkivan - the nearest railhead - for many years. With the approach of the rail line from Kilkivan, transportation of produce to markets became more feasible and the struggling agricultural settlements of the South Burnett became viable.
The town of Kingaroy owes its establishment to the arrival of the Kilkivan branch railway in 1904. In 1898 the only resident in the vicinity of Kingaroy was Daniel Carroll who had selected a 160 acre block abutting the 3430 acre Kingaroy Paddock selection in 1891 and built a hut and yard for his horses. By 1900 he had built a cottage and had selected further blocks of land adjoining his original portion. In 1902 a provisional school opened in Kingaroy with about twenty pupils. Once the Kilkivan branch railway reached the 56 mile peg near the corner of the Kingaroy Paddock in 1904, the railway terminus was the impetus for the establishment of Kingaroy township. Both Carroll and Arthur Youngman, owner of the Kingaroy Paddock, sold town blocks at public auction during 1904. When the first train arrived, there were only three buildings - Carroll's new hotel, the Carrollee, FC Petersen's store and Carroll Cottage [QHR 601901]. After the railway arrived Kingaroy quickly developed as a service centre with the establishment of commercial premises such as shops and hotels. These were soon followed by public buildings, churches and schools. The seven years during which Kingaroy was the railhead were enough for it to establish a lasting dominance over neighbouring townships.
During the first four decades of the 20th century the South Burnett was a rapidly developing agricultural area in the Wide Bay district. The railway facilitated the clearing of the land for agriculture and timber became the major industry for some years with teams hauling logs to the Kingaroy railway yards. From circa 1910 the Wide Bay region's maize production was the second highest in the state, following the Darling Downs. It was the fourth largest wheat producing area and the fourth largest cotton producer in the state. During the 1920s the embryonic peanut industry became headquartered at Kingaroy. In 1929 the Wide Bay district's milk production was the second highest in the state after the Moreton district. By 1938 dairying in the Burnett district was burgeoning, having the second largest number of dairy herds and of dairy cows in Queensland after Moreton district. By 1941 Kingaroy was the largest town in the South Burnett region.
Initially, Anglican services and Sunday School in Kingaroy were conducted by Reverend PS Wigram of Nanango parish in a hut that stood on the site now occupied by Carroll's buildings in Haly Street. However, with the rapid growth of the Kingaroy congregation a church became essential. Circa 1910 the congregation was offered two pieces of land for this purpose; one by Dan Carroll and the other by Arthur Youngman of Taabinga, who also was willing to make a donation to the building fund. Youngman's offer was accepted and a Diocesan grant was obtained for the Church's construction. Architect Colin Deighton, who was assistant to JH Buckeridge, the Anglican Diocese of Brisbane Architect between 1887 and 1901, designed the church. Deighton designed a number of country churches and St Colomb's Anglican Church at Clayfield in Brisbane.
The foundation stone of St Michael and All Angels Church was laid on 10 November 1910 by the Venerable RR Rivers, Archdeacon of Toowoomba. Construction of the building, which was to seat 250 worshippers, began in December 1910 and was completed in 1911. Its cost, including furniture, was almost £2000. The church was dedicated by Archbishop Dr Donaldson in 1912 at a service attended by members of the whole community which regarded its opening as a great event for the growing township. In 1912 the Brisbane Diocese newsletter, The Church Chronicle, stated that St Michael and All Angels Church was 'a really beautiful Church - one of the best wooden buildings in the Diocese'.
The church was built in a cruciform plan with few internal wall planes, an arched ceiling space formed by an exposed scissor-braced roof frame and a tall nave and arched windows giving the illusion of verticality.
The timber interior of St Michael and all Angels Church is believed to have been milled at Taabinga. The red beanwood pulpit and pews were made from timber from the Atherton Tableland. The vicar, the Rev PS Wigram, who was a member of a wealthy English family, received gifts for the church. These included a carved English oak altar with inset panels of the angels painted by members of his family; an altar cross and candlesticks from Venice; and the chalice and paten, which were gifts from his godparents. A picture of St Peter, painted by a German artist, was presented by another English friend of the rector.
Some time after 1912 the Nanango parish was divided into three - Nanango, Kingaroy and Wondai - each served by its own priest. A house for the rector (pre-1935) and later a hall were constructed on the site to fulfil the needs of the growing congregation. A wheelchair access ramp has been added to the northern side of the entry porch. On 14 November 1993 the church was consecrated by Bishop Clyde Wood.
The development of a peanut storage and processing plant by the Peanut Board and Peanut Growers' Cooperative Association on adjacent land began in 1927.
The success of the Kingaroy-based peanut industry has resulted in a large industrial site becoming the backdrop to the church. This juxtaposition highlights the aesthetically pleasing nature of St Michael and All Angels Anglican Church.
The church has served the Anglican community in the Parish of Kingaroy since its establishment in 1910.
The church has served the Anglican community in the Parish of Kingaroy since its establishment in 1910.
","criteria":"St Michael and All Angels Anglican Church illustrates the growth and prosperity of the township, which resulted from the extension of the railway line to Kingaroy in 1904. Kingaroy's role as the terminus of the rail line for the subsequent seven years consolidated its position as the major town of the South Burnett region, which evolved into one of Queensland's major agricultural districts during the first decades of the 20th century.
The construction of St Michael and All Angels Anglican Church between 1910 and 1911, to serve the spiritual needs of Kingaroy's rapidly expanding population, is associated with this period of significant growth in the district.
|St Michael and All Angels Church has considerable aesthetic value being a well composed building in a cruciform plan. The Church is significant for its high degree of creative achievement in its interior craftsmanship. The highly intact, unpainted timberwork of the roof framing, walls and ceiling linings displays great artistic value. The church contains many finely crafted elements including an exposed roof frame which dominates the interior, ornate timber colonnades, rood screen, chancel arch, carved English oak altar, pulpit, bishop's chair, pews, panels of the angels and crucifix. Elaborately decorated candlesticks, chalice and paten and a painting of St Peter are also housed in the church.
Its steeply pitched roof crested with an ornate bellcote makes a strong impact in the streetscape.
|St Michael and All Angels Anglican Church is an excellent example of a timber-framed church, which at the time of construction was considered one of the best timber buildings in the Brisbane Diocese. Highly intact, it demonstrates the principal characteristics of an early 20th century Anglican church utilising a Latin cross plan with the northern transept accommodating a chapel, the southern transept a vestry and the western end an entry porch.
","criteria_letters":"Criterion A | Criterion E | Criterion D","criteria_definitions":"The place is important in demonstrating the evolution or pattern of Queensland's history | The place is important because of its aesthetic significance | The place is important in demonstrating the principal characteristics of a particular class of cultural places"}, {"heritage_type":"State Heritage","site_id":4178,"place_ref":602812,"name":"Murgon Civic Centre","alternate_name":"Murgon Public Hall","street_address":"62-70 Lamb Street","suburb":"MURGON","lga":"SOUTH BURNETT REGIONAL COUNCIL","register_entry_date":"2012-11-09","description":"The Murgon Civic Centre is located on the corner of Murgon's main intersection and comprises a public hall, former library (now offices) and four shops. A central clock tower gives the building prominence in the streetscape and acts as a pivotal point with shops extending from it to south-west along Lamb Street and with the public hall and library extending from it along Gore Street to the north-west. The Murgon Civic Centre is a stately building with a strong presence in Murgon, forming part of the Murgon shopping precinct, and at the rear is bordered by the railway lines to Kilkivan and Proston.
The Civic Centre has Art Deco design features including a streamlined appearance, horizontal and vertical banding, simple geometric decoration and three-dimensional massing which emphasise important elements such as entrance ways. The street-facing elevations have stepped parapets and are finished in roughcast cement render with decorative elements accentuated with contrasting paint colours.
Public Hall
The public hall is a double height space with a rectangular footprint. It comprises an auditorium, mezzanine and supper room. The main elevation is symmetrical and links to the former library via a low screen wall. It is constructed with a masonry frame and is finished with a roughcast cement render. A stepped parapet with geometric banding partly conceals a gabled roof which covers the auditorium space and is clad in painted corrugated metal sheeting.
Each end of the main elevation is emphasised with a projecting tower. The northern-most tower accommodates the auditorium entrance which has recessed double doors sheltered by a cantilevered masonry awning with decorative edging. The entrance porch is accessed via a short flight of stairs framed by wide columns with decorative horizontal banding. Plaques commemorating the opening of the building have been fixed to the columns below a chevron motif. Vertical banding rises above the awning to stylised lettering forming the words ‘PUBLIC HALL'. The northern-most tower reads as another entrance mirroring the form of the southern end but is in-filled with a multi-paned window above a solid base decorated with a three-dimensional chevron motif. Vertical banding rises above a second-level angled metal-framed window. The parapet of each tower is decorated with parallel sweeping curves.
Tall masonry buttresses formed by the building's concrete frame punctuate the elevation between the towers and frame tall metal-framed windows with truncated tops. Transoms decorated with horizontal banding divide each of the window bays. Two secondary entrances are sheltered by smaller cantilevered awnings. The hall is set on a solid masonry plinth and is separated from the footpath by a low garden bed. Metal rain-heads drain from gutters concealed behind the parapet.
A supper room is located at the rear of the building and is a long lean-to structure attached to the auditorium. It has a corrugated metal roof and is clad with weatherboards. It is punctuated with simple timber-framed casement windows. Gable ends of the main building are clad in fibrous cement sheeting. Recent single level change rooms, a loading dock and a small kitchen extension have been added to the library end of the building. These are not considered to be of cultural heritage significance.
Internally the building comprises a foyer space with a mezzanine level above (seating 100 people), an auditorium (seating 300 people) and a stage located at the library end. The auditorium is a wide space with a flat, recently installed, acoustic panelled ceiling with recessed lighting. Walls, finished with hardset plaster, are punctuated by the street-facing windows. These are mirrored on the opposite wall, which separates the auditorium from the supper room, by openings filled with timber screening forming a chevron pattern. The stage is simply detailed and lined with fibrous cement sheeting and accessed via double steel-framed steps. The mezzanine level is accessed via simple timber-framed, enclosed-riser stairs. It has little decoration and is furnished with early fixed seating. The foyer space is simply detailed with a flat ceiling lined with fibrous cement joined with timber cover strips. It contains a small box office and double doors provide access into the auditorium.
The supper room is a lofty space with exposed roof framing consisting of triangular timber trusses supported on the auditorium's concrete frame and bracketed off the external wall. Walls and raked ceilings are lined with fibrous cement sheeting joined with timber cover strips.
Floors throughout the public hall are lined with clear-finished hardwood tongue and grove boards.
Former Library
The former Library building is a timber-framed building of a more domestic scale with a stepped parapet masonry facade. It is low-set with a hipped roof clad with painted corrugated metal sheeting. The roof is partly concealed by the parapet wall which is finished with rough-cast cement render. The parapet is simply decorated with horizontal banding. A curved cantilevered street awning supported on a steel frame shelters a centrally-placed entrance door with timber-framed casements on either side. A curved garden bed separates the building from the footpath. Other elevations are plain with walls clad in fibrous cement sheeting.
Internally the building comprises several office spaces. Walls and ceilings are lined with fibrous cement sheeting joined with cover strips and floors are lined with carpet. Internal doors are panelled timber. Cornices and picture rails are simply detailed and formed from timber.
Shops
Four shops run along Lamb Street with the clock tower located above the corner shop. The shops are timber framed with masonry external walls which form a parapet to the roof behind. A recent curved street awning supported on steel posts has been installed. The roof slopes away from the street to the north-east and is clad with corrugated metal sheeting. The clock tower mirrors the design of the public hall entrance projections with vertical banding rising to the clock face. The clock face is square and is flush with the facade.
The two central shops retain some original shopfront glazing. Central, recessed timber-panelled shop doors with multi-paned glass remain to these shops. They are framed by sheet glass shop windows with multi-paned horizontal glazing above. Internally ceilings and walls are unchanged and lined with fibrous cement sheeting joined with timber cover strips. Floors are lined with vinyl sheeting.
The corner shop is covered with advertising or in-filled with sheeting and access into the shop is via a metal roller-door. Sheet glass remains either side of the entrance. The fourth shop space has been substantially altered in accordance with the needs of a modern banking facility and an ATM has been installed into the front wall. Early awning windows punctuate the south-east elevation.
On Gore Street a large conifer shields the building (not considered to be of cultural heritage significance) and a low concrete-formed garden bed filled with flowering shrubs separates the public hall and the library building from the footpath. A loading dock and bitumened service road accesses the complex adjacent to the library building and leads to a bitumened carpark at the rear of the supper hall.
The building overlooks the Royal Hotel on the opposite side of Gore Street and the Murgon War Memorial to the south.
","history":"The Murgon Civic Centre, located on the corner of Murgon's principal intersection, Lamb and Gore Streets, was built in 1938 - a period of civic pride expressed in the building of town halls and council chambers throughout Queensland - to serve this important South Burnett town. Designed by Brisbane architect Clifford Ernest Plant, the Murgon Civic Centre was constructed by Maryborough builder HG Neilsen. Comprising a hall, former library, four shops and a corner clock tower, this Art Deco complex makes a major contribution to the streetscape of Murgon.
The town of Murgon grew around the location of an unattended siding on the railway line from Kilkivan, which opened on 14 September 1903. The railway was the crucial causal factor in the vast influx of selectors who took up land excised from Barambah Station in 1902 and again in 1913 and provided the stimulus for the development of Murgon as a service centre. The railway facilitated selectors sending their produce - maize and pumpkins, pigs, cattle and dairy products - to markets.
Within the first decade of the town's existence two hotels opened, various stores operated, a combined newsagent, tobacconist and barber's shop opened, a Methodist Church was completed and Murphy's Hall was hosting meetings of the Salvation Army and other religious groups. Murgon's butter factory opened in 1913.
Further stimuli to Murgon's development were the creation of the Shire of Murgon and the construction of two branch lines from Murgon to Proston and to Windera. The new shire was formed from parts of Weinholt and Kilkivan Shires on 16 January 1914, with Murgon as its administrative centre. The Murgon Shire Chambers were located in Macalister Street by 1919. The two branch rail lines were completed in February 1923 and in March 1925 respectively, making Murgon an important railway junction.
By the mid- to late-1930s Murgon was rapidly expanding as a service centre for its surrounding agricultural community. The Shire of Murgon, covered 271 square miles and had a total population of 4000. Major improvements to the town of Murgon during the decade from 1928 to 1938 amounted to £255,000. In 1938 dairying in the Burnett district was burgeoning, having the second largest number of dairy herds and of dairy cows in Queensland after Moreton district. By 1941 Murgon was the second largest centre in the South Burnett with a population of 1091; after Kingaroy, the largest town with 2300 persons.
By 1938 plans for the construction of a civic centre at a cost of £10,500 were underway. Tenders were called by the architect, CE Plant, in September 1937 and closed in January 1938. HG Neilsen's tender was accepted. Building took place during 1938 and the Murgon Town Hall was officially opened on 16 December 1938 by the Minister for Agriculture, FW Bulcock. The opening was celebrated with a ball and supper to which all residents of the shire were invited. The building incorporated a main auditorium, library, reading room, and Returned Soldiers' League room along Gore Street, a corner clock tower, and five shops facing Lamb Street. Part of the building was situated on the site of the original School of Arts building and several shops. These were removed to the show grounds and redeveloped under the supervision of CE Plant. The new town hall took over many of the functions of the old School of Arts.
Town halls of varying design and dimension are landmarks of Australia's cities and suburbs, shires and towns. They have been important as social venues and focal points for their communities and also for the administration of local government. However, it is from an architectural viewpoint that they are probably best remembered.
Numerous town halls were constructed across Australia during the second half of the 1930s as an expression of civic pride when the economy was once again on a more secure foundation after the Great Depression. During the late 1930s many Queensland country towns were engaged in erecting or remodelling civic buildings. More than 20 centres built new shire and council buildings while shire halls at Wambo, Boulia, Woongarra, Gympie, Cunnamulla and Aramac were remodelled. Within the last two years of the 1930s, more than £177,000 was spent on new shire and council halls and nearly £20,000 was outlaid on alterations to existing buildings. This building programme was encouraged by the Queensland Government through subsidies to councils.
In Queensland the design of these town halls spanned the spectrum from strict axial classicism (Childers) to Goondiwindi Civic Centre's highly personal and rich Art Deco-inspired style [QHR 600531]. Typical was the vertically or striated masonry façade, found for example in the Johnstone Shire Hall at Innisfail [QHR 601579] (1938) and in the Rockhampton Town Hall [QHR 601572] (1941); both of which were substantial buildings serving prosperous centres of primary industry. According to architect Ian Sinnamon, author of Putting on a brave front: Queensland between the wars, the Murgon Civic Centre, though more humble in size and resources, is a virtuoso piece of its kind. It and the Johnstone Shire Hall are the only known 1930s Art Deco reinforced concrete municipal buildings of this style and scale in Queensland.
The Murgon Civic Centre is one of the interwar shire chambers and town halls that are fine examples of the influence of modern architectural styles in Queensland townscapes. Incorporating elements of the jazz-influenced Art Deco and the machine-age vision of the Moderne, these buildings were built as expressions of confidence in a bright and modern future. Stylistic elements of Art Deco and the Moderne include decorative treatments like geometrical motifs, decorative vertical banding and a streamlining of the building form. These features are evident in many prominent civic buildings throughout the State including the Kingaroy Shire Chambers, Goondiwindi Civic Centre [QHR 600531], Southport Town Hall [QHR 601649] and Gayndah Shire Hall [QHR 602124].
Architect CE Plant, designed a number of public buildings in south-east Queensland during the 1930s. These include the Kings Beach Bathing Pavilion, Caloundra [QHR 601513], Dalby Swimming Pool Complex [QHR 602564], five bathing pavilions on the Redcliffe peninsula and the Sandgate Bathing Pavilion (demolished). Born in Cheadle, England in 1885 Plant was articled as a pupil and then architect's assistant in England from 1902. He was employed by the Queensland Government in the Department of Railways as a draftsman 1911-14; was employed as an instructor by the Central Technical College; served during World War I (1915-20) before returning to the Central Technical College and working for the Department of Railways during the 1920s. Plant became registered as an architect in Queensland from 1929. His architectural practice however, dated from October 1926 and in the following year he designed premises in Adelaide Street, Brisbane for auctioneers Blocksidge and Ferguson. He produced many residences in Brisbane during the 1920s and 1930s, some influenced by the Spanish Mission style, while other works explored contemporary architectural styles such as the Moderne and neo-Georgian.
The exterior of the Murgon Civic Centre is quite intact, although some alterations have been made and the complex has been repainted.
The Library building has had a number of functions since 1938. It housed some high school classes before the Murgon High School was built in 1945 and acted as temporary shire council offices circa 1952 to 1964 until the Shire Council Offices were erected diagonally opposite on Gore Street in the early 1960s. After the building's completion the library transferred there from the Murgon Civic Centre. Currently, the former library is used as office space. Its asbestos roof was replaced with corrugated metal sheeting after 1995.
The town hall continues to be used for its original purpose. Internal alterations to the hall were made in 1972 by Stuart Reed and Associates. Air conditioning, sound proofing and new electrical systems have been added. New changing rooms and a new loading dock were added to the northern end. On either side of the stage, new walls and new openings were added and partitions were removed, altering access to the wings. The kitchen has been refitted.
Of the five shops, only the two occupied by the Commonwealth Bank have been substantially altered internally. The shops' original flat awning with signage along the street frontage has been replaced with a convex sheet metal awning.
","criteria":"Murgon Civic Centre (1938) is the result of the growth of Murgon as a major service town in the South Burnett region in the inter-war period. It is important in demonstrating the development of agricultural settlements and establishment of their service towns in rural Queensland up to World War II through the Queensland government's policy of closer settlement of the land facilitated by branch railway lines.
The Murgon Civic Centre is also important in demonstrating the widespread pattern in Queensland of expressing civic pride through building council chambers and town halls during the 1930s. While some were Depression-era relief projects, others, such as Murgon Civic Centre, were built in the latter part of the decade, when economic conditions had improved and expectations for a prosperous future were high.
|The Murgon Civic Centre is important for its contribution to the townscape of Murgon. Situated at the principal intersection the clock tower is designed to address the corner and ensure the complex's prominence in the streetscape. The Art Deco influences - linear form, stepped skylines, chevron motifs and decorative horizontal banding - enhance the aesthetic appeal of the complex.
|The Murgon Civic Centre is a good, representative and intact example of a regional Art Deco and Moderne-inspired civic centre. It is one of a group of fine town and shire halls built throughout Queensland in the 1930s in response to improved economic times post-Depression.
The Murgon complex displays the principal features of these civic buildings, combining a public hall, library (now offices) shops and a clock tower. Like other town hall complexes, it is the focal point of the community and is located near the centre of the town on the corner of Murgon's principal streets.
","criteria_letters":"Criterion A | Criterion E | Criterion D","criteria_definitions":"The place is important in demonstrating the evolution or pattern of Queensland's history | The place is important because of its aesthetic significance | The place is important in demonstrating the principal characteristics of a particular class of cultural places"}, {"heritage_type":"State Heritage","site_id":15421,"place_ref":600646,"name":"Wylarah","alternate_name":null,"street_address":"South Burrandowan Road","suburb":"KINGAROY","lga":"SOUTH BURNETT REGIONAL COUNCIL","register_entry_date":"1992-08-21","description":"Wylarah is a pastoral property located approximately 50 kilometres west of Kingaroy.
The homestead is a single-storeyed, single-skinned timber building with a corrugated galvanised iron roof. The plan is unusual. It has a verandah on three sides, and a U-shaped hipped roof, encircling a double pitch over the central hall.
The central hall is encircled by bedrooms to the east and west, a large lounge to the north, a dining room to the north east, kitchen to the south east and several smaller service rooms to the south, the latter including the southern entry vestibule. The more formal entrance to the house is located on the northern frontage, which also features a metal belfry and weathercock flanked by two red brick chimneys.
An unpainted panel system is used throughout the interior as well as the exterior; it consists of an ironbark frame which is expressed, internally and externally, with vertically-jointed (probably cypress) infill panels trimmed with cavetto-section pine mouldings.
The central hall, which measures approximately 15 m by 11 m, has a polished beech floor, and a double-pitched, timber-lined ceiling with exposed rafters. A valley beam
running north-south has two intermediate chamfer post supports, and two timber ties run east-west. The southern gable ends are glazed with yellow patterned glass. Similarly patterned glass is used in the fanlights above doors opening onto the central hall. The doors have clear glazed panels.
The rooms surrounding the central hall to the north, west and east have timber-lined ceilings, and french doors with arched upper panels opening onto the verandah and fanlights. Brick fireplaces with timber mantelpieces serve six of these rooms. The verandah has chamfered timber posts with cross-braced timber balustrades, and a timber-lined ceiling with exposed rafters.
The grounds include lawns and gardens to the east and north, and remnants of the original orchard to the west. To the south of the homestead are several original service buildings: to the immediate south east is a corrugated iron bath house, with a corrugated iron water tank on its roof and a steel windmill immediately adjacent; a timber and corrugated iron blacksmith's shed sits further out to the south, and contains early blacksmithing and carpentry tools; to the west is a double-storeyed corrugated iron coach house, with the coachman's residence above and two coach bays; a timber hoist approximately 5 m high sits between the coach house and the timber and corrugated iron stables.
Most of the original buildings survive, and Wylarah stills functions as a pastoral property.
","history":"Wylarah was selected in 1890 by Alfred Greenup who was manager of "Maryland" near Stanthorpe from 1868. He named the property after the Aboriginal word for black cockatoo. It comprised a grazing lease of 9 000 acres (3 600 ha) and an agricultural farm of 1 267 acres (506 ha) which were part of the resumption of
Burrandowan Station.
In 1891 work on the main homestead commenced by J Gibbs, a Victorian, with assistance from Greenup. A slab hut was erected for use while the homestead was built. The hut's hearth survives. The bricks were made from clay on the property while the timber was milled at Chinchilla. Some of the furniture was also built by Gibbs at this time.
Originally planned to be U-shaped, the internal courtyard was considered too small, and so was covered and floored to form a central hall. An innovative feature was the integration of the kitchen into the house.
Although they visited the property in 1891 it was 1897 before the Greenup family moved to Wylarah. Alfred Greenup continued as manager of "Maryland" until 1905. Wylarah's hall was the venue for the district's church services and other community activities for many years.
After Greenup's death in 1915 the property was run by his son Harold. The lease area was halved in 1924. Following Harold Greenup's death in 1957 Wylarah was left to his daughter Frances, whose son now runs the property. He has undertaken considerable repairs including replacing the side verandah's floor and lining the service rooms at the rear.
","criteria":"Wylarah is significant in demonstrating rare aspects of Queensland's cultural heritage, namely: it is an uncommonly intact example of a late 19th century homestead complex which served a medium-sized pastoral property; and the homestead is unusual and idiosyncratic in its construction, plan form, distinctive central hall, unpainted interior and exterior, and varied use of timber. Wylarah demonstrates the principal characteristics of a 19th century homestead complex on a pastoral property and its layout, unpainted materials, setting and harmonious colours of buildings and landscape exhibit aesthetic characteristics which are valued by the community.
|Wylarah is significant in demonstrating rare aspects of Queensland's cultural heritage, namely: it is an uncommonly intact example of a late 19th century homestead complex which served a medium-sized pastoral property; and the homestead is unusual and idiosyncratic in its construction, plan form, distinctive central hall, unpainted interior and exterior, and varied use of timber.
|Wylarah demonstrates the principal characteristics of a 19th century homestead complex on a pastoral property
|and its layout, unpainted materials, setting and harmonious colours of buildings and landscape exhibit aesthetic characteristics which are valued by the community.
","criteria_letters":"Criterion A | Criterion B | Criterion D | Criterion E","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"}, {"heritage_type":"State Heritage","site_id":15422,"place_ref":600647,"name":"Taabinga Homestead","alternate_name":null,"street_address":"7 Old Taabinga Road","suburb":"KINGAROY","lga":"SOUTH BURNETT REGIONAL COUNCIL","register_entry_date":"1992-10-21","description":"The Taabinga Homestead Complex is situated on Old Taabinga Road, off the Bunya Highway about 11km north-east of Kumbia and 15km south-west of Kingaroy. It comprises of a main homestead building, a number of associated outbuildings, the remnants of an extensive, carefully tended garden, a tennis court, and a small cemetery. The outbuildings include a kitchen, dairy, meat house, carpenter/blacksmith's workshop, and grain store, as well as garages, cottages, and stables. The main approach to the complex, and the front face of the property, is from the east. The outbuildings have been located in a zone to the west behind the homestead building.
House
The single-storey house is made of two gable-roofed sections, with broken-back extensions. Together they form a long, rectangular plan shape, the long sides of which are oriented toward the east and west. The northern section of the house is wider than the other by approximately 2m. This additional width extends to the west, on the rear elevation. The roof to the southern section of the house is slightly lower than the other, though its steep pitch is the same. A broken-back skirt of roof is created on its three exposed sides. On the eastern elevation, the long plane of roof set at a secondary pitch continues past the northern segment of the house, making a separate verandah roof. This roof bends to meet the wall of the first storey lookout, which nestles under the high ridge of the gable roof. A sandstone chimneystack projects from the site where the two main gable roofs join, near their ridgelines. Two sandstone chimneystacks project through the line where the roof changes pitch on the western side of the northern section of the house. On this elevation, where the two parts meet, the roof to the northern section is stepped back. This marks a narrow corridor and stair that separates the two sections. All roof planes are clad in corrugated iron, and unless otherwise stated this is the case with the roofs of other buildings in the complex.
A large proportion of the exterior walls to the northern section of the house are constructed of sandstone ashlar that is approximately 60cm deep. The sills and flat arches to windows and doors in these walls are also made of sandstone. The windows on the western elevation are timber-framed casements with a total of 3 lights in each sash, while the doors are five-panelled. In the short corridor between the two sections of the house, the ashlar is topped with weatherboard cladding. The exterior walls to the east and north-facing verandah areas are clad in wide chamferboards and have exposed timber framing. The northern gable end of this section of the house, and its first-storey lookout are clad in weatherboards. The lookout is open to the east and north, and its rails and balusters are timber. Fitted above these, framing each view, are simple, single-board timber brackets and valances. The verandah roof is supported by a series of square timber posts, which have simple timber capitals and are scored on their outward-facing sides. A scalloped fascia runs the length of the verandah roof's edge. The sloping ceiling to the verandah is lined with single-beaded, tongue-and-groove boards, while the floor is clad in shot-edge timber boards. Each double door opening onto the verandah has a low waist, 4 lights in each leaf, and a 2-paned fanlight.
The exterior walls to the southern section of the house are largely clad in chamferboards, except for a small section on the western façade, which is clad in wide, vertical timber slabs. A square verandah area occupies the south-east corner of this section of the house. The windows on the eastern façade are casements, except for a fixed pane of glass separating two double doors with upper lights. Two large windows on the southern-most end of this elevation have low sills when compared with the remaining ones. They each have three sashes, which are then divided into 6 lights. The remaining casement windows each have three sashes with only single lights. On the southern façade, the three windows match those described as having comparatively low sill heights, except they feature four sashes rather than three. A wide section of the western façade steps back towards the interior of the structure, separating the chamferboard and slab claddings. This stepped section is clad in wide, vertical timber boards.
House Interior
The southern section of the house is divided into two large rooms by a timber bi-fold door. The ceiling is coved and lined with tongue-and-groove timber boards. A long timber beam supported by timber posts supports the change in pitch of the roof. The single fireplace has a timber mantel and the wall it opens out of appears to be plastered.
The northern section of the house is divided into a number of rooms. Two large ones abut the eastern verandah, sit under the main gable, and are divided by a set of 6-panel timber bi-fold doors. Each room has a fireplace with a simple timber mantelpiece and curved back. The walls are lined with fibrous cement sheeting, which have beaded joints. They were originally lined with paper on hessian. The walls of the chimneys are painted stone. The ceilings are lined with wide, single-beaded tongue-and-groove boards, with timber cornices. Under the secondary pitch of the roof, facing west, there are a number of bedrooms. A corridor, parallel with the stairs, is situated at the southern end of this wing. It allows entry to the larger rooms behind.
It is believed that the stairs situated between the two parts of the house, lead to a corridor running under the main ridge to the upper storey lookout.
Kitchen
The kitchen building is located a few metres to the west of the sandstone section of the house, with a gable-roofed walkway connecting the two. It has a hipped roof with broken-back wings along the northern and southern sides. The ridgeline runs perpendicular to that of the house's gable roofs. The exterior walls are clad in a combination of vertical slabs and weatherboards. On the eastern façade is a double-hung sash window with hand-drawn glass, and on the opposite façade there is a bank of casements, possibly dating from late 1900s to early 1920s. To the south, a square open section, occupies the middle of the kitchen's slab façade. A single board door opens onto the interior from here. A french door with 8 lights in each sash opens off the kitchen onto a semi-enclosed verandah area on the northern facade. On the interior, the floors are covered with linoleum, the walls are lined with wide, single-beaded tongue-and-groove boards, and the ceiling is unlined, revealing the original shingles. The roof beams are adzed and the battens are pit-sawn.
Dairy
The dairy is located about 10m to the west of the house and 7m to the south of the kitchen building. It has a high-pitched pyramid roof clad in tiles (scale), the deep overhang of which is supported by simple timber braces. The sloping eaves are lined with wide, single-beaded tongue-and-groove boards. On the exterior, the walls are clad to sill-height with weatherboards, and above this with panels of galvanised metal louvres set in timber frames. The square-plan structure sits on a concrete slab-on-ground, and 2 ventilation blocks are fitted in each wall at slab level. Inside, the walls are lined with timber workbenches, and below and above the metal louvres are single-beaded tongue-and-groove boards. The ceiling is lined with shot-edge timber boards.
Cottage 1 (Single Men's Quarters)
This building was originally located on the other side of the stables, but was moved during the Second World War to accommodate women and children evacuees. It is currently located approximately 10m from the south-east corner of the house. The external walls are clad in weatherboards and the windows are casements.
Meat House
The meat house is located in a cluster of buildings over 35m to the west of the house, and adjacent to the tennis court. It has a short-ridge hipped roof, the fourth, north-eastern side of which has been cut back. On the remaining three sides the roof forms an overhang about 2m deep that is supported by timber posts. On the south-western elevation the edge of the roof is finished with a half-metre wide, solid valance of shot-edge timber boards. The building sheltering under the roof sits on a concrete slab-on-ground. The walls are clad in weatherboards to a height off the ground of approximately 600mm. A timber sill separates this from the fine steel mesh, which covers the timber frame above. There are double board doors on the north-eastern elevation. Inside the meat house is divided into two rooms by a wall made with steel mesh fixed to a timber frame. There is a single board door in this wall, which extends only to the height of the top plates of the exterior walls. While the underside of the corrugated iron roof is exposed in the first room entered, in the second there is a tongue-and-groove timber board ceiling. A step in the slab also separates the two spaces. The butcher's blocks are still in place.
Carpenter/Blacksmith's Workshop
This building has a gabled roof, and is located about 4m to the south-east of the meat house. The walls are clad in weatherboards, and there is a large opening in its southern elevation. Inside the floor is dirt and the sawn frame is exposed on each gable end and to the roof. On a wall that divides the room lengthways, timber boards are fitted vertically to the height of the top plates of the exterior walls. There are two casement windows in the northern elevation, each with 3 lights in each sash. Large double board doors open out of the building's eastern elevation. The forge appears to be made from a ship's tank, and the anvil and bellows are also still in place.
Garage and Chauffeur's Residence
This building is located about 4m west of the blacksmith's. In plan it is L-shaped, and gable roofs project along each wing. A part of the roof on the shorter wing has been extended to cover a strong room made with concrete walls and a steel door. The walls are clad in weatherboards and the windows are predominantly timber double-hung sashes with two lights in each sash. The entire building sits on a concrete slab-on-ground. Inside the garage occupies the long wing. There is a single room allocated for the driver, and its walls and ceiling are lined with tongue-and-groove timber boards. There are timber board doors. The garage was built to accommodate Arthur Youngman's Rolls Royce, which was said to be the second bought in Queensland. There is a greasing pit for the car nearby, with a simple curved roof supported on timber posts.
Store/Cottage 2
This building is located about 4m to the south-east of the blacksmith's. It is timber framed, sits on low stumps and has a gabled roof. The walls are clad in weatherboards. The building was originally the store and the storekeeper's residence.
Grain Shed
The grain shed is located about 15m to the south-west of the blacksmith's. It was originally used to store grain in bulk, however it is now used as theatre. It has a low-pitched gable roof and sits on low timber stumps. The walls are clad in weatherboards and the awning windows are made of timber boards. Entry is gained via a short flight of timber stairs on the north-eastern façade. Inside the floor is lined with timber tongue-and-groove boards. The seating was provided by the Princess Cinema in Mt Gravatt, Brisbane. Adjacent to the north-west of this building is an open gable-roofed barn supported by rough timber poles.
Stables
The stables are located about 10m to the west of the grain shed and hay barn (on an adjoining allottment). It is a long narrow structure with a low-pitched gable roof. The wall and roof framing is constructed of timber stumps and poles, and vertical slabs are fitted in between those to the walls. Its north-eastern façade has a single opening, while the opposing one has a number of them. A number of stalls are separated from the western yard with rails. The three sections the building is divided into on the interior are made with top plate height slab walls.
Cemetery
The cemetery is located over 200m to the east of the homestead, and can be accessed via a secondary track. One grave, with an elaborate headstone and metal railings surrounding it, is that of two Haly children who died in 1858. They were Anastasia (1 year) and Charles (13 months), who died within weeks of each other suggesting they may have been twins. Another grave belongs to Matilda Baker (3 years). The headstone records that she died in 1864, and was the child of George and Bridgetta Baker who were employed by the Halys. Another early grave belongs to a stockman, Henry Weldon, who died at age 19 years in 1869. The headstone's inscription reads 'Boast not thyself of tomorrow for thou knowest not what a day may bring forth'. As they are weathering, small metal, inscribed plaques have been affixed to these headstones by members of the Leu family. Arthur Youngman, who died in 1935, and his wife Daphne who died in 1975, are both buried here. The cemetery is currently in use, as later family members have been interred there. The current owners tell a story, which suggests that 8 graves marked by local boulders belong to Aboriginal children.
Gardens
There appear to be remnants of the gardens established by Arthur Youngman. On either side of the entry to the homestead complex, to the north-east of the house, stand two large palms. The area to the east of the house is covered in lawn. A Bunya pine stands to the north of the house. Adjacent to the south-western corner of the house stands another tall pine.
","history":"The Taabinga run was originally taken up by the Haly brothers in the 1840s and the main residence was developed during the 1840s and 1850s. Most of the outbuildings on the Homestead site were built during the 1890s and early 1900s when Arthur Youngman was owner of the property.
The explorations of Henry Stuart Russell in the Burnett district during the early 1840s mark a watershed in the pastoral history of Queensland. Following the closure of Moreton Bay as a penal colony, Russell led the search for land north of Brisbane and the Darling Downs. He first arrived in Queensland in 1840 to stay with cousins on the Darling Downs and by 1842 he was the first European to pass through what was later to become Taabinga. Russell's expeditions in the Burnett had opened a district of rich grazing and agricultural land, and in 1843 he took up Burrandowan run on the Borne River as a sheep station.
Other squatters soon followed Russell and it was brothers Charles Robert and William O'Grady Haly who first settled on Taabinga station. The Haly brothers had arrived in Australia from Newfoundland in 1838 and settled on the Hunter River before moving to the Gwydir River. From there they assembled a team of men and some 5,000 sheep and travelled north through the Logan district during the early 1840s in search of land. Shearing records indicate the Haly brothers had settled Taabinga station by 1846, at which time it was an established sheep property covering 305 square miles. Despite their early occupation of the land, the Haly brothers did not apply for a lease over Taabinga until June 1850, which was granted on 10 February 1852 for a term of 14 years. By 1853, Charles Haly was at Tamrookum in the Logan district, where he married Rosa Harpur and was to remain until at least 1854. During this time it is most likely that either William Haly or a superintendent was managing Taabinga station. When William Haly returned to England in 1859, Charles became sole lessee of Taabinga and the following year was elected to the first Queensland Legislative Assembly as the member for the Burnett. In 1863 he acquired a freehold over 314 acres of the run and remained at the property until 1875 when he moved to Dalby.
While documentary evidence for the physical development of Taabinga is non-existent, Hector Munro, who was the son of George Munro, onetime manager of Boondooma station (QHR 600967), and who was a friend of the Haly family, described the first structure at Taabinga as a hut 'built with bark, then perpendicular slabs with a ground floor and bark roof. The house known as the Boss's residence was built with pit saw and timber foundation logs of wood, squared on one side with walls of horizontal slabs and floor in boards of pit saw and roof shingles'. From these rudimentary structures the homestead site gained more permanent buildings. It is claimed that the first part of the main residence, which still stands today, was constructed during the 1840s and was developed through to the 1850s. According to the Alford family, who later acquired Taabinga and whose papers have been published as Alford Family Notes, Charles Haly began residing at Taabinga with his family in the late 1850s, just prior to becoming sole lessee of the property. An article in The Queenslander in 1924 indicates the continued development of the homestead site in this period: 'Sixty-seven years ago where now stands this beautiful, and complete home, was little better than wild, crude bush'. While precise dating of the main house remains elusive, the freeholding of a portion of the Taabinga run by Charles Haly in 1863 would seem to indicate the existence of the main residence by this time. Its western wall is built from locally quarried sandstone and the cedar was obtained from the Bunya Mountains while the timber for the hardwood floors was taken from the property itself. At much the same time that the main residence was being constructed it is believed that the Halys also built the stockyards and stables. The stables, which remain well preserved, are located on an adjoining lot, however the stockyards were damaged in a fire during the 1950s.
On 27 March 1875, Charles Haly was preparing to sell his interests in Taabinga and the Brisbane Courier reported he had 'received what is considered a good offer . . . and it is not unlikely that the station may shortly change hands'. Two months later the Brisbane Courier reported that Taabinga, with some 3,000 head of stock, was just about 'ready to hand over. A short time after, it is understood, Mr Haly and family will take their departure from the station'. By October 1875, James Henderson, Boulton Molineaux and Thomas Littlejohn had acquired both the leasehold and freehold portions of Taabinga. The following year the leasehold was transferred to Thomas Littlejohn and Thomas Alford, and Richard Symes Alford, brother of Thomas, was charged with managing the property. Thomas Alford was originally from Drayton and by the mid-1870s had an interest in Coochin Coochin station (600034), where he lived, as well as Gwambagwine station. At the time of Haly's departure from Taabinga station both sheep and cattle were on the run, but Alford's prime interest in the property was in expanding the cattle breeding programmes of Coochin Coochin and Gwambagwine. In 1883, Thomas was registered as the sole owner of the leasehold and freehold portions of Taabinga and moved there to live after his brother, Richard, relinquished the position as manager of the station. Thomas remained at Taabinga until a riding accident in 1887 forced him to sell his interests in the estate.
Arthur Youngman, who was a close friend of Richard Symes Alford, took up the leasehold and freehold portions of Taabinga in 1888 from Thomas Alford. Youngman was born in Melbourne in 1862 and after an abortive attempt to study medicine he moved to Queensland to work as a jackeroo. He was relatively inexperienced at pastoral life, having gained his first taste at Rawbelle station before purchasing Taabinga, but benefited from the continued employment of John William Walters who had served as head stockman at Taabinga since the mid-1870s. Youngman was also able to call on Richard Symes Alford to return to Taabinga as a bookkeeper. Youngman built a house, once known as The Lodge, to accommodate Alford and his family, but this was not the only improvement made to the property during Youngman's time there. An article on Youngman in the Queensland Trustees Quarterly Review in March 1951 noted that when 'he first took possession of Taabinga he began to improve the property by a policy of ringbarking the heavily-timbered country, by the planting of artificial grasses . . . and by subdividing the large paddocks into smaller and more workable areas'.
A programme of rebuilding and renovation during the 1890s and early 1900s resulted in the homestead being modernized and expanded, as noted in The Queenslander in 1924: 'Modern in all comforts and conveniences, the home (which has been added to of late years) is distinctly charming in its simple, old-fashioned architecture'. Most of the outbuildings also date from Youngman's time at Taabinga and they remain in a well-conserved state as part of the homestead complex. These include a garage, store and meat house for which Brisbane architects HW Atkinson and Charles McLay called tenders in March 1909. Similarly, the gardens that surround the main residence are today a reminder of Youngman's improvements to Taabinga. The Brisbane Courier in 1932 described the gardens as 'one of the most glorious . . . that any one could possibly wish to see. In it Mr Youngman has personally expended much energy, and he has every reason to be proud of his achievement'.
While the homestead block remained unaffected, the increasing demand for land in the Burnett district had reduced the Taabinga run during Youngman's time there. Early resumptions had occurred during Thomas Alford's tenure, reducing the size of the leased land from the original 305 square miles to 154 ½ square miles at the time of Youngman's succession. Further resumptions occurred in 1901 and 1907, and in August 1911 the government resumed the whole of the run under the crown Land Act of 1897. Youngman was compensated £11,745 being the value of the resumed land, improvements and legal costs.
Youngman remained at Taabinga until his death in 1935. He was buried in the cemetery located within the homestead complex, and title to the property was held in trust by Frederick Septimus Lee, Queensland Trustees and Youngman's wife, Florence Daphne Youngman. In 1958, Roderick Gordon Graham replaced Lee as one of the trustees of the estate and following Graham's death in 1961 Dorothy Foster McWilliam was appointed in his place. When Daphne Youngman died in 1975 her remains were buried in a plot next to her husband on the homestead site. The property was further subdivided in the 1980s, with the homestead portion remaining in the Youngman family and operated as a professional homestay.
","criteria":"Taabinga station was established in the 1840s by the Haly brothers in the wake of Henry Stuart Russell's exploration of the Burnett district in 1842. The development of Taabinga is an important part of the pastoral history of Queensland, and the site stands as testimony to the emergence of Taabinga as one of the earliest principal pastoral holdings in the Burnett district. The physical expansion of the site, especially during the 1890s and early 1900s, reflects the growth of the Queensland rural economy during this period.
|The principal built elements of Taabinga include the main residence built between the 1840s and 1850s, as well as the kitchen; dairy; single men's quarters; meat house; carpenter/blacksmith's workshop; garage and chauffeur's residence; storehouse; grain shed; and cemetery. Most of these structures were built during the 1890s and early 1900s. The stables, reputedly erected around the same time as the main residence, are now located on an adjoining lot. The survival of these structures in a well-preserved state provides an example of an early homestead setting, and the relationship between these elements contribute to an understanding of early station life and as such it is important in demonstrating the principal characteristics of a particular class of cultural places.
|The Homestead site provides a well-preserved example of vernacular architecture of the Queensland pastoral frontier and its aesthetic significance is enhanced by its picturesque setting within mature landscaped gardens. The main residence exhibits a high degree of workmanship and design, and its use of local resources for building highlights the adaptive lifestyle of Queensland's pastoral pioneers.
|Taabinga has a special association with brothers Charles Robert and William O'Grady Haly, who were early pioneers of the Logan and Burnett regions. The site also has a special association with the Youngman family. Arthur Youngman was responsible for the development of the homestead complex during the 1890s and early 1900s and the property remains in the Youngman family.
","criteria_letters":"Criterion A | Criterion D | Criterion E | 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 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":15423,"place_ref":600648,"name":"Burrandowan Station Homestead","alternate_name":null,"street_address":"Kingaroy Road","suburb":"KINGAROY","lga":"SOUTH BURNETT REGIONAL COUNCIL","register_entry_date":"1992-10-21","description":"The homestead buildings are located in a garden setting without a formal approach drive. They comprise a dwelling in three sections, sheds, a guest cottage, an ant bed tennis court and traces of various other outbuildings just visible above ground.
The main residence consists of three buildings; a kitchen and office, a dining room connected to it by a covered way and a bedroom wing. The kitchen building is set on low timber stumps with logs as bearers. It has a hipped roof clad in corrugated iron sheeting and the walls are constructed of split and trimmed horizontal slabs dropped between uprights. Windows with multiple panes overlook an area paved with dressed stone blocks, some of which are pecked and have tooled margins. This is shaded on the eastern side by an awning of corrugated iron on a pole frame supported by timber posts. The building is unlined but ceiled with fibrous cement sheeting. It has an early closed stove made by the Scottish firm of Smith and Wellstood and a modern kitchen counter. A door opens from the kitchen into an office which is a separate gable roofed building butted against the kitchen and which has a lower floor.
To the west of the kitchen is a passageway with stone paving which leads to the dining room. This is a large rectangular slab building with a gable roof clad in corrugated iron. Verandahs run along both long sides and French windows open onto them. Part of one verandah is used as a servery and part of the other has been enclosed as a bathroom. It has a stone fireplace and a coved ceiling. A wide covered area floored in timber links this to the bedroom wing. This is a gable-roofed rectangular building with three core rooms and is constructed of heavy weatherboards and has French doors. There are now three bedrooms and a sitting room. The verandah area at the rear is enclosed and has a bathroom at one end.
Some distance to the west of the main house is a drop log cottage with a new corrugated iron hipped roof and a bullnosed awning supported by timber posts along the front. This contains a modern kitchen and has a weatherboard extension to the rear.
The other major building is a large, rectangular shed to the east of the house. It has a steep hipped roof clad in corrugated iron and is also constructed of drop log slabs, is unlined and has a pole frame. One end has a small skillion roofed addition and has an earth floor. It is used as a garage. The adjoining section is separated from this by a drop log partition that reaches only to wall height. The building was originally divided into three rooms and a second partition has been removed, though the frame remains. A pole storage rack has been built against one wall and most of the floor in this area is paved with small blocks of timber placed in irregular rows. The shed has large barn doors at one end with forge-made hinges and fixings.
An open shed is situated to the north of the kitchen. It has a hipped corrugated iron roof supported on timber posts. It has some wall sections at the rear that are constructed of slabs.
The homestead grounds contain visible traces of outbuildings, and quantities of the dressed stone blocks of unknown provenance that have been used for paving and low seats around the house and garden. Some bricks also remain from the former homestead although few are whole. There is an ant bed tennis court.
The grave of Jane Warren, wife of Charles Warren, who died in 1903, can be seen about one kilometre to the south of the homestead, although the path that linked them has vanished. It has a headstone and ornamental metal railings. There are believed to be other graves located nearby, although they are not visible due to vegetation growth.
","history":"Burrandowan was established by Henry Stuart Russell in 1843 and was one of the first pastoral runs to be taken up in the Wide Bay area. The homestead buildings are early vernacular structures associated with the operation of this station.
Henry Stuart Russell arrived in Australia from England in 1840 and joined relatives in Sydney. These were the Hodgsons who had a property in the Hunter Valley and subsequently established Eton Vale station on the Darling Downs. Russell travelled with them to the Downs and in 1841 took up Cecil Plains station with his brother Sydenham.
Searches for pastoral land extended north in the early 1840s after the Moreton Bay region was opened for selection following the closure of the penal colony. Initial leases were taken up in the Moreton Bay, Darling Downs and Brisbane Valley regions, but by 1842 squatters were looking further north for suitable land. In May 1842, Russell joined an expedition to search the Wide Bay area for grazing country and in November of the same year, with Sydenham and William Glover, made another expedition to the Wide Bay area. They chose land that they named Burrandowan, said to mean 'big wind' in the local Aboriginal dialect. This area was outside the area officially designated for pastoral settlement, however, and so the run was not registered. After a second visit to the area, Russell returned to Cecil Plains, leaving Sydenham and Glover in charge and the new run was stocked with sheep from Cecil Plains in May 1843. Relationships with the local Aboriginal people at Burrandowan were, and continued to be, hostile and shepherds were reluctant to work there. Sydenham and Glover soon became dispirited and left, Sydenham being back in England by 1844. Russell returned to manage the property until he sold it to Captain G.S.N. Living in the same year.
In June 1847 Burrandowan was sold to Phillip Friell. In 1848 the Burnett District was officially opened for settlement and tenders for runs were opened. Friell's 1849 application for a lease was accepted in April 1850 and gazetted on 26 July 1851. He made improvements to the property including the surviving buildings, which are thought to have been built around 1848. A homestead was built which included a billiard room and library. Bricks from this homestead remain on the property and are stamped with a heart motif. It is thought that these were made by a local brickmaker, who also made bricks for other stations, including Jimbour, Jondaryan and Boondooma, using a different card suit design for each place.
Friell died in 1854 and the property appears to have been managed by Gordon Sandeman, possibly until it was sold to Robert Campbell in May 1860. In the mid-1850s, Burrandowan was reported to be the largest property in the Burnett district, carrying 65 000 sheep. In 1870 it was sold to Robert Towns and Alexander Stuart trading as Towns and Co., Towns holding a number of other properties at the time. In 1872 the run was acquired by Alexander Campbell and John Hay and in the late 1870s was restocked with cattle. In 1885 it passed to the Mercantile Bank of Sydney who consolidated the run. During the 1890s a series of resumptions for grazing leases began on properties in the area to encourage closer settlement following the 1884 land Act. The core section of the run was leased to the Commercial Bank of Australia in 1900 and sold by them in 1901 to Frederick Borton, who was placed at Burrandowan by the 1874 Post Office Directory and may have been a manager. Borton immediately transferred the property to George Keppel, Gerald, Mark and Roderick Borton.
In 1910 land sales were held of resumed Burrandowan land, which sold quickly as a railway to Nanango was anticipated. In 1917 the final sections of resumed land on this and several other runs in the district were allocated for the Soldier Settlement scheme.
Keppel Borton retired and Gerald Borton ran Burrandowan until he died in 1919 when his son managed the property until purchased by a Mr Turner in 1921 and then by Richard Tancred. The current homestead is assembled from three early buildings and is slightly higher and further away from Garden Creek than the previous main house. They are thought to have been assembled in this form around 1927 and comprise the Burrandowan store, part of the homestead and a building relocated from Cooinda, a grazing property formed from Burrandowan land in 1890. Tancred died in 1934 and his widow leased the property to George Lewis who purchased Burrandowan in 1943. The property was subdivided into three sections in 1987 and was purchased by the current owners in 2001.
","criteria":"Henry Stuart Russell took up Burrandowan run following his exploration of the Burnett River District in 1842. It was one of the first pastoral runs in the region and provided an impetus for further settlement. Burrandowan homestead illustrates the pattern of early European exploration and settlement of Queensland where the development of pastoral properties preceded agriculture and the establishment of towns. As an early pastoral property, which has remained in continuous use, Burrandowan has important associations with the development of the pastoral industry in Queensland.
|Burrandowan has the potential to yield information that will contribute to an understanding of Queensland's history through historical and archaeological research. The buildings provide evidence of early building techniques and traces of other early structures remain on site and possibly below ground.
|Burrandowan homestead complex incorporates structures from the early operation of the station brought together in their current formation in the early 20th century. These include residential and working buildings that are good examples their types and demonstrate the recycling of useful structures commonly made on pastoral properties.
|Burrandowan homestead complex has aesthetic significance, comprising structures that are well made examples of traditional buildings that are pleasing in form, materials and detail.
|Burrandowan homestead has special associations with the life and work of Henry Stuart Russell who took up the run, with Philip Friell who was responsible for the construction of the buildings and with members of the Borton family of whom three generations worked on the property.
","criteria_letters":"Criterion A | Criterion C | Criterion D | Criterion E | 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 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 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":15534,"place_ref":600759,"name":"Tarong Homestead","alternate_name":null,"street_address":"Cooyar Road","suburb":"TARONG","lga":"SOUTH BURNETT REGIONAL COUNCIL","register_entry_date":"1992-10-21","description":"Tarong Homestead comprises 630 acres of land bordered to the north by Cooyar Creek. The principal residence is situated on elevated land, overlooking flats to the south-west and north west.
The principal residence at Tarong comprises three timber buildings, of varying ages, separate in structure but joined by verandahs, an internal garden courtyard and a semi open breezeway. The first section, constructed in the 1840s, is a long, one room width, section running south east to north west; the kitchen constructed in 1859, runs perpendicular to the first wing and is joined to it at the south eastern end by a verandah. In the cavity of the L-shaped plan created by the two first buildings is a square planned building surrounded by verandahs built in 1890. The three sections manifest different timber construction methods. Access to the residence at Tarong is via the verandah of either the earliest section or through the wider verandahs of the 1890s buildings.
The earliest section of the building is constructed from adze cut, unpainted vertical timber slabs housed in painted timber bearers at the base and top of the walls. The building has a corrugated iron clad gabled roof, steeply pitched over the rooms and changing to a more gradual pitch over the front and rear verandah. At the south eastern end of this section, projecting from the original dining room which was at this end, is another fireplace formed from bricks clad with corrugated iron sheeting projecting from the end of the building. Adjoining the dining room on the north eastern side is a skillion roofed and timber framed extension clad with horizontal chamfered boards. Most of this section of the residence is elevated only very slightly from the ground level, although a gentle tapering downwards to the north west necessitates open tread timber steps providing access to the south western verandah.
This wing houses three principal rooms, with additional rooms of modern fitout added to the two ends. The rooms have access both to the front, south western verandah and to the rear verandah via both pairs of french doors and timber four panelled doors. The north eastern wall of this section of the residence is clad with fibrous cement sheeting. Internally this building has raked timber beaded board ceilings, timber boarded floors and timber boarded walls. Later V-J pine boarding lines the internal walls up to the level of the start of the ceiling rake in the two smaller rooms. The larger room, originally the dining room has a dark green hessian backed wall paper and a patterned frieze featuring a stylised landscape design. A small timber lined room, on the original south western verandah is entered from the former dining room. At the north western end of this part of the residence is a small two roomed extension, fitted as a bathroom with small gauge corrugated iron clad walls and fibrous cement internal lining.
The kitchen wing, the smallest of the three sections of the residence, comprises only two principal rooms and is of similar vertical slab construction, but the vertical slabs in some places are rounded and chamfered at the top and base. The building has a corrugated iron hipped roof, again steeply pitched over the main rooms and more gradual over the front and rear verandahs. An iron ventilator with decorative cap projects through the ridge of the roof. Attached to the south western end of the kitchen is a substantial brick chimney which services the main kitchen oven and a bread oven in that end of the building. The north eastern end of the kitchen wing supports a large climbing plant which, though picturesque, threatens to overtake the building. Internally the kitchen wing has a raked ceiling clad with unpainted cedar beaded boards, a timber boarded floor and an early white lime paint on all internal walls. The door to the kitchen from the north western verandah comprises three adze cut timber slabs, braced on the rear side. Early internal fittings in the kitchen include small cupboards, a long preparation bench, the stove and associated bread stove; and shelving. At the north eastern end of the kitchen block is a small storage room, with raked ceiling, unpainted timber lining boards and a boarded floor.
The 1890 section of the homestead, elevated on round timber posts, comprises five rooms of varying sizes all opening onto a wide verandah which surrounds the section. This section has a low pitched hipped roof clad with corrugated iron sheets, extending over the verandahs where it is lined with fibrous cement lining sheets with timber cover strips concealing edges. The verandah is supported on slender square planned posts which have partially chamfered corners and sit on the hand rail of the chamfer board cladded balustrade. Infilling some of the verandah openings are a series of early timber louvres. The building is constructed from wide, horizontal hardwood slabs housed in dressed vertical studs. Doors and windows in this section are housed frames between the studs. The windows are vertical sash with two sheets of glass per pane. The doors in this section of the building are four panelled with bolection mouldings on the horizontal edges of the panels and chamfered vertical edges. Above most of the doors but separated by two sections of timber slab, are operable transom windows, aligned with the ceiling line.
A fireplace is found in the eastern corner of this section, formed by white washed bricks which project from one of the principal rooms onto the verandah space and taper towards the ceiling. A slender chimney, of unpainted cream bricks, projects from the roof and is crowned with a simple corbelled top. Adjacent to the south west side of the base of the chimney, on the verandah, is a timber V-J boarded phone box.
Internally this section of Tarong, which comprises five rooms, has cedar beaded board ceilings and timber boarded floors and V-J boarded walls lined with paper. The wall paper is backed with a hessian based lining in most of the rooms and is complete with a frieze paper, complementing the general wall paper. The paper in each room is different but four of the papers are of the same type vertical pattern and water-wave embossing on a satin base. Also in these rooms are sections of early linoleum and oil cloth floor coverings. One of the rooms features another paper, without lining, of an orange and yellow background and printed white large floral design and green and yellow patterned frieze. Early furniture and fittings, including wardrobes, drawers, shelving units, chimney mantle and fireplace survive in this part of the residence.
To the south east of the residence are a number of timber outbuildings, of various ages and construction types. Furthest to the south of this group of buildings is a hipped roof building clad with horizontal weatherboards and with a skillioned extension to the south, thought to be an early fowl house. One of the more substantial outbuildings is a timber framed and gable roofed structure, partially of vertical slab construction and most recently in use as a garage but formerly a residence, with two shallow hipped roofed extensions on either end. There are several other gabled roofed structures clad with horizontal weatherboards and in varying states of deterioration. From this section and continuing eastward are a number of aligned round timber posts which are remnant from an early woodshed. To the north west of the residence are two more outbuildings, both with hipped roofs clad with corrugated iron one of masonry and timber construction and the other timber framed and cladded.
To the north, north west and north east of the house are remnants of a large garden. Stone terracing and walling and extensive timber paling fences survive as do many established trees and plantings. The trees in this area include a jacaranda, several figs, pepperina, and orange trees. To the north west of this area is a small graveyard containing seven gravestones, mostly of the Clapperton family, dating from 1876 to about 1980. The graveyard is bordered with a course and recent single rail timber log fence without a gate. Extending eastward from the graveyard are a number of established olive trees planted in a line. Further to the north west are timber posts and remnants of an early woolstore and complex built on this site.
To the south west of the house at the base of the spur is a substantial lagoon, on the banks of which are timber posts, remnants from an early bath house and water slide. As well many trees and early plantings surround the lagoon.
About 200 metres distant from the house to the north west is a power line supported on large three tiered metal power poles.
","history":"Tarong Homestead was established in about 1842 with the arrival of James Borthwick to the South Burnett region. Soon after the run was acquired by Borthwick's manger, George Clapperton who retained the property until his death in 1875 when it was transferred to his estate. Tarong Homestead remains in the ownership of the Clapperton family.
In late 1842, John James Malcolm Borthwick, from Buaraba Homestead near Ipswich, and William Elliott Oliver visited Taromeo Homestead on their way north seeking land for establishing pastoral runs. After leaving Taromeo, Oliver soon discovered land on which he established Nanango Station and Borthwick continued northward where he decided upon 260 square miles of land which was to become Tarong Station.
Although he is believed to have established Tarong by the end of 1842, Borthwick did not receive official notification in 1850 of the acceptance of his tender for the 27 400 acres comprising the Tarong run, two years after the Burnett Pastoral District was established. A depasturing license was issued to Borthwick and Oliver by the New South Wales Government in 1844. Borthwick seems to have spent very little time at Tarong from an early date soon after its establishment. Leaving the day to day running of the property to his manager George Clapperton.
In 1857 Clapperton acquired the lease of the property and it is through a series of diaries, journals, ledgers and letterbooks kept by him that a record of much of the history of Tarong Station after the mid 1850s is kept. Clapperton was a prominent local citizen, involved with most local activities, including lobbying the government for the laying out of a township at Nanango. During Clapperton's ownership Tarong changed from principally a sheep station, to a sheep and cattle station in the 1870s, and under his son's ownership to a cattle station toward the end of the nineteenth century reflecting the region's future prominence in cattle production.
Although a comprehensive history of the complex of buildings at Tarong Station has not been established, an approximate guide to construction on the station can be discerned from the surviving records. The principal residence was constructed in three stages, the first as the residence of Borthwick, the second as the kitchen wing and the third stage as another general residential wing.
It is thought that the first section of the homestead was constructed in the 1840s. This is the south western wing of the extant complex, and is constructed from vertical adze cut timber slabs housed in dressed timber beams at the base and top of the walls. This building originally had a gabled roof clad with shingles and extending, with a lower pitch, over verandahs at the front and rear. There is little evidence to suggest a building date only that it was probably built within a few years of the arrival of Borthwick on the property. The building is similar in construction technique and age to structures on other early homesteads including the first stage of the Canning Downs principal residence built in about 1847 and also to the first stage of Cressbrook also built in the mid 1840s.
Substantial building work seems to have been carried out at Tarong in the 1850s, a time when more substantial records exists of life at the station. The woolstore, which no longer stands but was to the south of the residence, was thought to have been completed in the 1850s, as was the kitchen wing. In 1856 reports of the garden suggest that it was "in a poor state of cultivation having been for long used as a sheep yard, occasionally as a green barley park, and again as a maize field." attempts were made, therefore, to improve the garden and fences were constructed, and in the next few years a large number of exotic trees and plants were introduced including orange and lemon trees; walnut trees; chestnut trees; peach, nectarine and apricot trees; bergamot plant; pear trees; plum, sage and cherry plants and fig trees. The diaries give very good records of the work completed in the gardens; walks were laid out and a gardener's cottage constructed in 1874 and garden beds were bordered with brick edging in October 1884.
In 1856 the kitchen wing was constructed perpendicular to the original house and using slabs of timber from earlier slab huts and shingling from trees on the property. The construction work was completed by general employees of Tarong. In 1870 a chimney was constructed near the kitchen, which collapsed in 1872 and required replacement, which was done in conjunction with the covering of the shingled roof with iron sheeting.
On 15 December 1875 George Clapperton died, leaving the property to his wife, Anne Clapperton who later re-married, assuming the name of her husband, George Wilson. As a result of Clapperton's death, a small cemetery to the north west of the residence was established to house his grave stone. The cemetery continues to be used as the Clapperton family grave yard.
Throughout the 1870s and 1880s improvements were made to the residence at Tarong, including papering and painting walls and ceilings and constructing a fireplace in the dining room, which was the largest room of the first building and the room closest to the kitchen. The kitchen was white washed in 1881 and extensively refitted internally in November 1887. In June 1874 a brickmaker was employed full time at Tarong making brick for use at the property and also for selling locally as closer settlement increased the population in the Nanango area.
The next major phase of building was the construction of the five roomed square planned wing within the cavity of the L-shaped plan created by the kitchen and original residence. The Wilsons, who now owned Tarong, employed a local carpenter, Mr Hugh Davidson, to plan and calculate the quantity of timber for the proposed building in January 1890 and throughout 1890 the building was constructed firstly by Davidson, who was paid out and left in March, and then by another local carpenter, Jimmy Walsh. Assistance was offered to the entire project by a Mr Moppett who worked at Tarong for many years carrying out small carpentering, painting and papering jobs to the buildings. The new building was planned and timber was both bought from a local timber supplier, Parsons and acquired from the property for shingling. The unusual four panelled timber doors were acquired from a Mr Heimer in Nanango. By November 1890 the carpentering work was complete and Moppett was left with the wall papering and making and laying of carpets. Early in 1891 Moppett constructed and white-washed a chimney, presumably in the new section as he then went about repairing the other chimneys in the residence complex. From April until May of 1891 cedar boarded ceilings, skirtings and other mouldings were erected in the residence. In December of that year Moppett constructed wardrobes and lined and papered the original dining room in the eh first wing of the house.
At some time in the early twentieth century the verandahs of the 1890 section of the Tarong residence were extended, also necessitating the replacement of the shingled roof with a low pitched corrugated iron clad hipped roof. Many smaller buildings on the site were constructed including the meat room which was converted from an old store in June 1862; a bath house built on the lagoon in 1880; and other removals and reuse of timber among the smaller buildings.
The original lease holding of Tarong was reduced with the government encouraging closer settlement in the South Burnett region. This happened over many years from the 1870s, to consolidation in the mid 1880s and to the early twentieth century when two Land Acts (1897 and 1902) allowed the resumption of much of the lease.
","criteria":"Tarong Homestead was established by John James Malcolm Borthwick in about 1842, one of the first runs taken in the Wide Bay/Burnett area. The run demonstrates the development of Queensland, particularly this area from the establishment of pastoral holdings in 1840s to closer settlement from the 1870s. The property illustrates the development of pastoral practices in Queensland, particularly the development of the beef industry in the South Burnett Region.
|Tarong has many rare built elements including an 1840s slab hut; an 1859 slab kitchen and surviving wallpaper in six rooms probably dating from the late nineteenth century. The site remains remarkably intact, despite continual additions.
|The early date of Tarong with its many extant features and extensive early documentation suggest that a potential exists for further historical and archaeological research which may yield information which will contribute to an understanding of early Queensland station life.
|The place is important in demonstrating the principal characteristics of an early Queensland pastoral station. The arrangement of the early buildings and their relationship to outbuildings provides important evidence of early station life. The buildings comprising the residence demonstrate three nineteenth century methods of timber construction; with two forms of vertical slab construction and a later horizontal slab building.
|Tarong has aesthetic significance; the entire site has a picturesque quality resulting from the layering of various periods of building construction over many years and the siting of these buildings overlooking the surrounding flats. The residence has architectural significance for its composition and planning, producing an environmentally sensitive and comfortable building.
|Tarong has special associations with the South Burnett community as one of their first settled stations and a place of employment for local residents and their families many of whom remain in the area.
|The place is associated with the Clapperton family who have owned Tarong since 1857 and were instrumental in the development of the South Burnett region and the town of Nanango.
","criteria_letters":"Criterion A | Criterion B | Criterion C | 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 has potential to yield information that will contribute to an understanding 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":15742,"place_ref":600967,"name":"Boondooma Homestead","alternate_name":null,"street_address":"8262 Mundubbera - Durong Road","suburb":"BOONDOOMA","lga":"SOUTH BURNETT REGIONAL COUNCIL","register_entry_date":"1992-10-21","description":"The Boondooma Homestead complex is located near the junction of Boondooma Creek and the Boyne River, in a corridor of land between the two waterways that is less than 1km wide. Part of the Boyne River has been dammed to create the Boondooma Dam, which is adjacent to the Homestead site. Its eastern boundary is situated on the Mundubbera-Durong Road, approximately 75km west of the town of Wondai, which is 31km north of Kingaroy.
The principal surviving buildings in the homestead complex include a stone building and timber house from the 1850s; a dining room erected during the 1870s, a walkway between the house and the dining room; a cooling shed; cow bails (prior to 1939 used as stables); a structure which functioned as a postal receiving office from the 1860s; and a garage built in the 1950s. The various built elements are disposed around the site according to their functional relationship to one another.
Stone Building
The stone building is located at the southern end of the property, furthermost from the Mundubbera-Durong Road. In plan it comprises a rectangular core of random rubble laid in rough courses, which is flanked by a verandah on each long side. The verandah roof to the south-west is continuous with the main gabled roof, while that to the north-east is separate, meeting the core's wall just below the eaves line. The pitch on both verandah roofs is slightly reduced from that of the main roof. All bargeboards are timber. A single line of guttering is fixed to the north-eastern edge of the main roof. All these roofs are clad in corrugated galvanised iron. The timber rafters are exposed on the interior, and some battening from the original shingle roof is still evident.
The walls of the central core are constructed of large sections of stone arranged roughly in courses, between which smaller pieces have been inserted. The whole construction is jointed with mortar made from termite mounds (antbed). The stonework continues to the underside of the main roof, except at each gable end where roughly sawn, vertical timber slabs have been fixed. The lean-to verandahs comprise of post and sapling frames and are enclosed with vertical timber slabs on the western ends of their northern and southern facades, and on their short western facades.
All windows and doors have timber lintels and frames. The windows have shutters made of vertical timber slabs, which open onto the interior. They also have vertical iron bars. A window in the north-eastern facade has horizontal and vertical bars. A 1997 archaeological investigation suggests that the timber posts remaining adjacent to the south-western façade were part of the adjoining meat house.
Internally, the core space comprises one large room with unlined walls and exposed timber roof framing. A number of ironbark roof ties are in place. Paint on the stonework may be indicative of previous partitioning. The floor is constructed of wide, hardwood shot-edge boards. Beneath this lining are timber joists and bearers.
Timber House
The single-storey house has a broken-back, hipped roof clad in corrugated galvanised iron. A detached single-storey kitchen, with a similarly clad pyramid roof, is centred adjacent to its south-western façade. This roof has a simple vent piece fitted at its peak. A small, skillion-roofed structure is also appended to its south-eastern face. At the western corner of the house, between the kitchen building and another skillion-roofed extension, a covered walkway is attached. This structure links the house to a dining room to its north-west, and is constructed of a post and sapling frame with a curved corrugated iron roof. A short section of the walkway roof, close to the house, is no longer in place.
The underside of the front verandah roof is not lined, revealing that a great number of the original timber shingles remain in place under the roof sheeting. The deterioration of this verandah floor, which is lined with shot-edge timber boards like the south-western one, reveals that the floor joists of the house and the timber verandah posts bear on an outer line of bedlogs.
The house is laid out with a central band of rooms running north-west to south-east along the length of the rectangle. A long, thin outer room on the north-west wraps around to take a small part of the front verandah facing north-east. This room, and a small one adjacent to it, have been formed by enclosing the former open verandah. A second verandah area remains on the south-west of the house, between the core and the kitchen building. Its southern end has been enclosed to make a small room. A large fireplace projects into this verandah space from one of the main rooms. Its lower half is clad in wide, vertical timber boards, matching those used elsewhere, and its upper half under the roof is clad in sheet steel. The steel-clad chimneystack is visible above the main roof.
The external walls are clad in a variety of materials. The north-eastern façade to the verandah is clad in 8inch wide chamferboards, except for a short section at its eastern end where there are wide, timber boards fitted vertically. This boarding pattern also appears on the south-western façade to the second verandah, which is adjacent to the kitchen. On the north-western façade, and partly on the north-eastern one, there are unpainted weatherboards. Unpainted, horizontal timber boards clad the south-west facing walls of the kitchen building and the small extension next to the walkway. These boards appear to fit between the exposed vertical framing members. The timber wall framing is also exposed on each verandah. The skillion-roofed extension on the south-east of the house is clad in roughly sawn, unpainted timber slabs fitted vertically. Some corrugated iron has been fixed to the remainder of the south-eastern façade of the house, where the brick fireplace has collapsed.
Four sets of French or double doors open from the three central rooms onto the north-eastern verandah, while two open onto the south-west facing one. The internal doors are four-panelled with simple bolection mouldings. The timber-framed windows, some of which have fixed-louvre shutters, are generally casement with three or four panes. Joinery to the main section of the house, incorporating the three main rooms, is finely detailed and includes a variety of mouldings. The wall framing is exposed in these rooms, and where it appears around the remaining fireplace and the doors to that room, it is finely moulded. Most joinery elements are painted in either white, or various shades of green and blue-green. The walls are constructed of wide, vertical timber boards that appear to have been stained or oiled. Numerous layers of wallpaper and backing material are evident, some of which have been papered over with magazines cuttings. Remnants of ceiling paper and associated backing materials, and various types of linoleum are also evident in some areas. The floors are largely finished with shot-edge timber boards, while the ceilings in the largest of the three rooms are finished with painted timber boards. In the room with the extant fireplace, there is a simple pattern to the floorboards around its edge. The floor to ceiling height is generally about 3m, however in the larger room on the south-east end of the house it follows the slope of the roof for part of its length. In the main room there is a picture rail fitted at approximately 2.5m and above this the walls are lined with horizontal timber boards to match the ceiling.
The external walls to the secondary rooms, particularly those that infill the verandah space to the north-west are not lined. The internal walls they share with the main part of the house are lined to match those rooms, as are their floors. The ceilings in this external band of rooms are unlined and slope to follow the pitch of the roof. It is here, as in the verandah areas, where the shingles are visible. The walls to the detached kitchen are unlined and the framing is exposed. The boards are painted and simple mouldings fixed at the joints with the framing. The stove recess is lined with corrugated iron. Its pyramid roof ceiling is lined with unpainted, horizontal timber boards, with beading fixed at each joint.
Other Timber Structures on Homestead Site
The other remaining timber structures on the Homestead site are similar in terms of design and construction techniques; incorporating post and sapling frames, corrugated iron roof sheeting, and walls lined with vertical and horizontal slabs and weatherboards. Some of the walls to the covered walkway are clad in corrugated iron, while parts of its floor is made with wide, roughly sawn timber slabs apparently laid on the ground. The small, gable-roofed structure to the north-west of the timber house (originally a dining room) currently has open walls, with some wall slab remnants located nearby. Its gables are in-filled with steel mesh. Adjacent to the south-west face of this structure is the cooling shed, which was apart of the creamery. This is also a small gable-roofed structure, however its gables are filled with weatherboards, and its walls are clad in rough-sawn timber slabs fitted horizontally between the exposed frame.
To the south-east of the timber house is located the milk or cow bails, and the stockyards. This building is a long rectangle in plan, is gable-roofed and its end walls are clad in rough-sawn timber slabs fitted vertically. There are timber posts and rails still evident inside the shed and marking the pens of the stockyards. The post office is located west of the cow bails. It also is a gable-roofed structure with an attached skillion-roofed garage and awning. The post office walls are clad in rough-sawn timber slabs, fitted vertically, while its gables are clad in weatherboards. The garage walls are also clad in weatherboards. Further west is a stand-alone garage structure with a skillion roof and unevenly clad walls matching those of the post office.
Grounds
The grounds in which the Homestead complex is located shows evidence of a formally laid out garden comprising an orchard of citrus trees, and mature plantings such as blackbean, bottle, oak, pine and pepperina trees. Trellises for grape vines, garden beds and various fences are also evident located adjacent to the timber house.
","history":"Boondooma Homestead is located on the Mundubbera-Durong Road in Boondooma. The Boondooma Run was originally taken up in 1846 by the Lawson brothers and Robert Alexander, and the Homestead site today includes a number of historic buildings, including a stone building and timber house erected in the 1850s, and several timber outbuildings.
Searches for pastoral land in Queensland extended north in the early 1840s after the Moreton Bay region was opened for selection following the closure of the penal colony. Initial leases were taken up in the Moreton Bay, Darling Downs and Brisbane Valley regions and by 1842, explorations such as those led by Henry Stuart Russell had spread further north.
Russell first came to Queensland in 1840 to stay with cousins on the Darling Downs, and in the subsequent year established Eton Vale on the Downs in partnership with his brother, Sydenham. In conjunction with others Russell made exploratory expeditions to the Wide Bay area and in 1842 he was the first European to pass through what was later to become Boondooma whilst exploring the area west of Tiaro with William H Orton and an Aborigine named Jemmy. In the following year, he took up Burrandowan run on the Borne River as a sheep station and other squatters soon followed his example in establishing themselves in the area. Two of these were brothers Alexander Robertson Lawson and Robert Lawson, who set up Boondooma Station as a sheep run in 1846 along with Robert Alexander. Temporary huts and sheds were erected on the site and by 1851 Boondooma comprised the runs of Boondooma, Jua, Waringa and Waagineraganya, while Piar, Dangarabungy and Weir Weir were subsequently acquired. The Boondooma lease was applied for on 31 October 1851 by the Lawson brothers and Alexander, and approved the following year. In 1863 the lease remained in the Lawson family but was transferred to Alexander Robertson Lawson solely. Four years later, in 1867, Boondooma lease was transferred to William Oswald Gilchrist and John Young, before being transferred to Gilchrist solely in 1872 and then held jointly by Gilchrist and John Brown Watt in 1888. It seems unlikely that Gilchrist, Young or Watt resided at the property and it continued to be managed by the Lawsons until 1870 when they were succeeded by George Munro.
Despite an outbreak of scab in 1853 which caused the loss of 17,000 sheep, the property prospered during this early period as a successful sheep run. A wool scour and pressing plant were established on the Boyne River, allowing wool to be cleaned and baled before being backloaded by teamsters who arrived with supplies. This continued until the early 1890s when, due to the spread of spear grass, the owners were forced to dispose of the sheep and restock with cattle.
The period from the 1850s to the 1870s was in general an era of expansion for Boondooma and this is reflected in its physical growth at the time. In November 1855, Alexander Robertson Lawson married Emily Mountford Ball and the following year a son named Robert was born. By that time, it seems plans had already been made to replace an earlier house, which was reputedly located on an area archaeologically identified as being later used for a fowl house, with a larger residence to accommodate the Lawson family. Station correspondence from this period reveals building supplies and furniture being ordered in September 1855, including door hinges, locks, handles, window glass, wallpaper, calico for the wooden walls, a drawing room table and chairs, a hand basin, cooking stove, and bath. By late 1856, the Boondooma wages book indicates that 2 carpenters, John Groom and John Moules, were employed at the Station. Both carpenters worked at Boondooma until mid-1857, along with a team of 5 other tradesmen under their supervision, and it is most likely that the main timber house, which is still standing, was constructed during this period.
At much the same time, it seems the stone storeroom and an adjoining timber meat house were also being erected. The stone building was constructed from roughly coursed local rock obtained from a nearby quarry, sawn timbers, logs, and antbed, and was built by Wilhelm Brill, a stonemason. Brill was born in Germany in 1811 and arrived in Brisbane on 12 January 1853 on board the Johan Caesar. With his family, Brill first moved to Toowoomba before making his way to Boondooma by August 1855. In the mid-1850s, the Lawsons were actively recruiting German workers owing to the general 'scarcity of labour and the satisfaction those already in our service have given us' and the Boondooma wages book shows Brill was employed as a stonemason from 24 May 1856 to 21 July 1857. He remained at the Station until 1861 working as a shepherd, thereafter moving to Ipswich and then to Toowoomba where he died in 1886. The main stone structure remains well preserved and Brill's familiarity with metric dimensions makes this building one of the earliest in Queensland constructed to metric standards.
Although Boondooma was not officially registered as a postal receiving office until 1900, the structure commonly referred to as the post office was built during the early 1860s after Joseph Booth won the contract for the weekly postal run to serve the Burnett district, which passed through Boondooma. Extensions to this building were added during the 1950s. Another structure from the 1860s is often referred to as the cook's room. It was a three-panelled building originally used as a dairy, wash house and cook's room, and the only extant physical remain is one standing post.
A separate dining room and cooling shed were reputedly built on the site during the 1870s. The dining room was later used as a kitchen and at some stage was linked to the homestead by a covered walkway. Adjacent to the dining room was a cooling shed built at much the same time from Cyprus pine and with a wooden shingle roof which has since been replaced by corrugated iron.
In 1885, the consolidated Boondooma holding was brought under the provisions of the Crown Lands Act of 1884 and was accordingly divided into 259 square miles of leased land in the name of Gilchrist and Watt and 249 square miles of resumed area. At this time, George Munro served as manager of Boondooma and was succeeded by his son, Peter Munro, in 1895. George Munro died on 24 March 1895 at Boondooma and his grave and tombstone remain on the site.
In 1898 the lease to Boondooma was obtained by EJ McConnel, a member of the well-known Cressbrook Pastoral Company, and when title was transferred in 1904, it was to DC McConnel & Sons. The McConnel family were pioneer pastoralists in the Brisbane River Valley, establishing Cressbrook (600503) in 1841, the first sheep run in the district. The company of DC McConnel and Sons was established by David Cannon McConnel prior to his death in 1885 in partnership with his sons James Henry, David Rose, Eric Walter and Edward John, and daughter Mary McLeod Banks. None of the McConnel family ever resided at Boondooma and it was immediately used as collateral for a stock mortgage of £160,000. David Stevens served as manager of the Station from 1898 to 1908, succeeded by Archie Graham.
In 1905, the government resumed a further 60 square miles of Boondooma, reducing the holding to 198 square miles. Three years later a further 42 square miles of land was resumed from Boondooma, at which time the station was released from the mortgage acquired in 1904 and operated by the Marshlands Pastoral Company, which had 3 McConnel family members as shareholders.
In 1913, when the lease on Boondooma expired, it was thrown open for selection. A large portion was retained by the McConnels, including the Homestead block, but in 1922 the lease was again open for selection with Fred Palethorpe, who became Deputy Commissioner of Police, successful in obtaining the Homestead site. From Palethorpe the property was transferred to Jane Ann Thomson in the mid-1920s and then to her son, Edward Thomson. During the Thomsons' time at Boondooma it was used as a dairy farm as well as for growing cotton and rearing cattle. In 1975, the Wondai Shire Council received a Federal Government grant to acquire the site and the Council in association with the Boondooma Historical Society have since maintained an ongoing programme of conservation.
Over the years since the establishment of the Boondooma Run in 1846, land resumptions and tenure changes have resulted in the reduction of the homestead site to its present size. It remains, however, a site of significant historical value. Although natural deterioration and an auction held in 1919 to sell the jackaroo quarters, buggy shed, blacksmith's shop and several other ancillary structures have reduced the number of extant structures at Boondooma, there remains on the site a number of buildings which are important in reflecting Queensland's early pastoral development. The importance of this site has been recognized by the formation of the Boondooma Homestead Committee, instituted to facilitate the ongoing conservation of the homestead and surrounding buildings, and the receipt in 2001 of a Community Garden Grants Award.
","criteria":"Boondooma station was established in 1846 by the Lawson brothers and Robert Alexander in the wake of Henry Stuart Russell's exploration of the Burnett River district in 1842. The Boondooma Homestead site stands as important surviving evidence of the early exploration and settlement of the Upper Burnnett region, and its buildings are indicative of early pastoral life in Queensland. The physical growth of the site reflects periods of economic prosperity in Queensland, whilst periods of rural hardship can be reflected in the abandonment and sale of structures.
|Boondooma comprises built elements that are now uncommon examples of construction methods and techniques. The principal historic buildings include an 1850s stone storehouse, which is both rare in its method of construction and an early example of the use of the metric standard in Queensland. The main house and the post office are also important surviving structures. The survival of interior finishes in the main timber house, including wallpapers and linoleums, contributes to its rarity.
|The site remains a good example of the early vernacular homestead and contains a range of ancillary buildings in varying states of preservation. It provides present generations the opportunity to observe and understand the operation of early pastoral stations, and through further historical and archaeological research the site also has the potential to yield information that will contribute to an understanding of early European settlement in the Burnett region.
|The Boondooma site is an example of a homestead setting, with remnants of other structures including various outbuildings, graves, fences and mature trees. The relationship between these elements contributes to an understanding of early station life and as such it is important in demonstrating the principal characteristics of a particular class of cultural places.
|The Homestead site provides a relatively well-preserved and vivid example of vernacular architecture of the Queensland pastoral frontier and its aesthetic significance is enhanced by the ongoing preservation of the site. The individual buildings that remain reveal a high degree of workmanship and design. The use of local resources for building, as evidenced most notably in the stone building on the site in which rubble obtained from a nearby quarry and antbed are used for construction, demonstrates a high degree of skill and highlights the adaptive lifestyle of Queensland's pastoral pioneers.
|Boondooma remains valued by the local community for its strong and very important links with early pioneers of the Burnett district, including the Lawson family.
","criteria_letters":"Criterion A | Criterion B | Criterion C | 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 has potential to yield information that will contribute to an understanding 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"}, {"heritage_type":"State Heritage","site_id":15896,"place_ref":601123,"name":"Taromeo Homestead complex and cemetery","alternate_name":null,"street_address":"624 Old Esk Road","suburb":"TAROMEO","lga":"SOUTH BURNETT REGIONAL COUNCIL","register_entry_date":"1992-10-21","description":"The homestead buildings are situated in open rolling country that features large granite outcrops and boulders. Rocky outcrops and large trees are interspersed between the buildings.
\nOn the western side of the entrance drive are two residential timber buildings, possibly from the 1930s, and a butchers shop. This has a pyramidal roof of corrugated iron with a core constructed of vertical boards, open below the roof. A flat modern roof has been erected on the western side. These buildings are separated from the earlier buildings of the complex by a fence. To the northwest is a kitchen garden fenced with timber slabs, which has a small timber structure in one corner.
\nThe stone stables and store face each other across the entrance drive and are the dominant buildings in the group. The store is a rectangular building with an east/west axis. It is made of granite blocks and has a gabled roof clad in corrugated iron. Windows barred by timber strips flank the central door on the southern side. The walls are thick and rendered internally and are lined with narrow shelves. It has a floor of wide boards and a loft area accessed by a ladder. There is a door high in the gable end that was probably used for loading from a cart into the loft area. A door on the northern side of the building has been filled in and there is a slab lean to section abutting this side of the building. Adjoining the store is a stone butchers shop. It has a lower roof with a small raised section along the centre of the roof ridge for ventilation.
\nThe stables have slab walls to plate height and comprise a rectangular core with a gabled roof and a verandah roof to the west, north and east. There is also a lean to extension to the east. The stables have a weatherboard hayloft added across the original gabled section. Openings along the southern side have large doors with forged pins, catches and hinges. To the north of the stables are yards.
\nBehind the store and butchers and separated from them by a large rocky outcrop is a single storey timber residence. Across from this to the north is a slab building with a gabled corrugated iron roof, which was the former blacksmith's shop. No blacksmithing equipment remains inside. In a line beyond this are a modern corrugated iron and weatherboard storage shed and a small bathroom structure comprising an enclosed, gabled roofed section with a drum shower suspended over a slatted timber floor. A corrugated iron partition divides this from an entrance area with a timber bench and washbowl. To the side of this is an open section sheltered by a skillion roof.
\nAbout 50 metres to the east of these buildings is a milking shed with a pole frame, open sides and a gabled roof clad in corrugated iron. The interior is fitted with cow bails. The adjoining yards are enclosed with sawn timber rails wired to posts.
\nTo the west of the homestead and across the creek is the family cemetery. A crenellated stone wall of coursed rubble encloses it and it is entered by an iron gate. Within the wall, arranged in two rows, are the graves of members of the Scott family. The memorials date from 1851 to 1962 and include including that of Simon Scott who died in 1858. A number of those buried were born on Taromeo in the 1840s and 50s. Some graves are outlined with granite stones, as is the narrow path down the centre. There are graves of Taromeo staff behind the cemetery enclosure including that of Charles Williams, the mason responsible for the stonework.
","history":"Taromeo was one of the original pastoral properties in the area and was taken up soon after land in Queensland became available for free settlement in 1842. The district was first divided into three huge runs, Taromeo, Tarong and Nanango, although Taromeo is thought to be the earliest of these by some months.
\nBy 1841 would be squatters were moving into southeast Queensland, settling first on the Darling Downs. The first sale of Brisbane land took place in Sydney in July 1842 and soon after an expedition comprising Andrew Petrie, Walter Wrottesley, W. Joliffe, Henry Stewart Russell, convicts and Aborigines set off to explore the Wide Bay area. Land holdings were quickly taken up, possibly as a result of their reports. In 1846 Capt S Perry and Burnett conducted surveys and Burnett alone made a second trip in 1847 looking at river systems mainly to establish a port to serve the area.
\nAlthough there is no evidence for the date on which Taromeo was first settled, it is known that in late 1842, John Borthwick, from Buaraba Homestead near Ipswich, and William Elliott Oliver visited Taromeo on their way north seeking land for establishing pastoral runs. Soon afterwards, Oliver took up Nanango and Borthwick continued northward to the land that was to become Tarong Station. Simon Scott had arrived from Scotland with his brother Walter in 1839. Simon worked initially on a property at Castlereagh and arrived in the Moreton Bay region in 1841 as part of a group delivering sheep to Cressbrook station. After taking up Taromeo he returned to Castlereagh and married Christine Swanson. In March 1847 Scott returned to Taromeo with his family and on 5 July 1847 applied for a squatter's license for an area of 200 square miles.
\nHe built a cedar house around 1850, probably replacing more primitive accommodation, and added ancillary buildings. Mrs Scott died on Christmas Day, 1851 and is buried at Taromeo, though the area was not officially proclaimed a cemetery reserve until 1878.[1] A stone pitched wall enclosing the cemetery was built by stonemason Charles Williams in 1882.[2] The smithy is thought to have been built in 1854 and Williams is said to have constructed a stone store and butcher's shop for Scott in 1856.[3] These were originally shingled and were separate buildings.
\nIn 1857 when a survey of the area was carried out, the station was flourishing with a number of buildings constructed and a large area under cultivation. Simon Scott, who had remarried in 1854, was killed close to the house in 1858 when he fell from his horse. His brother then ran the property until his son, also named Walter, came of age. The Scott family appears to have been on relatively good terms with local indigenous people and Walter Scott Junior, later MP for Burnett between 1871 and 1878, is reputed to have spoken their language fluently.
\n\n
By the 1860s, tenders were called for the conveyance of a mail service route between Ipswich and Nanango, via Wivenhoe, Mount Brisbane, Cressbrook, Colinton and Taromeo. A newspaper in 1870 reported that a tender for once a week services, by horse, had been accepted.[4] By 1882, tenders were called for the conveyance of this service by coach.[5] Taromeo was reportedly used as a horse-changing station, and a clearing house for mail, along this route.[6] The station ceased running sheep to raise cattle.
The original lease holding of Taromeo was reduced as the government sought to encourage closer settlement in the South Burnett region. Beginning in the 1870s, resumptions occurred over many years, through consolidation in the 1880s, to the early twentieth century when two Land Acts (1897 and 1902) allowed the resumption of much of the lease. In 1889 Walter Scott voluntarily allowed resumption of a large area on which the townships of Blackbutt and Benarkin were established, though most of it was subdivided into 160-acre farms.
The Queensland National Bank took over the property in the 1890s, leaving Mrs Scott as the manager after her husband died. She retired to live in Brisbane in 1897, when a relative then managed the property until the outbreak of World War I.
\nThe original homestead building was demolished in 1948, and a new homestead, guesthouse and meat house have been constructed to its south.[7] Work has been carried out to repair the early buildings. The stone walled cemetery is reputedly one of only two recorded stone walled family cemeteries in Australia and contains many of the Scott family graves.[8] There are a number of formerly unmarked graves of non-family members, staff and immigrants outside the walled enclosure.[9]
\nOn 9 January 2011, floodwaters breached the walls of the cemetery, severely damaging the stone walls and toppling the headstones. By 2012, South Burnett Regional Council secured approximately $180,000 in Federal and State government grants for its reconstruction, and a team of over 20 volunteers, including local residents, council staff, and members of the State Emergency Service (SES), rural fire brigade and the Blackbutt Heritage and Tourism Association, assisted in the cemetery rebuilding works. The walls were pieced back together by stonemasons Roy and Geoff Welling, using lime-based cement, and the stone of the remaining ruins. The marble headstones were cemented in place after being restored in Toowoomba and cleaned. The South Burnett Regional Council included a time-capsule within the cemetery walls, which includes a list of the names of the volunteers that worked on the project. On 23 February 2013, a ceremony took place to reopen the refurbished cemetery, and unveil new plaques listing its history.[10]
Taromeo Station was established by Simon Scott in about 1842 and is thought to have been the first run taken up in the Wide Bay/Burnett area. The run demonstrates the development of Queensland, particularly this area from the establishment of pastoral holdings in 1840s to closer settlement from the 1870s. The property illustrates the development of pastoral practices in Queensland, particularly the development of the beef industry in the South Burnett Region.
|Taromeo has a number of rare built elements including a stone walled private cemetery, thought to be one of only two stone walled family cemeteries in Australia
|The early date of Taromeo with its many extant features suggest that a potential exists for further historical and archaeological research which may yield information which will contribute to an understanding of early Queensland station life.
|The station complex at Taromeo is important in demonstrating the principal characteristics of an early Queensland pastoral station. The arrangement of the early buildings and their relationship to each other provides important evidence of early station life.
|Taromeo has aesthetic significance; the site has a picturesque quality resulting from the layering of traditional buildings of various styles, materials and periods of construction set amongst granite outcrops and large trees.
|Taromeo has special associations with the South Burnett community as one of their first settled stations and as a place of employment for local residents and their families many of whom remain in the area. The place is associated particularly with the Scott family who are important pioneers in the area.
","criteria_letters":"Criterion A | Criterion B | Criterion C | 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 has potential to yield information that will contribute to an understanding 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"}, {"heritage_type":"State Heritage","site_id":16332,"place_ref":601571,"name":"Nanango Court House","alternate_name":null,"street_address":"30 Henry Street","suburb":"NANANGO","lga":"SOUTH BURNETT REGIONAL COUNCIL","register_entry_date":"1995-01-13","description":"Nanango Court House is a symmetrically-planned timber building with a corrugated-iron roof and a wide verandah on three sides. The roof is low-pitched, with prominant gables and wide overhanging eaves. The verandah roofs are supported by grouped timber posts. The projecting entrance is distinguished by a small gable on paired timber posts. Behind it is a half-gabled roof. The main ridge of the roof is surmounted by a large ventilator, with a flagpole, which forms the dominant decorative element of the building.
","history":"Completed by late 1937, this single-storeyed timber building replaced a court house erected in 1912. The court house was designed in the office of the Department of Public Works; AB Leven was Chief Architect at the time.
The pastoral stations of Taromeo, Nanango and Tarong in the South Burnett district of Queensland, were taken up by selectors during the 1840s. In 1847, a prospector named Jacob Goode set up his camp near a waterhole on Nanango station, and reputedly established an inn. Goode proceeded to build stockyards and open a general store, and it is understood that a post office was opened at the small settlement in 1850. Gold was discovered in the Nanango district during the 1860s, and although the gold mining activity never lived up to the high expectations of the miners, it succeeded in attracting people to the area. A school was established in 1866, and it is noted that the first sale of town lots took place in October 1870. Records indicate that the area was opened up for closer settlement from the mid 1870s, and by the mid 1880s, the residential and business areas of the town was established. By the late 1880s, Directories described the main features of the area as sheep and cattle grazing; mining reefs and splendid timber.
Tenders were called in 1862 for additions to the court house and lock-up at Nanango, and it is possible that it had been built during the late 1850s. Additions to the court house for a Lands Office were completed in 1889. By the early 1910s, there was antagonism between the towns of Kingaroy and Nanango as they vied for supremacy in the district. Nanango provided the headquarters of the official staff of Government Departments such as Justice and Lands which controlled extensive districts, and the town was given a boost in 1912, when the District Court of Nanango was established to serve the Petty Sessions Districts of Nanango, Weinholt and Kilkivan. With the anticipated expansion of official work to be carried out, plans were prepared and a new court house erected at Nanango in 1912.
By 1936, a new court house was again required, and plans were prepared. The new building was completed in August 1937, and included offices for the Dairy Inspector, Stock Inspector, Clerk of Petty Sessions and Land Ranger. The site of the building was east of the former building, fronting Henry Street. The former court house was sold for removal.
Additions to the court house were undertaken during the mid 1960s, and included the provision of a tea room, storage facility and toilets.
","criteria":"Erected in 1937, the Nanango Court House survives as an important illustration of the pattern of Nanango's development as an official centre for the South Burnett district of Queensland.
|Nanango Court House is a good example of a timber court house in a provincial centre. It reflects the high standard of Government buildings in Queensland, designed by the Department of Public Works during the early-mid 20th century.
","criteria_letters":"Criterion A | Criterion D","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"}, {"heritage_type":"State Heritage","site_id":16637,"place_ref":601901,"name":"Carroll Cottage","alternate_name":"Daniel Carroll's House","street_address":"6 Edward Street","suburb":"KINGAROY","lga":"SOUTH BURNETT REGIONAL COUNCIL","register_entry_date":"2000-07-28","description":"Daniel Carroll's House is located on a small block of land in Edward Street in the town of Kingaroy. The house is comprised of a four roomed cottage with several accretions. The cottage is a small, single storey timber dwelling, low-set on short timber stumps with a short, centrally located entry stair. The area of the house that accommodates the front two rooms has a steep, hipped roof without eaves that is clad in corrugated iron and the back two rooms have a simple lean-to roof. A verandah runs across the front of the house with a recent cross braced balustrade replacing an earlier dowel balustrade. The cottage is clad externally in weatherboards and has ogee-profile steel window hoods surmounting the windows, which are double hung timber sashes.
The detached kitchen is located at the back of the house, connected by a raised, covered walkway that has been enclosed in horizontal, corrugated iron sheeting. On the western side this area is abutted by a bathroom also sheeted in corrugated iron. The kitchen is a simple rectilinear building with a pitched roof. It is clad in weatherboards and has been extended with a small open, lean-to at the back which is used for timber storage. The cottage is lined internally with beaded, tongue and groove timber boarding and has three bedrooms and a parlour. The kitchen is lined with fibro cement sheeting.
","history":"Daniel Carroll's House is a small timber residence constructed in 1900 on a selection owned by Daniel Carroll. Carroll was an early settler of the district, part of a wave of selectors who took up land in the area from the 1880s onwards, and his cottage was the nucleus of a small settlement that was to become the town of Kingaroy. Significant pastoral expansion took place in southern Queensland commencing in 1840 when extensive tracts of land were taken up on the Darling Downs, Brisbane Valley and Logan River area in 1840 and 41. The first large properties of the Burnett district, Tarong and Nanango, were taken up in 1842.
For about 40 years, these large pastoral holdings survived substantially intact and their dominance suppressed the need for service towns. However, the Lands Act of 1868 caused dramatic changes to rural areas and large portions of these leases were resumed for selection purposes. The result was the closer settlement of smaller selections, which consequently enabled the establishment of rural communities and created a need for service towns and public facilities. The first notable selection in the area was that of the Markwell brothers, who applied for 2156 hectares of land in 1878. It was located on the Stuart River and Kingaroy Creek and became known as the Kingaroy Paddock, ultimately giving its name to the area.
In 1891, Daniel Carroll selected portion 107V, a 160 acre block abutting the Kingaroy Paddock. Carroll had arrived from Ireland at the age of twenty in 1887 and spent some years in the area working as a coach driver. In 1898, it was reported that Carroll was the only European living in the vicinity of the current site of Kingaroy and that he had built a hut for himself and a yard for his horses nearby. In 1900, in anticipation of his forthcoming marriage to Bridget Pender, Carroll had the present cottage built, by a Mr Ferdinand Seng. By this time, Carroll had selected further blocks of land adjoining portion 107V.
To facilitate the transport of timber and other produce of developing agricultural industries in the district, the Kilkivan branch railway was extended to Wondai in 1903 and to the "56 mile peg" in 1904. The 56 mile peg was near the corner of the Kingaroy Paddock. The termination of the railway line at the peg was the impetus for the establishment of the town of Kingaroy. Daniel Carroll and Arthur Youngman (owner of Taabinga station) sold town blocks at public auction in 1903-04. When the first train arrived on 19 December 1904, the Carroll Cottage was one of only three buildings at the termination site. The others being Carroll's new hotel, The Carrollee (burnt down in 1913)and F C Petersen's recently completed store. The official banquet for the opening of the railway was held in Carroll's horse paddock.
After the extension of the railway, the establishment of commercial premises such as shops and hotels were soon followed by public offices, churches and schools. The seven years that the town served as railhead were sufficient to secure its growth beyond neighbouring centres and establish a lasting dominance. Daniel Carroll continued to be involved with the development of Kingaroy through his property interests and as a member of a variety of committees for public facilities. He donated a building site from his original block for St. Mary's, the first Catholic Church in Kingaroy and also donated land for the hospital. The Carroll family moved into a new home in Albert Street in 1910, but retained possession of the cottage, which was rented out. The property is still owned by members of the Carroll family, with the Kingaroy Historical Society as caretakers. It is furnished and interpreted to the early Interwar period and is open by appointment as a house museum.
","criteria":"Daniel Carroll's House is important in demonstrating the evolution and pattern of Queensland's history, reflecting the housing and living conditions of early settlers in rural districts. As the earliest dwelling to be constructed in Kingaroy, Daniel Carroll's House demonstrates the growth of the town from a rural selection to a thriving town around a railhead and later a regional administrative and commercial centre. Constructed in 1900, the house is conspicuous amongst surrounding Interwar homes as being of an earlier period and contributes to an understanding of how the town developed.
|Daniel Carroll's House demonstrates the principal characteristics of a small, timber residence constructed in a then remote rural district. Key features include the simple rectilinear form of the building, steep, hipped roof, basic four-roomed plan and detached kitchen. The house provides a good illustration of the way in which houses have traditionally been extended in Queensland.
|Daniel Carroll's House has aesthetic significance derived from its simple design, diminutive scale, cottage-like form and unrefined use of materials. It is largely intact and its current use as a house museum has the ability to evoke an impression of the lives of early residents and other times.
|Daniel Carroll's House has strong social value to the Kingaroy community, both as the earliest house in the settlement on its original site and also as part of a community museum complex maintained by the local historical society.
|The house has a special association with Daniel Carroll, a key figure in the establishment of Kingaroy.
","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":19647,"place_ref":602525,"name":"Nanango Butter Factory Building","alternate_name":null,"street_address":"George Street","suburb":"NANANGO","lga":"SOUTH BURNETT REGIONAL COUNCIL","register_entry_date":"2005-06-03","description":"The main factory building is two stories high, rectangular, and runs parallel to George Street, on a north-south axis. It is constructed of concrete, with a brick extension to the north, and has fibrous cement sheeting and battens on the upper levels to the north and south. It has a gabled roof of galvanised iron with skylights, and a clerestory runs along the apex of the southern part of the roof. The western side of the building facing George Street has been stuccoed. There are four doors, a high-set roller door, and two hatches on the western side of the factory, five roller doors on the south side, and a roller door on the north side. There is a high-set loading bay with roller door on the southern end of the east side, and a concrete loading dock juts out between this and the engine room to the north. Windows are generally steel-framed with wire-covered panes, or consist of panelled glass louvres.
Internally the factory is divided into two main sections with concrete floors, and the smaller northern end currently contains an office facing George Street, with a larger open section behind. The southern end has a small office on a raised section facing George Street, and a large open area behind this, with a coldroom and storeroom on the George Street side, north of the office. A door on the east side of the southern section leads from the main space through to the engine room.
On the east side of the factory is an attached single-story engine room, with gabled roof of galvanised iron, constructed of rendered brick, with metal strapping set into the render. Steel loops are welded to the strapping at intervals. The engine room has a smaller northern section, with a roller door exiting the north side, and a double steel door exits the southern section to the east. The engine room has a concrete floor, and contains the concrete mounting pads of removed equiptment, and one small engine. A hole has recently been cut into the floor of the engine room, near the largest concrete mounting.
South of the factory, across a large concrete pad, is the old office building of the Nanango Dairy Co-operative Association. It faces George Street, and is constructed of brick with a concrete and stucco frontage. To the east of the concrete pad are two open sheds of steel and timber construction, and an enclosed timber shed. To the east of the factory and engine room are a number of other structures. Running south to north these include: a small overgrown shed, related to the factory's cooling system; a rectangular semi-underground covered concrete tank; a brick toilet block; two underground concrete tanks next to the engine room; a small open-topped semi-underground concrete water tank; and a open two-storied twin-gabled loading bay, constructed of steel and timber and clad in galvanised iron. It has raised vents at each apex, clad in curved galvanised iron sheeting.
","history":"The Nanango Butter Factory, bounded by George Street and Sandy Creek, Nanango, is closely linked to the development of the Nanango district, as well as the rise and fall of the dairy industry in Queensland. The original factory, made of timber, was built in 1905. The current factory, of concrete and brick construction, was erected in 1927, extended to the north in 1953, and retains a number of its outbuildings and structures. These include loading bays, concrete tanks, sheds, and an office building.
The South Burnett district was first settled by Europeans in the early 1840s, as pastoralists worked their way north from the Darling Downs. By 1842 the sheep station Taromeo had been established by Simon Scott. Two other sheep stations were established shortly thereafter: Nanango, by William Elliot Oliver, and Tarong, by John Borthwick. Taromeo, Nanango and Tarong had all switched to beef cattle by the 1880s. Oliver's Head Station was at a creek two miles west of the site of the town of Nanango. The latter grew around an inn established by Jacob Goode in 1848, after he was allowed to camp near a waterhole on Nanango Station. The tracks from the Darling Downs and Brisbane converged at Goode's Inn on their way to Gayndah.
Nanango is one of Queensland's oldest towns. A post office was established at Goode's Inn in 1850, and in 1857 Nanango was gazetted for Courts of Petty Session, with a Courthouse being built in 1859. In 1861 the town of Nanango was surveyed, and the first sale of town blocks occurred in 1862, between today's Henry, Appin, George and Alfred Streets. James Nash found gold seven miles southeast of Inn in 1866, and the "Seven Mile Diggings" helped to increase the population of the area. Closer settlement began after an 1875 petition, and in 1876 regulations were for drawn up for monthly land courts, the first of which occurred in Nanango in 1877. In 1879 the Barambah Divisional Board was formed, and its office was built in Nanango in 1883. The 1884 Agricultural Lands Purchase Act aided in the resumption of part of Nanango Station for selection by farmers, who produced wheat and butter for the local market. Timber getting was also an industry in the area.
Initially, local farmers kept a few cows for domestic purposes, and town dwellers paid a fee to have a house cow that could be grazed on the town common. The first commercial dairy farm was started near Nanango in 1865, but this was a small operation that had to cart its cream overland to Gympie. By the 1890s events were occurring that would lead to the rapid growth of commercial dairy farming around Nanango, such as the advent of mechanical cream separators in Australia in the 1880s; the Babcock butterfat test; government grading of butter; and the advent of refrigerated shipping from Brisbane in 1884. In the late 1880s and early 1890s the Department of Agriculture and Stock used a Travelling Dairy to demonstrate techniques and equipment to potential dairy farmers. The 1893 Meat and Dairy Produce Act, which established subsidies for dairy farmers, and the 1894 Agricultural Lands Purchase Act also aided commercial dairying. Between 1894 and 1919 a large amount of land was repurchased by the government from pastoralists, was and offered as agricultural selections. Closer settlement legislation between 1906 and 1917 also played its part in creating small agricultural service towns, as did the spread of Queensland's railway network. In 1890 there were 3,500 kilometres of rail-line in Queensland. By 1910 there was 6,300 kilometres and by 1920, 9,300 kilometres. Between 1910 and 1920, most of the lines built were branch lines for agriculture.
The Co-operative movement, where producers held shares in the enterprises that processed and sold their product, had been developed in Switzerland during the 1880s, and was transferred from Victoria to Queensland by dairy immigrants during the 1890s and the first decade of the twentieth century. In 1900 the South Burnett carried 3000 acres of crops, 7000 sheep, and 84,000 cattle. Dairying became a mainstay of the Nanango district between 1900 and 1914, the period of the industry's most rapid development.
In 1903, the year that the Shire of Nanango was formed, the railway reached Wondai. In December of that year a thrice-weekly cream van run from Kunioon to the railhead was organised by Mr William Selby. Four farmers from Booie had begun carting their cream to Wondai earlier that year. From Wondai, the cream travelled by train to Gympie. In 1904 meetings were called at Nanango to consider a Co-operative butter factory, and in July 1904 the Nanango Co-operative Dairy Company was formed. The company was floated in February 1905, and in October a tender to build the factory was allocated to Waugh and Josephson. A single story timber factory was built in late 1905 for £820 (a second story was later added in September 1907). Machinery and plant cost a further £929. The first Annual General Meeting of the Co-operative was held in February 1906, and 1565 shares were allotted to 152 shareholders, 115 of those being fully paid up.
Butter manufacture commenced in April 1906, and by November the factory was also supplying ice. By 1906 the railway was moving closer to Nanango, and the first consignment of three tonnes of butter was dispatched from the Kingaroy railhead (1904). Nanango butter soon developed a reputation for excellence; in June 1906 the factory's product won first prize at the Maryborough show. Catalysts for dairying occurring around this time included the 1904 and 1905 Dairy Produce Acts; a cream testing certificate for officers in butter factories, introduced in 1906; and the 1906 Closer settlement Act. By 1910 there were 100 suppliers for the Nanango factory, which produced 197,889 pounds of butter. In 1911 the railway reached Nanango from the north, and in 1913 it reached Yarraman from the south.
On 25 October 1918, a fire started by lightening destroyed the factory, which was re-opened on 15 December 1919. By 1920, there were 5,000 sheep in the South Burnett compared to 230,000 beef and dairy cattle, with 10,000 pigs and 42,000 acres of crops. The Cactoblastis cactorum insect was introduced in 1923, and its defeat of the prickly pear enabled the Queensland dairy industry to rebuild and expand during the late 1920s, leading to the 1930s dairy boom. Also during the 1920s Butter and Cheese Boards were formed to equalise market prices, and the Nanango Co-operative Dairy Company became the Nanango Co-operative Dairy Association in 1924. By 1925 there were 320 suppliers to the factory.
On 13 October 1926 the factory burned once more, shortly after an equiptment upgrade, and it was re-built in concrete at a cost of about £15,800. The Minister for Works, Michael J. Kirwan, officially opened the factory on 21 October 1927. In October 1929 a Mr W.G. Counsel of the Electric Supply Works, Warwick, recommended that the butter factory supply electricity to the town, using its engine to power a generator. Electricity was supplied from the factory to the Nanango Shire Council between March 1933 and March 1948.
By the 1930s, dairying was the most widely spread agricultural industry in Queensland, and it was the state's second most profitable export industry from 1936 to 1941. In 1938 there were five co-operative butter factories in the South Burnett: Nanango (since 1906), Kingaroy (1907), Murgon (1911), Wondai (1931), and Proston (1935). In 1940 the factory at Nanango peaked at 483 suppliers. A cheese factory was established during World War Two to feed the troops, but it only operated between January 1942 and November 1943. The building still stands to the north of the butter factory. In the 1947-48 financial year 2,806,881 pounds of butter was produced at the Nanango factory, and in 1948 the Nanango Dairy Co-operative Trading Society as created as a subsidiary of the Nanango Co-operative Dairy Association.
By 1950 the South Burnett was carrying 650 sheep, 130,000 dairy cows (ten percent of the Queensland total), 110,000 beef cattle, 70,000 pigs, and 160,000 acres of crops. However, as demand and prices for butter dropped in the 1950s, the decline of dairying accelerated. In 1953 the Nanango butter factory started producing butter milk powder, and a brick annex was added to the northern end of the factory to house the roller-drying plant. Butter consumption per capita in Australia dropped from 12.2 kg to 8.3 kg between 1957 and 1972, and Britain joining the European Economic Community provided another blow to prices. Irregular seasonal conditions and a lack of profits led many dairy farmers to drop out of the industry, and by 1975 the factory had 66 suppliers left. 1977 witnessed the end of the butter and cheese price equalisation scheme, and in May of that year butter production ended at Nanango. The factory continued to act as a depot for bulk milk tanker collections, which had begun in 1972. When the Nanango Dairy Co-operative Association closed the factory in 1986 only 37 milk suppliers remained.
The railway line that used to run alongside the western side of the factory has disappeared, as has a large water cooler that stood to the northeast of the factory. A 1929 Ruston Hornsby Model 9XHC 132 horsepower diesel engine, with a seven-foot flywheel, and a 1935 Ruston Hornsby Model VER 220 horsepower diesel of 18 tonnes, remained on site until June 2004. These engines would have been used to run the factory's machinery, as well as to generate electricity for Nanango. A gas fitting business currently occupies the northern extension of the main factory building, and a plumber uses the southern end. To the south of the factory the old office building, of late 1920s construction, is now a residence/home business.
","criteria":"The 1927 Nanango butter factory, built on a site that was used for butter production from 1906 to 1977, is evidence of the growth and decline of the dairy industry within the Nanango Shire, and within Queensland.
|The decline in the Queensland dairy industry in the 1960s and 1970s, and the resulting closure of small town butter factories, means that ex-butter factories that are relatively intact are now becoming uncommon.
|The layout of the factory, with its large internal space, loading bays, cold room, engine room, exterior water tanks, office building and other secondary structures demonstrates the principle characteristics of a early twentieth century butter factory.
","criteria_letters":"Criterion A | Criterion B | Criterion D","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"}, {"heritage_type":"State Heritage","site_id":31371,"place_ref":602747,"name":"King's Boarding House (former)","alternate_name":"Kings Boarding House","street_address":"Maidenwell-Cooyar Road","suburb":"MAIDENWELL","lga":"SOUTH BURNETT REGIONAL COUNCIL","register_entry_date":"2010-09-17","description":"King's Boarding House (former) is located on an elevated parcel of land overlooking the Maidenwell-Cooyar Road, Maidenwell. It is comprised of two structures connected by a covered walkway. The structure to the east overlooking the road is the original boarding house while the structure to the west is the original kitchen.
The landscape around the coach house is scrubby with the only established plantings being a large Bunya Pine (Araucaria bidwillii) to the north of the kitchen and a palm tree to the north of the boarding house. Located in the southern courtyard of the complex bounded by the kitchen, walkway and boarding house are the remains of a stone lined well. A mound of spent carbide is located at the southern end of the kitchen building.
The coach house complex including the boarding house, kitchen and walkway are all equally elevated above the ground. The boarding house is comprised of a simple rectilinear planned core with an enclosed verandah to the west and semi enclosed verandah to the east. A gable roof form covers the main core of the building while simple lean-to roofs cover the verandahs.
The kitchen structure is also comprised of a central rectilinear planned core covered by a gable roof. A simple lean-to roof covers the semi enclosed verandah space to the west. No verandah exists to the east of the structure; however remains of floor framing indicate that such a structure may once have existed on this side of the kitchen. A fire place and associated chimney constructed from stone bonded with lime and loam adjoins the northern end of the kitchen.
The walkway between the boarding house and kitchen is covered by a curved roof. All roofs to the coach house complex are clad with corrugated metal sheeting.
The coach house complex is established on a floor framing system comprised of hardwood stumps, rough sawn hardwood drop log bearers, pit sawn hardwood joists and floor boards. Exterior walls to both buildings are timber framed with the dominant wall construction for both structures being a system of vertically expressed hardwood posts housed into bed log bearers and extended up to meet a hardwood top plate. Smaller twin sections of timber are fixed to posts to create rebates running the length of the post. Pit sawn timber slabs are stacked horizontally into these rebates to create the wall membrane.
Wall construction differs across the coach house complex. In the kitchen building the wall to the semi enclosed southern verandah is constructed from rough sawn vertical timber slabs spanning from the ground to the pitching point of the lean-to roof. In the boarding house the southern end of the east facing verandah has been enclosed with butt jointed pit sawn hardwood boards spanning vertically from floor level to the pitching point of the lean-to verandah roof. The eastern exterior wall to the boarding house is clad with dressed tongue and groove timber boards.
At the gable and lean-to roof ends of both the boarding house and kitchen timber framing is extended from wall top plates to the under side of the timber framed roof structures. These wall areas are externally clad with hardwood weatherboards. Remnant painted signage that reads 'King's Boarding House' is just visible on the southern gable end of the boarding house building.
Some windows to the coach house complex are now missing, those extant include a combination of double hung timber framed windows to the boarding house and timber framed fixed and casement windows to the kitchen. Windows to the northern, western and eastern elevations of the boarding house are protected from the weather by timber framed awnings sheeted with corrugated iron.
Internally both buildings reveal clear evidence of the manner in which they were originally configured despite sections of internal wall and ceiling linings being removed.
In the boarding house remnant hardwood partitions indicate that both the central core of the building and the enclosed southern verandah were broken up into a number of rooms. The enclosed section of the northern verandah accommodated the post office. Surviving fabric indicates that the ceiling and internal partitions were lined with timber tongue and groove boards while internal surfaces to external walls remained unlined revealing the timber post and slab style of construction.
The kitchen building includes an open plan central core complete with stone fireplace for cooking and a semi enclosed western verandah and sub floor cellar. An intact high level partition indicates that the core of the building may once have been divided into two rooms. The verandah is set at ground level and has an earth floor. Similar to the external walls of the verandah the cellar walls are constructed of vertically stood timber slabs set in between timber stumps and spanning from ground level to meet bearers above. This cellar is accessed via a set of timber framed doors.
The timber framed roof structure is exposed in the core of the kitchen building and it is not clear if the ceiling was lined. There is no evidence of internal linings to the external walls of the kitchen building and as with the boarding house the timber post and slab wall construction is expressed internally as it is externally.
","history":"The former King's Boarding House, a gabled building of horizontal slab construction with a detached kitchen was built in 1889 by selector John King, on the Maidenwell-Cooyar Rd, Maidenwell.
The area encompassing present day Maidenwell, close to the Bunya Mountains and on the Cooyar Range, was first settled in the post-contact era following the establishment of Tarong Station [QHR 600759] by James Borthwick in 1842. It was a vast holding of approximately 250 sq miles (168.35 sq km) comprising four runs; Tarong, Kunioon, Tureen and Neumgna.
The creation of large holdings such as Tarong played a key role in the development of Queensland's transport network, with mail routes often following tracks and stock routes connecting pastoral properties. By 1849, pastoralists in the Burnett district were petitioning the Postmaster General to establish mail services to their regions. In 1859, the Postmaster-General advertised for tenders for two mail services to Nanango: one via 'North Brisbane' and another via Drayton. The Drayton route was operating by 1860 and connected the Rosalie, Cooyar and Tarong pastoral stations before terminating at Nanango.
The establishment of the railway network throughout Queensland from the mid 1860s realigned the way goods and services were transported between destinations, with routes feeding into the railway assuming greater importance. The railway from Toowoomba reached Jondaryan at the end of 1867, with a mail service between Nanango and Jondaryan established soon after, replacing the Drayton-Nanango service while still using much of the earlier route. By 1877, the Nanango correspondent for the Brisbane Courier named Jondaryan Railway Station as 'the chief depot from where goods arrive to this township'.
Under the Crown Lands Alienation Act of 1876 approximately 35 square miles (56.33 sq km) of the Neumgna run of Tarong was resumed in 1878, to open the area for conditional selection. On 10 April 1883, John King applied to lease Portion 194, a 640 acre (258.99 ha) block. King along with his brother James and William McConnell were the first closer settlers in the district.
John King was born in Chalgrove, Oxfordshire, England in 1853, later immigrating to Australia with his parents. While the date of his arrival is undetermined, family history records King working on the Main Range railway and later in a brick factory, after his arrival. King married Mary Chalklin in 1875 at Ipswich and by 1879 had taken out a brand registration in the Parish of Greenmount, Warwick, indicating an involvement with agriculture prior to his selection of land in the South Burnett. Following the death of his wife Mary in 1895, King remarried in 1898 to Caroline Rutsch. Both spouses had two children from their first marriages, and five more children were born at Maidenwell.
After Portion 194 was surveyed in early 1884, John King objected, as the eastern boundary cut off his property's direct access to the Jondaryan-Nanango road. This issue was resolved by excising 84 acres (33.99 ha) from adjoining Portion 193, the former selection of James King, who had forfeited his lease to take up another selection nearby. Consequently, John King's selection was increased to 724 acres (292.99 ha), with a frontage along the road.
The conditional selection inspection of 1890 lists among the improvements, a house and outhouses, fencing, ringbarking of 100 acres and nine acres of land under cultivation. A well of 26ft depth was also noted, the structure behind the name of 'Maidenwell'. Initially used by King for his own property, the name Maidenwell later assumed a wider use for the district and subsequent township in the early twentieth century.
The house listed in the 1890 inspection is believed to have been built in 1889, replacing an earlier slab hut that was built some 400 metres in from the Nanango road. The building, constructed of horizontal hardwood slabs and weatherboards, had a front verandah, was sheltered by a gabled roof clad in shingles and included a detached kitchen to the rear, connected via a walkway. King utilised stone bonded with lime and loam to construct a fireplace and chimney, and an underground water tank adjacent to the walkway. The space underneath the kitchen was used as a cellar, to store home made wine, jam and preserves, from produce grown on the property. A large mound of spent carbide close to the house indicates the use of this material for lighting.
The Kings capitalised on their residence's close proximity to the road and its location suggests that a commercial use may have been intended for the building when constructed. By at least 1899, and possibly earlier, the Kings were operating a boarding house, the Pinpinbugie Receiving Office and a store from their residence.
The precise date coach services were established between Nanango and Jondaryan is unclear. By 1893 Michael Collins operated the Nanango-Jondaryan mail service twice a week by buggy and a coach run was operating between the townships by 1897. Coach routes were broken up into 'stages' or 'posts', and the amenities offered to travellers at such places, were a critical component of road infrastructure throughout Queensland. While the size and range of services offered at coach stops varied, essentially they were places where horses were changed and where establishments offered food, drink and accommodation.
Coach stops were important spaces for travellers to socialise, shelter from inclement conditions and obtain information on the condition of the road ahead.
The setting of King's Boarding House, above a water crossing and on level ground highly visible and in close proximity to the road, follows the pattern found at similar coach stops at Bankfoot House, Glasshouse Mountains [QHR 602702] and the 'Stonehouse' at Moore [QHR 601626]. Addressing the road on its east facing gable, the name 'King's Boarding House', can still be faintly made out on the building.
Although John King was listed as the Receiving Office Keeper, his wife Caroline is thought to have been responsible for duties attached to the office, with about 120 letters received and despatched each month. In 1906 the office was renamed the Maidenwell Receiving Office. Part of the front verandah of the homestead was enclosed to form the office, with a mail slot inserted into the verandah wall.
The King's store operated from the cellar beneath the detached kitchen and serviced the local settler population, which increased as further land was made available for selection in the Parishes of Neumgna and Tureen, from 1903 to 1914. An interesting detail of the former store area is the inscription of 'Big Druth (sic) 1902' together with a date and the initials 'J.K.', which appears to a record of the devastating drought that occurred throughout Australia in the early years of the twentieth century.
Branch railway line extensions to Nanango (1911), Cooyar (via Oakey, 1913) and Tarong (1915) ended the role of Jondaryan station as the railhead for the district. In 1906 and 1907 King selected Portions 50 and 52, adjoining the north-western boundary of his property, and it was here that the small settlement of Maidenwell came to be established in the 1910s. The services that King had offered for travellers and local settlers at his original selection were eventually transferred to this new location. In 1913 King built the Maidenwell Hotel, opening in early 1914. The Maidenwell Receiving Office remained at King's original premises until 1918, when John Castree, who was operating a store first established by King in 1914, became the mail receiving officer.
John King passed away in 1934, with Portion 194 left to his sons Walter and James. Walter King assumed full title in 1939, later building a residence near the boarding house, and was involved in farming and dairying on the property. In 1970 Portion 194 was subdivided into two lots, with the former boarding house and later residence included within the boundary of Lot 1. In 1972, Walter's son Donald became the titleholder of both lots, retaining ownership of Lot 1 until 2000, when it was bought by the present owners.
While the roof is now clad in corrugated metal sheeting and some alterations have occurred internally and to the exterior verandah wall, the former King's Boarding House remains relatively intact and is currently used for storage.
","criteria":"King's Boarding House (former) is important for its strong aesthetic appeal. Located in a quiet rural setting, the place has been a prominent roadside landmark on the Maidenwell-Cooyar Rd for well over a century.
|King's Boarding House (former) is important as a once common, now uncommon surviving example of a coach stop established on a historically important travel route. Coach stops/changing stations and the services they provided were a critical component of road infrastructure throughout Queensland, prior to the emergence of the motor vehicle in the twentieth century. While some alterations have occurred over time, the place is relatively intact and retains sufficient fabric in its layout and materials to demonstrate its functions as a boarding house, mail receiving office and store.
|King's Boarding House (former) is important for its potential to contribute to our understanding of horizontal timber slab construction, and to assist in the comparative analysis of similar places built in 19th century Queensland.
|The former King's Boarding House is an important surviving example of a coach stop established on a historically important travel route. Its setting, along a flat section of a predominantly hilly road, easily visible to travellers and near a water crossing, is a good example of a favourable site for a coach stop/changing station on a coach route. While some alterations have occurred over time, the place is relatively intact and retains sufficient fabric in its layout and materials to demonstrate its functions as a boarding house, mail receiving office and store.
|The former King's Boarding House (1889) is important in demonstrating the pattern of development in the South Burnett associated with the beginnings of closer settlement in the region from the 1880s. In addition to being a family residence, by 1899, the place operated as a boarding house for travellers on the Jondaryan-Nanango route, and as a mail receiving office and store for the growing settler community, until the establishment of the Maidenwell township in the 1910s.
King's Boarding House (former) is important in illustrating the evolution of transport and communications links in the Wide Bay-Burnett district. Located on a road in use as mail route by the 1850s, the provision of a boarding house for travellers, and a receiving office and store demonstrates the expansion of roadside services along the route in response to the establishment of coach services and increased closer settlement in the district during the 1890s.
","criteria_letters":"Criterion E | Criterion B | Criterion C | Criterion D | Criterion A","criteria_definitions":"The place is important because of its aesthetic significance | The place demonstrates rare, uncommon or endangered aspects of Queensland's cultural heritage | The place has potential to yield information that will contribute to an understanding of Queensland's history | The place is important in demonstrating the principal characteristics of a particular class of cultural places | The place is important in demonstrating the evolution or pattern of Queensland's history"}, {"heritage_type":"State Heritage","site_id":31876,"place_ref":602811,"name":"South Burnett Co-operative Dairy Association Factory (former)","alternate_name":null,"street_address":"Macalister Street","suburb":"MURGON","lga":"SOUTH BURNETT REGIONAL COUNCIL","register_entry_date":"2012-11-09","description":"The former Murgon Butter Factory stands to the corner of Macalister and McLucas Streets in the southern outskirts of Murgon, adjacent to the formation of the Kilkivan/Kingaroy railway line. The site is a complex of buildings and structures tightly assembled with the main entrance from Macalister Street arriving to a rectangular bitumened yard from which the loading dock of the factory worked. The site is notable for the buildings and structures surviving from the various eras of the dairy processing business including the relocated former Tiaro Butter Factory, main building (1929), plant room, boiler shed and stack.
Main building (1929)
Fronting the loading yard to Macalister Street, the main building is a rectangular concrete shed distinguished by decorative stepped parapets which screen a gable roof clad with corrugated metal sheeting. The north-west elevation is divided into seven bays each housing recessed blind panels to the upper level and openings within the recessed panels to the exterior loading dock. Two dock level bays accommodate nine-light casement windows and the balance have either large timber doors or fixed timber panels. The decorative stepped parapet to this elevation contains the lettering "The South Burnett Co-operative Dairy Association Ltd" framed by moulded decorative scrolls to each side. The north-east elevation is divided into three bays, one of which has a large timber door opening onto the dock which extends through the space joining the main building and the earlier Tiaro building. This elevation is distinguished by a glazed semi-circular window within the stepped parapet. The south-west elevation has three blind bays and a blind semi-circular window within the parapet. The south-east elevation is part concrete and part timber framed clad with corrugated metal sheeting and houses a large modern roller door.
The roof is framed with steel trusses and the ceiling is lined with a particle board sheeting joined with cover strips. The shed has a concrete floor throughout and a raised concrete dock (parts covered with red tiles) runs around the north-east and north-west sides. A narrow roof vent with fixed glazed windows and timber louvres runs along the ridge.
A concrete loading dock sheltered by a metal awning supported by metal posts runs along the north-west side of the buildings to the Macalister Street yard, from the southern corner of the main building (1929) to the northern corner of the earlier former Tiaro butter factory building. Siding railway tracks from the nearby Kilkivan/Kingaroy line run parallel to the dock.
Former Tiaro butter factory structures
Timber framed and clad and sheltered by gable roofs clad with corrugated iron, the two rectangular structures surviving from the former Tiaro butter factory stand to the Macalister Street yard of the complex south-east of the modern besser block shed standing to the north corner. Facing north-west, the northern building is distinguished by a narrow blind roof vent running along the ridge while the southern building has a narrow ridge roof vent with fixed timber louvres. These structures accommodate a number of spaces associated with dairy product processing including cold and salt rooms and are comprised of brick and concrete partitions and posts, timber floors, and concrete floors and ceilings. Some rooms have coved ceilings of a particle board sheeting joined with cover strips.
Modern cold rooms and laboratory facilities occupy the northern part of the former external dock to Macalister Street.
The space between the earlier Tiaro buildings and the main building (1929) is sheltered by a skillion roof and is open to the dock.
Other earlier structures
Other earlier structures associated with butter and milk product processing include a rectangular timber shed to the McLucas Street side and a small timber shed with twin gable roofs standing south of the stack.
Plant Room
A rectangular steel framed and concrete shed sheltered by a gable roof clad with corrugated metal sheeting, the plant room stands to the middle of the site. The south-west wall is concrete with a corrugated iron gable infill; the concrete block north-east wall has a fibrous cement sheet gable infill and the side walls are concrete to half height, the balance clad with corrugated iron. The interior concrete walls are plastered and painted, a dado line separating the upper and lower portions. A concrete floor runs throughout and low concrete upstands accommodate various pieces of machinery. The timber framed roof is unlined and accommodates a narrow ridge vent with fixed glazed windows and timber louvres. Two large 20-light steel framed windows punctuate the north-west wall and a double timber door opens to the south-east. A later cold room extension sheltered by a skillion roof sits off the south-east side.
An array of plant including engines, pulleys and belts, pipes, gauges, valves, exhaust fans and equipment associated with the ammonia chilling process is accommodated in the shed.
Boiler shed and stack
Two cylindrical metal boilers with brick fireboxes framed with steel strapping are housed in a rectangular timber framed shed sheltered by a hipped roof and clad with corrugated iron. The fireboxes have metal fronts with a number of hatch openings. Each firebox connects by a brick tunnel to the stack standing to the south-east.
A concrete floor runs throughout the shed and there is a short run of trolley rails adjacent to the fireboxes. The south-west elevation is relieved by three large unglazed window openings. The shed accommodates plant and equipment associated with the boilers including ladders, gantries, pipes and valves.
The tall brick stack is square in plan, tapers to the top, and is bound by metal strapping. The stack is distinguished by stepped cornices to the plinth and crown.
Modern structures not considered to be of heritage significance
Three later besser block buildings associated with the dairy processing business - one to the north corner of the site and two south-east of the former Tiaro structures - are not considered to be of heritage significance.
The site accommodates a number of recent structures that relate to the present wine making business including tanks and storage and cold rooms which are not of heritage significance.
","history":"The former South Burnett Co-operative Dairy Association Ltd Factory Murgon, incorporating a range of structures dating from 1908 onwards, was built for South Burnett Co-operative Dairy Association, and is an important site associated with the manufacture of dairy products in the region from 1913 to 1995.
From the late 1800s, a number of critical factors enabled the expansion of the dairy industry into one of Queensland's principal primary industries by the interwar period. These included: government resumption and repurchase of land from pastoralists for the purpose of agricultural selection; the introduction of mechanical cream separators in the 1880s; Babcock testing to accurately measure cream content in milk; The Meat and Dairy Encouragement Act 1893 which made provision for government loans to construct butter and cheese factories; and the Department of Agriculture and Stock's use of a ‘Travelling Dairy' to demonstrate techniques and equipment to potential dairy farmers throughout Queensland. This period also saw the introduction of sown pastures such as paspalum and Rhodes grass and the cultivation of fodder, to improve milk yields and to provide adequate feed during the less productive months of winter.
Effective transport infrastructure was essential for dairy products to reach their desired markets. The extension of Queensland's rural railway network enabled more efficient transportation of dairy produce, facilitating the establishment of local butter and cheese factories in close proximity to railway lines. The first shipment of butter to Britain occurred in 1895 and from 1903, government subsidisation of a fortnightly shipping service to the United Kingdom improved Queensland's butter exporting capabilities.
The arrival of the Kilkivan branch railway to Murgon in 1904 was the impetus for the establishment of the township and a catalyst for the rapid expansion of dairying in the surrounding district, then an emerging but relatively small scale industry in the South Burnett.
By the early 1900s, co-operatives, where groups of local producers banded together to establish factories, were becoming the dominant form of ownership of cheese and butter factories, a pattern that defined the Queensland dairy industry for much of the twentieth century. In 1908 Tiaro Dairy Co-operative Company was established, with a butter factory built of timber opening in the township in the same year. A significant number of cream suppliers to the factory were from the South Burnett, from areas such as Goomeri, Kilkivan and Murgon. A cream receiving depot was established in Murgon, where cream was forwarded to Tiaro by rail. By 1912, 84 percent of the Tiaro butter factory's cream supply was sourced from the South Burnett and a correspondingly large number of the co-operative's shareholders were from the region. A meeting of shareholders in August 1912 voted to move the factory's operations to Murgon.
A site was acquired along Macalister Street, close to Murgon Railway Station in August 1913 and following the relocation of the Tiaro factory to Murgon, operations commenced in September. Mr George Wood was the builder of the factory while Waugh and Josephson were contractors for the machinery. The capacity of the factory increased from 12 tons at Tiaro to 40 tons of butter per week. In early 1914 the co-operative adopted the name of the South Burnett Co-operative Dairy Company Limited (SBCDC). During the latter half of the year, a railway siding was completed to the factory at a cost of £608/8/1.
Following the establishment of the Murgon butter factory, operations progressively expanded, reflecting the suitability and productivity of the South Burnett district for dairying. This growth is illustrated by the increase in the number of suppliers from 250 in 1913 to 800 by 1929, and in butter production from 252 tons in its first year at Murgon, to 1644 tons in 1928. By 1929, the Wide Bay district, in which the South Burnett was included, was second only to the Moreton district in Queensland milk production.
The growth of the South Burnett Co-operative's processing activities necessitated the expansion of the factory in 1929. In order to increase production capacity, the South Burnett Co-operative Dairy Company commenced the construction of a new unit of 35 tons capacity to work in conjunction with the existing unit, and a power plant capable of running both components together or independently. The objective behind the dual factory system was to apply the churning capacity of both factories to the manufacture of butter before noon, with the remainder of the day geared towards the handling and treatment of cream deliveries from suppliers. The Murgon butter factory increased the overall production capacity to 64 tons of butter a week, or 128 tons using double shifts. The dual factory system, driven by a common power plant, was claimed at the time to be ‘unique in the history of butter production in the Commonwealth'.
Brisbane architect George Hutton, supervised building plans and construction and Mr H. Taylor (also of Brisbane) was the builder. The cost of the remodelling was reported as exceeding £25,000. The largest of the new buildings, built to receive, process and churn cream, was constructed of reinforced concrete with a tubular truss roof, crowned by a lantern roof. The engine/plant room was built to the rear of the larger structure. The new buildings were officially opened on 9 March 1929 by William Forgan Smith, Minister for Agriculture and Stock, with over 1000 invited guests and the township ‘en-fete' for the occasion.
The building of the new Murgon factory occurred during a period of modernisation for butter manufacturers. By the end of the 1920s most Queensland butter factories had been remodelled or were new buildings of brick and concrete, replacing earlier timber structures. The emphasis on producing high grade butter saw the need for more churns within factories, as the lower temperatures necessary meant churns were turning longer than previously. In addition to upgrading buildings and equipment, greater attention was paid to ensuring butter was of a high standard, through stricter grading and modern processes of pasteurisation and neutralisation. Increasing numbers of trained staff were also working in factories.
The manufacture of butter followed a fairly typical process at factories throughout Queensland. Once cream cans were received and weighed, the cream was tested to determine its grading (choice, 2nd or 3rd), before the cans were emptied into vats and cleaned for return to the supplier. The cream was then pasteurised, cooled and pumped to storage vats, before being sent to the churns. The butter was refrigerated, parcelled into butter boxes and forwarded by rail for export.
The interwar period saw the dairy industry expand greatly in Queensland. Between 1927 and 1937 the total number of dairy cattle rose by 50 percent. By the 1930s, dairying was Queensland's most widely spread agricultural industry and the state's second most profitable export industry from 1936 to 1941, accounting for 20% of primary production. By the late 1930s, around one in eight Queenslanders were living on dairy farms. In 1938 there were five co-operative butter factories in the South Burnett: located at Nanango, Kingaroy, Murgon, Wondai and Proston. While butter factories enabled the production and export of dairy products, numerous small farms, reliant on family labour to milk herds twice daily for generally modest returns, were the backbone of the industry.
With its increased productive capacities, Murgon butter factory, had by 1931, become Queensland's fourth largest butter producer. Production at the factory reached its peak in 1934, when 2873 tons was manufactured. The opening of the South Burnett Co-operative Dairy Company's branch factory at Proston in 1934 meant a significant number of suppliers west of Murgon sent their cream to the new factory. During 1938-9, a record year, almost 1/3 of all Queensland's butter was produced in the Wide Bay-Burnett, with Murgon the seventh largest producer in the state.
By 1950 the farms of the South Burnett carried 130,000 dairy cows, ten percent of the Queensland total. However, as demand and prices for butter dropped in the 1950s, the decline of dairying accelerated. Butter consumption per capita in Australia dropped from 12.2 kg to 8.3 kg between 1957 and 1972 as margarine increased its market share. The downturn worsened in the 1960s, with a reduction in cream suppliers diminishing output. The transition towards the production of milk rather than cream, requiring larger herds and new equipment, saw many smaller scale farmers leaving the industry. Export opportunities also became restricted, culminating with the end of preferential trade agreements with Britain following its entry into the European Common Market in 1973.
The late 1960s saw the beginning of closures of butter factories in the Burnett region. The Proston Butter Factory, a branch of the SBCDA, closed in 1967. The Maryborough Co-operative Dairy Company closed their branch factories at Wondai and Biggenden in February 1969. By 1976 dairy farmers in the South Burnett numbered under 400 and of these, 211 were bulk milk suppliers. The average age of a dairyman was 55 and two dairy producers were leaving the industry per week.
The Murgon butter factory's diversification into dairy products other than butter from the 1940s enhanced the longevity of SBCDA operations compared to other factories which became increasingly vulnerable to closure from the 1960s. Cheese making commenced at the factory in late 1942 in response to wartime demand, as occurred at the Kingaroy, Nanango and Wondai butter factories. While cheese making ended during or shortly after the war at most of these places, Murgon maintained this production until the 1990s. In 1948 pasteurised bottled milk sales commenced and in 1953, the earliest part of the complex was remodelled and a modern pasteurisation and bottling plant was installed. In 1950 the office was re-established in new brick and concrete premises opposite the factory in Macalister St, with the former office building operating as the co-operative's trading arm from 1951. This was followed in 1952 with the construction of a dairy research laboratory, staffed by members of the Department of Agriculture and Stock, adjacent to the new office. In 1960 a new building was constructed for the production of buttermilk powder, produced from the liquid by-product of butter churning.
With the closure of the Nanango and Kingaroy butter factories in 1977, all cream supplies were diverted to Murgon factory, the last remaining dairy factory in the South Burnett. 1978 saw the opening of new milk processing facilities, followed by the manufacture of skim milk from 1979, and later, the production of flavoured milk drinks. In 1983, 2.7 million litres of milk was processed through the Murgon plant, and 813 tonnes of cheese and 250 tonnes of butter were manufactured on-site.
During 1989-90 the milk processing component of the operation was sold to Queensland United Foods (QUF), resulting in local milk supplies being sent to Nambour. The SBCDA (later changed to Burnett Valley Ltd) were able to procure milk from QUF, which allowed for Murgon cheese to be continued to be manufactured, albeit in a much reduced capacity. By 1995 butter production had ceased, and a decline in demand for the cheddar cheese forced the closure of the Murgon factory, marking the end of dairy processing at the site.
The former Murgon Dairy Factory was purchased in 1998 by Clovely Estate and since this time has been utilised for wine making, an industry that has developed in the South Burnett since the early 1990s.
","criteria":"The South Burnett Co-operative Dairy Association Ltd Factory (former) is important in demonstrating the principal characteristics and processes of a dairy factory. The place is situated adjacent to a railway line, formerly served by a siding to enable transportation of its products. The internal arrangement of interconnected buildings incorporate loading areas for receiving dairy supplier's produce, large rooms used at different periods of its history to manufacture butter, milk and cheese products, and cold storage and packing areas. The 1929 engine room and its remaining fittings (ammonia compressor and piping), and other extant elements of the factory's plant (large brick chimney, boilers, sheds) demonstrate the industrial requirements of the complex over time.
|The South Burnett Co-operative Dairy Association Factory (former) in Murgon, a site used for dairy production from 1913 to 1995, is important in demonstrating the growth and evolution of the Queensland's dairy industry during the twentieth century. The factory was one of Queensland's largest butter producers during the dairying boom of the interwar period and throughout its history was one of the Wide Bay-Burnett's largest and most important dairy manufacturing outlets.
The remaining fabric of the Tiaro butter factory (1908) shifted to Murgon in 1913, reflects the rapid increase in dairy farming in the South Burnett region in the early 1900s, while the 1929 extension of the factory, illustrates the response to the ongoing expansion of cream production and the adoption of modern manufacturing processes in Queensland butter factories during the interwar period. Adaptations and additions to the factory from the 1940s onwards reflect the shift from concentrating on butter manufacturing to processing cheese and milk products, in response to the changing market requirements of Queensland's dairy industry.
","criteria_letters":"Criterion D | Criterion A","criteria_definitions":"The place is important in demonstrating the principal characteristics of a particular class of cultural places | The place is important in demonstrating the evolution or pattern of Queensland's history"}, {"heritage_type":"State Heritage","site_id":33398,"place_ref":602810,"name":"Kingaroy Shire Council Chambers (former)","alternate_name":null,"street_address":"Haly Street","suburb":"KINGAROY","lga":"SOUTH BURNETT REGIONAL COUNCIL","register_entry_date":"2012-11-09","description":"The Kingaroy Council Chambers, a single storey masonry building with Art Deco decorative features, is located on Haly Street directly opposite Kingaroy's towering peanut silos [QHR 602764]. In 2012 it forms part of the Kingaroy Visitor Information Centre and is linked to the former power house (now the Kingaroy Heritage Museum) via a connecting building to the east. Its decorative Art Deco styling with vertical banding, geometric motifs and stepped parapet gives the building a strong streetscape presence.
The front elevation is symmetrical about a central entrance and has a stepped parapet finished with a decorative moulding. The façade, finished with a smooth cement render, is divided into three bays by projecting pilasters with vertical banding. The central entrance way is flanked by single rectangular windows with concrete-formed architraves. The windows are metal-framed with multi-paned leadlight glazing incorporating the Kingaroy Shire's original logo and a pivoting central window panel. Large decorative diamond-shaped motifs are above the windows. The entrance way is sheltered by a horizontal, concrete awning with a moulded profile and supported on tapered masonry columns with a decorative vertical banding pattern. The entrance door is recent and is accessed via splayed concrete steps. Lettering 'KINGAROY SHIRE COUNCIL CHAMBERS' is above the entrance and is framed with a simple decorative moulding and flanked by two stylised classical columns with fluting protruding from the facade. Flag poles rise from the roof behind the parapet.
The west elevation is a rendered masonry wall with little decoration. It consists of a central service door flanked on each side by two windows. Decorative treatments similar to the front elevation are used including the moulded capping to the wall and around the window frames. Small hooded vents are set into the wall above each of the windows.
The building's hipped roof is hidden behind parapets on all but the rear elevation and overhangs by approximately 40 centimetres. The roof is clad with red corrugated metal sheeting. Gutters are quad profile and soffits are lined with timber battens. Window and door treatments on the rear elevation are similar to the western and front elevations. The eastern elevation is mostly concealed by an adjoining building. A parapet wall with a single multi-paned window is visible.
Inside, The Council Chambers comprises a large open space (formerly the public office) at the front of the building incorporating a former strong room and the meeting room at the rear of the building. Hallways run down each side of these two large rooms providing access to several (former) offices.
The front central space, formerly the public office, features a crows ash and ironbark timber floor forming a striped pattern. Walls are finished with hard-set plaster. Ceilings are also finished with plaster and are adorned with ornate plaster cornices and panels featuring geometric designs. Multi-paned skylights with coloured glass have been inserted where early pendant lights remain. Skirting boards and architraves are varnished silky oak. Several internal windows and openings are located in this room. One is a timber framed opening to the teller's booth set into the wall and features a metal grille. Others are leadlight glazing.
The meeting room at the rear of the building features walls panelled in silky oak and floors finished with tulip and rose gum parquetry. A dais (seating the shire chairman and clerk) overlooks a solid U-shaped table furnished with drawers and accommodating 12 chairs including six swivel oak chairs. Silky oak public seating and timber screen are also located in the room. A vertical map cabinet is built into the wall panel on the west wall. Ceilings are formed from plaster and are raked near the wall junctions which are finished with a decorative plaster cornice. A central plaster panel adorns the ceiling from which early pendant lights are hung. Panelled doors, architraves and skirtings are silky oak. All timberwork including the furniture is similarly detailed.
Offices are more simply detailed with plaster cornices and some feature decorative plaster ceiling panels. All rooms have silky oak architraves, panelled doors and skirtings. Floors are lined with hardwood boards though some have been covered with carpet. Some pendant lights remain but some have been replaced with recent fittings.
The strong room is formed with thick masonry walls finished with plaster and has a solid metal door featuring brass door hardware. A small brass plaque with the words Ajax Manufacturing Co. is fixed to the door. Some early shelving remains together with an early timber rolling ladder.
Entry into the adjacent museum is via a recent covered area accessed through a new opening formed in the eastern wall of the chambers building.
Plantings in garden beds around the building are not considered to be of heritage significance.
","history":"Built in 1938, the Kingaroy Shire Chambers (former) demonstrate the growth, prosperity and consolidation of Kingaroy as an important regional centre in the Wide Bay-Burnett.
The arrival of the Kilkivan branch railway to the ‘56 mile peg' in 1904 was the impetus for the establishment of the township of Kingaroy, as a rapid expansion of closer agricultural settlement occurred in the surrounding region. Town lots were auctioned in that year and public and commercial interests soon clustered around the railhead. Earlier settlements such as Booie (1882), Taabinga Village (1892) and Coolabunia (1879) could not compete with Kingaroy's proximity to the railway. By the time the railway extended to Nanango in 1911, the township was replacing its older counterparts as the dominant service centre for the South Burnett.
Initially, timber was the main product transported from Kingaroy Railway Station, with loggers capitalising on the abundant stands of hoop and bunya pine that existed in the softwood-vine forests of the region. Increasing land settlement saw large amounts of the existing scrub, eucalypt forests and brigalow cleared for agriculture, exposing a range of soil types, including the rich red soils, for which the region has since become known. By the 1910s, maize cultivation and dairy farming were replacing the timber industry as the key components of the local economy, while the region's peanut industry was in its nascent phase of development.
The Shire of Kingaroy was established in 1912 by excising former areas of the Nanango, Wambo and Weinholt Shires and later increased in size with the addition of land from Wondai Shire. Kingaroy's first council chambers, a modest timber structure was built in 1913, with the first council meeting held in the building in June of that year.
During the interwar period, a rapid expansion of agricultural activities occurred in the Kingaroy Shire. Dairying was the principal primary industry in the shire, with the Kingaroy Butter Factory one of the largest producers in the region, the outlet for the numerous dairy farms engaged in the production of cream. Kingaroy Shire was the centre for Queensland's burgeoning peanut industry, boasting over 550 growers and 11,500 acres (4653.88 hectares) under cultivation by 1928, with the town's first timber silos built in that year. The district was one of the state's most important for corn growing, with the Manneum Maize Company farm the largest of its type in Australia in 1927. As the surrounding area's service centre, Kingaroy benefited from this growth in primary industry.
By late 1937 the Kingaroy Shire Council had outgrown its small chambers. The four officers employed by the Shire were located in the chamber's small board room, and were forced to relocate to a shared counter during council meetings. Additionally, engine smoke from the adjacent power house periodically entered the shire chambers. In September 1937 a council meeting moved that a committee be instructed to proceed with the arrangements for the erection of new council chambers. To enable construction, vacant land adjacent to the existing chambers was purchased by the Council in mid-1938.
The construction of the new chambers in Kingaroy was part of a wider pattern of civic building that occurred in Queensland in the 1930s. This period saw the construction of numerous council chambers, town and shire halls, and other public buildings in settlements throughout the state. While some were Depression-era relief projects, others were built in the latter part of the decade, when economic conditions had improved. In the South Burnett, examples of this pattern included the Nanango Council Chambers (1934-35), (demolished), Murgon Civic Centre (1938) and the Wondai Town Hall and Library (1938-39). The Queensland government played an important role in facilitating many of these projects, by offering low interest loans and subsidised labour costs, as a way of generating employment. However, this process did not occur at Kingaroy. After adopting the decision to build new chambers, Kingaroy Council applied for a loan of £5000 to fund the construction of the building. The council felt it was uneconomical to pursue the path of State assistance, as by this time, government subsidies only covered around a third of actual labour costs, while the interest rates of a shorter term government loan were thought to be too high.
Many shire chambers and town halls of the 1920s and 1930s are fine examples of the influence of modern architectural styles in Queensland townscapes. Incorporating elements of the jazz influenced Art Deco and machine-age vision of the Moderne, these buildings were built as expressions of confidence in a bright and modern future. Stylistic elements of Art Deco and Moderne include decorative treatments like geometrical motifs, decorative vertical banding and a streamlining of the building form. These features are evident in many prominent civic buildings throughout the state including the Goondiwindi Civic Centre [QHR 600531] and the Southport Town Hall [QHR 601649].
Initial plans were prepared for the building by local builder Mr C Gill, who later collaborated with council engineer GW Barlow in the final design of the building. The construction of the chambers was undertaken by Sydney building firm Kell and Rigby of Sydney, Brisbane and Toowoomba. Established in 1910, Kell and Rigby's work in Queensland during the 1930s included Toowoomba's Empire Theatre [QHR 600978], Stanthorpe Hospital and the Masel residence [QHR 601552]. The 1913 council chambers were relocated from their position between the new chambers and the powerhouse, to face the street directly behind.
The building of the Kingaroy Council Chambers coincided with a number of major projects in the Shire that collectively reflected the progress and confidence of the district. During 1938, the South Burnett's first radio station 4SB, opened its studio in the township and construction began on a new Kingaroy Hospital, regarded at the time as Queensland's most ‘modern'. A new district office was established by the Department of Agriculture and Stock, an acknowledgment of the area's importance for primary production. The Peanut Marketing Board significantly expanded their operations by erecting large concrete silos on their processing site opposite the shire chambers. Kell and Rigby also constructed these agricultural skyscrapers, completing both the silos and shire chambers within a short time of each other.
The Kingaroy Shire Chambers were officially opened on 1 December 1938 by the Minister for Agriculture and Stock, FW Bulcock. Prior to the ceremony at the chambers, Bulcock officially opened the new silos. Conducting both of these ceremonies on the same day symbolically expressed the Shire's confidence and its progress since formation, while acknowledging its dependence on agriculture to deliver its future prosperity.
The new chambers were a single storey building of brick and concrete. Silky oak timber was used extensively throughout the interior for the fittings, doors and furniture, the work of RV Rogerson's local joinery firm. Ornate plaster work adorned the ceilings while leadlight windows incorporating the Shire's logo were included in the main elevation. A detached toilet block was constructed at the rear of the building.
A description written at the time of opening outlined the internal arrangement of space and features of the new chambers. The front central space, featuring a crows ash and ironbark timber floor, contained the public office for business and other transactions, incorporating the strong room. The left hand side of the building contained the health inspector and engineer's offices and records room, while the right side provided rooms for the accounting office, clerks and shire chairman.
The centrepiece of the new chambers was the boardroom at the rear of the building. The room was panelled in silky oak, with parquetry floors of tulip and rose gum timber. A dais with seating for the shire chairman and clerk overlooked a ‘U' shaped table for twelve councillors, furnished with drawers and swivel oak chairs, and oak seating was provided for the public gallery.
The Kingaroy Shire Council continued to operate from the chambers for over forty years. In 1979, new administrative offices for the council were built alongside the Kingaroy Civic Centre, as envisioned in architect Karl Langer's original plan of the complex. In December 1983, the former chambers were officially reopened by local state member and Premier Sir Joh Bjelke-Petersen, as the Kingaroy District Development Board Tourist Information Centre.
The former Kingaroy Shire Chambers is currently an art gallery, a component of the Kingaroy Visitor Information Centre, which opened in 2005. As part of this complex, a new building was built between the chambers and the former power house (Kingaroy Heritage Museum). To provide a connection to the new building, part of the chamber's right wall was removed. The vestibule screen and original counter of the chambers had previously been moved to the museum building when it was operating as the art gallery. Despite these alterations, much of the Kingaroy Shire Chambers, especially its meeting room, remains highly intact. In 2008, Kingaroy Shire was amalgamated with Wondai, Murgon and Nanango Shires to form the South Burnett Regional Council.
","criteria":"The Kingaroy Shire Council Chambers (former) are important in demonstrating the growth, prosperity and consolidation of Kingaroy as an important regional centre in the Wide Bay-Burnett. It illustrates the pattern that occurred in Queensland after towns on branch railways developed as service centres for regions transformed by the interconnected processes of government-initiated closer settlement and increased primary production. Built and opened in 1938, the Shire Chambers are a tangible expression of a pronounced period of prosperity in the township, resulting from the rapid expansion of dairying, peanut production and other agricultural activities in the surrounding region.
The Kingaroy Shire Council Chambers (former) are important in demonstrating the widespread pattern in Queensland of expressing civic pride through building council chambers and town halls during the 1930s. Many of these buildings, including the Kingaroy Shire Chambers, are important in demonstrating the influence and spread of modern architectural styles in Queensland townscapes during the interwar period, illustrated by its use of decorative vertical banding and geometrical motifs.
|The Kingaroy Shire Chambers (former) are important in demonstrating the principal characteristics of shire council chambers. The building is prominently positioned on a principal thoroughfare of the township. Internally, the place features a front central space for public transactions, flanked by a small number of rooms, with the rear of the building housing the highly intact and finely crafted meeting room and record storage area. This spatial arrangement illustrates the requirements that facilitated the day-to-day operations of a shire council. Finely crafted interior joinery remains intact including the meeting room's table and chairs, dais, public seating and map cabinet.
Externally, the building's vertical banding and geometric motifs on its main elevation demonstrates the use of such architectural elements in Queensland shire chambers and town halls of the 1930s.
|The Kingaroy Shire Council Chambers is important because of its aesthetic significance. It is a modest but elegant and well-proportioned building. These qualities are in contrast to its setting with the monumental peanut silos opposite forming a dramatic counterpoint.
The building's prominent position on a principal thoroughfare of the township expresses the centrality and importance of local government to the community, while its design expresses civic pride and the confidence of Kingaroy Shire at the time of construction.
The Kingaroy Shire Council Chambers is also significant for the outstanding craftsmanship of the meeting room. The chambers contains many finely crafted elements and timber joinery including walls panelled in silky oak and floors finished with tulip and rose gum parquetry, dais, meeting table, swivel oak meeting chairs and public seating and map cabinet.
","criteria_letters":"Criterion A | Criterion D | Criterion E","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"}, {"heritage_type":"State Heritage","site_id":33399,"place_ref":602813,"name":"Shepherd Memorial Church of St Peter","alternate_name":"St Peter's Anglican Church | St Peters Anglican Church","street_address":"cnr Drake Street and Wondai Road","suburb":"PROSTON","lga":"SOUTH BURNETT REGIONAL COUNCIL","register_entry_date":"2012-11-09","description":"The Shepherd Memorial Church of St Peter is located on the corner of Drake Street and Wondai Road, Proston. The church occupies a parcel of land which falls gently toward Drake Street and includes a number of established trees to the street frontages and a concrete pathway, none of which are considered to be of cultural heritage significance.
An architectural anomaly in an otherwise rural townscape, the church stands as a very austere composition of four simple architectural forms, each accommodating one of the principal interior areas of the church: the entry/bell tower; nave; chancel and vestry. The cavity brick wall construction is exceptional and features pale, sandy coloured cavity face bricks, with flush vertical and recessed horizontal mustard coloured mortar joints, skilfully laid in a combination of English bond and Flemish garden wall bond with brick-on-edge and soldier course detailing. All openings feature stepped reveals externally and stepped mitred reveals internally.
The double height nave of the church is essentially rectangular in plan and runs in an east-west direction under a low pitched gable roof clad with red concrete roof tiles. The eaves are lined with timber boards above exposed decorative rafters that carry half round gutters. A series of long, narrow, high level, arched windows punctuate its northern and southern elevations and contain fixed, nine pane, steel framed windows glazed with randomly set yellow, blue, green and uncoloured obscure glass. Located beneath these windows and of equal width are a series of square, recessed, hit-and-miss brick ventilation panels that reveal the symbol of the cross in their patterning. These baffled ventilation panels, similarly expressed on the interior in metal, are part of the church's passive cooling system, allowing air to be drawn into the church. The western elevation includes a circular timber vent above a single centrally positioned high level window with arched head housing a fixed, thirty two pane, steel framed window glazed with the same palette of coloured glass. Located below the window is the marble foundation stone of the church commemorating benefactor Charles Shepherd.
The square-planned bell tower on the southern elevation contains the entry to the church reached by a set of brick stairs with integrated brick planter boxes. The belltower has a flat concrete roof concealed by parapet walls and is surmounted by a bell enclosure comprising a circular colonnade of eight columns which support a faceted metal clad lantern roof and a weather vane in the likeness of a rooster, the symbol of St Peter. The soffit of this lantern roof is lined with timber boards and the door and window openings are detailed similarly to the nave.
The semi-circular planned chancel with truncated low pitched metal clad roof adjoins the eastern end of the nave of the church and is similarly detailed with narrow windows on the north and south elevations. The sub floor area of the altar accommodates a mortuary chamber in which the late Charles Shepherd, benefactor of the church, is entombed. Enclosing the chamber at the eastern end of the chancel, is a dressed timber panel decorated with a timber cross.
The vestry is expressed as a simple single storey cubic volume with parapet wall adjoining the north elevation of the nave. Centrally positioned steel-framed casement windows punctuate its northern and western elevations. Concrete stairs enclosed by a low level wall lead to a timber-panelled door located in the eastern elevation of the vestry where it adjoins the nave of the church.
Internally the simple plan that gives rise to the austere exterior form of the church is clearly evident.
The bell tower accommodates the entry to the church as well as a first level choir loft above and a second level platform accessed by a timber stair and ladder respectively. The choir loft is expressed directly above the main entry as a small balcony with curved solid balustrade overlooking the nave. Opposite the entry, adjacent to the northern wall of the nave, is a cast concrete baptismal font located between the rows of pews which line each side of the central aisle and are crafted from local hardwood. A brass plaque on the front northern pew states that benefactor, Charles Shepherd, is buried opposite that pew, under the aisle, however, he is entombed under the sanctuary of the chancel. The aisles are covered with carpet, the timber floor under the seating, exposed. The ceiling is coffered and lined with Cane-ite sheets painted dark red with expressed joints and perforated ventilation panels. A system of wall lights on decorative metal brackets, mounted between the windows may be a more recent addition.
The chancel contains two platforms covered with carpet, stepping up to the sanctuary and altar. A large opening in the eastern end of the nave frames the sanctuary beyond and a curved brick wall with centrally suspended curtain creates the backdrop to the sanctuary and altar. Low level, angled brick walls create the altar rail and the elevated pulpit is located in the south-east corner of the chancel behind a curved face brick wall. Both walls are finished with a dressed timber capping. The sanctuary ceiling is lined with Cane-ite and painted light blue.
Notable chancel furnishings crafted from local hardwood include the priest's chair and kneeler, the sanctuary altar piece, secondary chair and kneeler, lectern and wall mounted hymnal boards. The figure of a rooster, symbol of St Peter, is carved into the timber facing panel of the priest's kneeler. Integrated brick shelving in the walls of the chancel accommodate a timber cross and other ceremonial vessels.
A timber panel door on the northern side of the lower altar provides access to the vestry which contains a storage cupboard and a sink area. The timber floor is covered with vinyl and the ceiling is sheeted with masonite finished with cover battens.
","history":"The Shepherd Memorial Church of St Peter (St Peter's Church), on the corner of Drake Street and Wondai Road, Proston was designed by architects, Fowell, McConnel and Mansfield, supervised by Brisbane architects Lucas and Cummings, and built between December 1937 and July 1939 by LGW Smith, using local bricks. This Scandinavian-influenced church was funded by a bequest from grazier Charles Shepherd of ‘Aston' near Proston.
The town of Proston is sited on land that was originally part of the pastoral lease Wigton, which dated from 1850. In 1910 the Queensland government opened the land for closer settlement and offered agricultural blocks by ballot. Those who were successful and settled on the land struggled against prickly pear, little reliable water and small returns.
Growth of the township of Proston was therefore slow until a branch railway line from Murgon opened in 1923 facilitating growth. A public hall, school, general store, bulk store, hotel, shop and banks were erected thereafter. Eradication of prickly pear in the late 1920s and the opening of a butter factory by the South Burnett Dairy Cooperative in June 1934 and its pre-war expansion again boosted Proston's development. As part of the Wide Bay district, Proston dairy farmers contributed to the district's standing as the second largest milk producer in Queensland during the interwar period. By 1939 Proston possessed many services including a railway station complex with cattle yards, police station, postal department and a school with 102 pupils. A small private hospital, the Boondooma Private Hospital, operated in the region from 1934 to 1940. Numerous small businesses had been established, such as garages, billiard rooms, hairdressers, bakers, plumbers, a restaurant, the Proston Electric Light Company and the CG Baldwin and Sons' sawmill. A telephone service had been installed and main roads construction was progressing.
It was during this period of Proston's growth (in 1934) that survey for subdivision of the land on which the Shepherd Memorial Church of St Peter's is sited took place. The foundation stone of the St Peter's Church was laid by the Archbishop of Brisbane, Dr JC Ward, on 30 May 1937. Transfer by Deed of Grant of allotments 1, 17 and 18 to the Corporation of the Synod of the Diocese of Brisbane occurred in October 1938. In the meantime, the church was constructed on allotment 1. Its dedication took place on 3 July 1938 and its consecration by the Archbishop of Brisbane occurred on 31 July 1939.
Funding for the church was provided by the will of Charles Shepherd, who passed away at the Boondooma Private Hospital in Proston on 7 June 1935, aged 70 years. Leaving neither wife nor offspring, he appointed his bank manager as his executor when making his will two months prior to his death. Charles Shepherd's will made two bequests of £50 each to his doctor and the matron of the Boondooma Private Hospital. The remainder of his estate, which totalled £8,687 4s 4d was left to the Corporation of the Synod of the Diocese of Brisbane of the Branch of the Church of England in Queensland; to be held in trust for the Proston and Wondai District (at the time in Kingaroy parish) to be applied in or towards such religious, charitable or educational purposes in the district as the Corporation should think fit. Furthermore, he directed that £3,000 must be used for the erection and furnishing of a church in Proston by the Church of England. Later, his body was exhumed from the Proston Cemetery and placed under St Peter's Church in a mortuary chamber shown on the architects' foundation plan. A plaque on the front right-hand-side pew states that his body lies opposite and beneath the aisle.
St Peter's Church was built using locally-made cream-coloured Wondai bricks. The Wondai Brick and Tile Company made several thousand specially moulded bricks for the door and window reveals and the arched heads. In the words of the architects, ‘the building is "a symphony in brick"'. The Shepherd Memorial Church of St Peter was the first major tender won by the Wondai Brickworks, a business commenced by seven local shareholders with a capital of £350. Their successful tender for St Peter's Church led them to discover a suitable clay deposit opposite the Wondai Hospital in Bramston Street, Wondai and establish a factory nearby. After interruption during World War II when the brickworks were taken over by the Army, the business went on to supply bricks throughout southern Queensland, including the former Princess Alexandra Hospital (demolished), Kingaroy Hospital and Wondai Town Hall, as well as houses in the region.
St Peter's Church has been recognised as an important 20th century building. The church's design was influenced by European and Scandinavian styles with high walls and a low-pitched tile roof and wide moulded eaves. Of particular note is the ventilation system which uses exceptionally high walls to give a large air space in proportion to the seating capacity of 100. There are both windows and ventilators but the windows do not open. The ventilators are designed to be opened at night to store cool night air in the roof space. The air heated by the congregation rises through grilles into the roof space and out through the gable ends allowing the cooler air to flow downwards.
An article in Architecture magazine in 1943 described the building as ‘of locally made cream bricks with a tile roof. The plan is a long rectangle with an apse at the east end and a vestry off one side. The entrance is on the south, towards the west end; it is marked by a square tower with a colonnaded lantern at the top surmounted by a weathervane carrying the symbol of St Peter. The organ gallery is above the entrance, whence it is approached by a stair, and opens on to a gallery overlooking the nave. The font is placed immediately opposite the entrance in a gap in the seating, which leaves a few seats between it and the west wall for use at christenings. The pulpit is in brick, and is placed in the south-east corner... The windows have steel frames, and are glazed with heat-resisting glass with a slightly greenish tinge, which helps to give a cool appearance to the interior. The ceiling is of wall board, set out in panels, the sides of the recesses being brilliantly coloured to tone with the windows and the ceiling of the eastern apse.' The furnishings, altar, pews and other fittings, designed by the architects, were made from local hardwood. The cost of building was £2,755 19s 5d.
The Archbishop of Brisbane (the Most Reverend John William Charles Wand) stated in his opening and consecration of the church that it ‘is a distinct departure from the usual design of churches in the diocese'. The Archbishop, (enthroned in St John's Cathedral Brisbane on 5 September 1934) had stated that more churches were required to serve the needs of the congregation, as the church building programme had stagnated because of severe financial problems caused by the Depression of the 1930s. Archbishop Wand urged that churches be constructed in stone and brick and compare favourably with the better class of public buildings being erected in the state. Concerned about the standards of ecclesiastical architecture he insisted that he approve the plans before building projects were undertaken. He reminded the clergy of the factors that should be kept in mind when planning churches and urged the desirability of moving away from the old Gothic styles. His primary motive for this, however, was to avoid obscuring the view of the altar by pillars, not concern for climatic conditions. Despite Archbishop Wand's comments, the majority of church buildings erected in the 1930s were small wooden structures - pseudo-Gothic with steep roof and high lancet windows - but frequently they were designed to become parish halls when permanent churches could be erected. It was not until the 1950s that church buildings in Queensland, and indeed Australia, moved away from traditional church building types that employed historical revival styles such as Gothic or Romanesque. The Shepherd Memorial Church of St Peter was a notable exception.
St Peter's execution also reflected the ‘low church' or more Protestant form of Anglican worship rather than the ‘high church' (Anglo-Catholic) form that became discernible in the Anglican church from the mid-19th century. Generally, Queensland was more ‘high church'. In this form the sanctuary, associated with the chancel was the most important and therefore most decorated part of any high church. Balconies were not permitted and a south porch, a humble entry, was desirable. ‘Low church' forms have always existed in Queensland, particularly in the south of the state. Churches following this form of Anglicanism were generally plainer in form and additional rituals such as the use of incense were not practised in them. ‘Low church' forms of Anglican worship demonstrate more reliance on Biblical teaching.
In 1940 the firm Fowell, McConnel and Mansfield were awarded the Queensland Meritorious Architecture - Country Division - Award: 1940 in the Ecclesiastical and Institutional (including Educational Buildings and Hospitals) Class by the Queensland Chapter of the Royal Australian Institute of Architects. War conditions prevented the presentation being made until 1943.
Both the South Burnett Times, in 1937, and Architecture, in 1943, attributed the church's design mainly to Kenneth Hamlyn McConnel of Fowell and McConnel Architects (1927-1938). McConnel was a member of the well-known family of Queensland graziers associated with ‘Cressbrook' in the Brisbane Valley. After his World War I service he was an early graduate of Professor Leslie Wilkinson's School of Architecture at Sydney University where he was awarded a University Medal. Fowell and McConnel formed a partnership in 1927 to enter a competition for the design of Tamworth War Memorial Town Hall, for which they were awarded second place. In the following year they were successful in winning the competition for the British Medical Association Building in Sydney's Macquarie Street, for which they won the first Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA) medal to be awarded in Australia. In 1935 Fowell and MConnel received the Royal Australian Institute of Architects' Sulman Award for St Anne's Church at North Bondi, which is in the New South Wales Heritage List. It also features a ventilation system using stored cool air to circulate throughout. The partnership went on to design many Catholic churches in Sydney and some New South Wales country towns. McConnel left the partnership of Fowell, McConnel and Mansfield (1939), due to ill health in 1939. After World War II he formed McConnel and Smith, later becoming McConnel, Smith and Johnson. This firm was responsible for the Sydney Law Courts, Queens Square, Sydney Water Board headquarters, and the University of Sydney's law school and faculty of architecture buildings.
In 1969 a church building was transferred from Tingoora to the Proston site to serve as the St Peter's Church Hall. This is located behind the church on a different allotment.
On 3 July 1988 St Peter's celebrated its 50th anniversary with the Bishop of the Western Region, Adrian Charles, a former Wondai minister, leading the commemorative service and planting a memorial tree to mark the occasion.
Few changes have been made to St Peter's Church. The ceiling of the nave and the sides of the recesses are no longer brilliantly coloured. The nave's ceiling is painted a brick red and the ceiling above the chancel is blue. Originally the church was intentionally set amongst eucalyptus trees, however, in the intervening years these have been removed and the site is planted with exotic species.
","criteria":"St Peter's Church has strong aesthetic value. Its scale and austere fabric and form have been influenced by Romanesque massing principles and twentieth century Scandinavian architectural detailing. The modernist aesthetic of the church juxtaposed with the rural townscape of Proston evokes extreme surprise.
It is significant for its high quality workmanship in particular the face brickwork, which shows the influence of the Modern Movement popular in the 1930s.
The Shepherd Memorial Church of St Peter is an outstanding example of church design for its period and location. Its massing and high quality brickwork are features of the design which show European and Scandinavian influences. The church is also significant for the way it was designed for the climate, through the use of an unusual ventilation system.
|St Peter's Church demonstrates a high level of creative achievement. Its architectural excellence and exceptionality is illustrated by its winning the 1940 RAIA Queensland Chapter Award for Ecclesiastical and Institutional Buildings including Educational Buildings and Hospitals - Country Division, which was awarded every five years.
|The Shepherd Memorial Church of St Peter is important in demonstrating the principal characteristics of an Anglican Church in its form and liturgical furniture, while its simplicity and interior treatment represent the ‘low church' form of Anglican worship.
The church is rectangular in form and comprises a nave which seats a congregation of 100, an east chancel, square tower with a colonnaded lantern, an entrance and an organ gallery above, and on the north side, a vestry.
Both externally and internally St Peter's Church remains substantially unchanged since completion of construction in July 1939.
|The Shepherd Memorial Church of St Peter (St Peter's Church) (1939) is important in illustrating closer settlement of Queensland through the development of agricultural settlements and establishment of their service towns in rural Queensland until World War II. These towns were the result of the Queensland government's policy of closer settlement of the land and its use of branch railway lines to facilitate this objective.
St Peter's Church demonstrates the establishment phase of town development during which permanent places of worship were built. The church was designed and built during a boom period in Proston's development when the town and region were significant producers of dairy products in Queensland.
St Peter's Church, is important as an early example of modernism in Queensland church architecture, an architectural style which did not become popular for this application until after World War II.
","criteria_letters":"Criterion E | Criterion F | Criterion D | Criterion A","criteria_definitions":"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 is important in demonstrating the principal characteristics of a particular class of cultural places | The place is important in demonstrating the evolution or pattern of Queensland's history"}, {"heritage_type":"State Heritage","site_id":null,"place_ref":650003,"name":"Murgon State School","alternate_name":"Murgon Rural School","street_address":"91 Gore Street","suburb":"MURGON","lga":"SOUTH BURNETT REGIONAL COUNCIL","register_entry_date":"2015-10-09","description":"Murgon State School is located on the northern side of the small town of Murgon in the South Burnett region. The gently sloping, 3.8ha site is bounded by a railway reserve to the west, Gore Street to the southeast, Dutton Street to the northeast and Krebs Street to the northwest. A former road reserve (now part of the school grounds) runs through the centre of the site, with most school buildings located within the triangular-shaped area to its south. The Teachers Residence is located in the far southern corner of this area; Blocks A and C in the centre; and the former Domestic Science Building, former Blacksmith’s Shop and Playshed along the northern edge. The former Court House is located on the north side of the former road reserve. The remainder of the northern school grounds contain playing fields and are not included within the heritage boundary. The school is accessed by several entrances from Gore Street and a secondary entrance from Krebs Street.
\nAll of the significant buildings are timber-framed with roofs clad in metal sheeting. With the exception of the Playshed and former Blacksmith’s Shop, all buildings have been re-stumped, so that they now stand upon a combination of square concrete piers and round metal posts.
\nTeachers Residence (1914)
The Teachers Residence occupies a wedge-shaped yard and faces southeast to address Gore Street. It is highset, clad in weatherboards, with a front verandah and a hipped roof. It contains: a four room core of three bedrooms and a living room, connected by a short hallway; a former dining verandah (now enclosed); and a rear wing containing a kitchen, bathroom and former servants bedroom. The understorey is enclosed by timber batten screens and has a laundry room enclosure at the northwest end.
The eaves have exposed rafters and are lined with v-jointed (VJ) tongue and groove (T&G) boards. A side staircase and landing are later additions and not of heritage significance. All windows are modern replacements; however skillion-roofed timber window hoods are retained on the southwest and northeast sides.
\nThe front verandah has a timber floor, a single-skin verandah wall, a two-rail balustrade with vertical rail infill, and a raked ceiling lined with VJ boards. It is accessed by a set of centrally-located timber steps. Two sets of half-glazed French doors opening on to the verandah have had the door leafs replaced, however they retain their early framing and two-light fanlights above. The main entrance has a low-waisted, four panel timber door with original hardware and a single-light fanlight above.
\nThe internal layout has remained largely unchanged, apart from the enclosure of a doorway between the dining verandah and the northwest bedroom; the addition of a toilet and cupboards to the northern end of the dining verandah; and the demolition of the former pantry to create a larger bathroom. The kitchen retains its projecting stove alcove in the western corner.
\nWalls and ceilings are lined with VJ, T&G boards, and round ceiling vents with decorative grilles are located in the centre of each room. Internal partitions are single skin and have belt rails with beaded edges. The rooms retain original joinery, including modest skirtings, cornices and architraves. Internal doors are generally four-panel timber doors with rectangular, horizontally-centre pivoting fanlights. A low-waisted, half-glazed French door connects the dining verandah and the living room, and doors to the former servant’s room and the toilet are braced and ledged board doors. All early doors have original door hardware.
\nNon-significant features include modern linoleum and carpet flooring, flat wall and ceiling linings, and the kitchen and bathroom fit-outs.
\nBlock A (1917, extended 1935-36)
Block A is a long, rectangular building, clad in weatherboards, with enclosed verandahs on the northeast and northwest sides and two projecting teacher’s rooms. The building was constructed in two phases – the southern end in 1917, and the northern end in 1935-36 – with some differences in joinery and interior detailing.
The gable roof has raked eaves lined with VJ, T&G boards. Gable end walls to the main building and teachers rooms have vertical batten gable infill and packed weatherboards at the gable peak. Two sets of timber stairs access the northwest verandah. A third staircase (c.1972, not significant) is located within the verandah space at the southeast end, linking Block A to the adjacent Administration building.
\nEarly joinery includes five large banks of windows in the southwest wall; casement windows to the teachers rooms; and two surviving sets of casement windows in the northeast verandah wall. Windows from the 1917 building are generally single-pane casements or vertically centre-pivoting windows with two-light fanlights above, while windows from the 1936 additions are tall, two-light casements with three-light fanlights. The 1917 teachers room has tall, three-light casements. Timber-framed, skillion-roofed window hoods shield the northeast-facing windows of the teachers rooms.
\nThe enclosed northeast verandah has a single skin verandah wall and a raked ceiling lined with VJ, T&G boards. Ventilation boards run along the base of the 1917 section of the verandah wall, and sections of bag hooks survive in places. The balustrade has been replaced by bag racks or modern kitchen cabinets. All doors have been removed from the verandah wall, however the openings remain with tall, two-light, horizontally-centre pivoting fanlights above. Additional doorways have been created in the location of former windows.
\nThe enclosed northwest verandah has been turned into a store room. The southwest corner contains fabric from a 1917 hat room which was relocated there during the 1936 extension.
\nThe teachers rooms are the same size and have similar design features and ornamentation. Both are accessed by a single door from the northeast verandah. The 1917 room is clad in weatherboards on the verandah-facing side, while the same wall on the 1936 room is single skin. Internally, both are clad in VJ, T&G boards on the walls and on the ceiling of the 1936 room. The 1917 room has a pressed metal ceiling.
\nOriginally containing five classrooms, a portion of the central classroom has been turned into store rooms by modern partitions. The boarded bulkheads of the original classroom partitions survive, with modern partitions and folding doors installed beneath. The 1917 classrooms have pressed metal-clad hipped ceilings with centrally-located, square ventilation panels. The 1936 classrooms have VJ board-lined coved ceilings with metal tie rods and square lattice ventilation panels. All classrooms have VJ board-lined walls.
\nThe understory has a concrete slab floor and is partially enclosed, with: weatherboard-clad walls along the southwest side; a weatherboard-clad room beneath the 1917 teachers room; and a former toilet block at the northwest end (now a storage area).
\nBlock C, southeast classroom (1935-36)
The significant portion of Block C is the southeast classroom, a highset building with a gable roof and enclosed southeast verandah. Adjoining classrooms to the northwest and a verandah to the northeast (added in the 1960s) are not of cultural heritage significance.
The southwest wall is clad in weatherboards, with vertical batten gable infill and packed weatherboards at the gable peak. It retains a bank of early windows, comprising two-light casements with three-light fanlights above, shielded by a timber, skillion-roofed window hood.
\nThe northeast wall has been re-lined below the verandah roof and early joinery removed, however above this level it retains its weatherboard cladding, vertical batten gable infill and packed weatherboards.
\nThe verandah retains its timber posts with decorative, arched brackets; raked ceiling lined with VJ boards; and single skin verandah wall. The balustrade has been replaced with bagracks. An early four-panel timber door with two-light fanlight and original hardware survives in its original position in the centre of the verandah wall.
\nThe interior is lined with VJ boards on the walls and ceiling (except for the northeast wall, which has been relined in flat sheeting). The ceiling is coved with a metal tie rod and central, square lattice ventilation panel. A four-panel timber door remains in the location of an original door at the southern end of the northwest wall.
\nThe understorey is partially enclosed with weatherboard-clad walls and has a recent concrete slab floor. A small section of corrugated metal sheeting-clad wall is located beneath the walkway to Block A.
\nPlayshed (1927)
The playshed is a 6-post timber structure with a hipped roof clad in corrugated metal sheeting. It is enclosed on the northwest and northeast sides with vertically mounted, corrugated metal sheeting. The earth floor is paved in the northwest bay. Notches in the posts possibly indicate the location of a former balustrade around the southeast and southwest sides. The purpose and former location of a corrugated metal-clad shelving unit, standing in the centre of the playshed, is unclear.
Former Blacksmith’s Shop (1930, extended 1936)
The former Blacksmith’s Shop is a timber-framed, skillion-roofed shed of four bays with a corrugated metal-clad roof and an earth floor. Open along the southwest side, it is enclosed by timber-framed, corrugated metal-clad walls on the remaining three sides, with the whole structure resting on round concrete stumps.
Former Domestic Science Building (1935-36)
The former Domestic Science Building is a lowset timber building, clad in weatherboards and orientated to face southwest. It has a gambrel roof clad in corrugated metal sheeting, with louvred ventilation panels in the gablets. Access is via by two sets of timber steps with timber handrails.
The building is divided by single-skin partitions into three rooms – a large room in the centre and narrower rooms (one an enclosed verandah) at either end. Walls and ceilings are lined with VJ boards. The main room has a picture rail and a flat ceiling with square lattice ventilation panel in the centre. The end rooms have raked ceilings.
\nEarly windows, including two-light casements and three-light fanlights, survive in the southwest and northeast walls and in the northeast verandah wall. Internal doors have been removed, but two-light fanlights survive above the doorways. Windows and the former stove alcoves in the side walls have been replaced by large banks of awning windows. Two external doors survive – a high-waisted, part-glazed door in the southeast wall and a boarded door in the centre of the southwest wall.
\nFormer Court House (1940)
The former Court House is a lowset, timber building with a hipped and gabled roof clad in corrugated metal sheeting. T-shaped in plan and surrounded by wide verandahs, it is orientated to face southwest, with a gable-roofed entrance portico located in the centre of the main façade, accessed by timber steps.
A single row of six rooms (former offices) forms the front of the building and the large former court room is located at the rear. Rooms are accessed via the front and rear verandahs, with internal doorways connecting the central two rooms with the court room (doors leafs have been removed and a larger opening created in one wall).
\nThe verandahs have a two-rail slat balustrade, raked ceilings lined with VJ boards, and single skin verandah walls. Timber verandah posts along the southwest verandah are paired and feature decorative cornices.
\nThe building retains nearly all of its original timber joinery, including six-light double-hung sash windows with three-light fanlights, and half-glazed French doors with four-light fanlights. The northwest and southeast end walls are clad in weatherboards and have six-light casement windows with fanlights protected by skillion-roofed window hoods with battened brackets.
\nInternally, walls and ceilings are lined with v-jointed tongue and groove boards. Skirting boards are stepped with bullnose edges. The former offices have flat ceilings while the former court room ceiling is coved with a central square lattice ventilation panel. Non-significant internal features include modern carpet and linoleum floor linings, flat sheeting re-lining some partitions, windows in partition walls, and post-1970s fit-outs including a kitchen and former children’s bathroom (now a store room).
\nThe understorey has been partially enclosed with weatherboard-clad walls at the northern end, where the slope of the ground allows for enough head height. A separate storage area is enclosed with battened screens.
\nGrounds
A variety of mature trees survive within the school grounds, including eucalypts, jacarandas and elms (species unknown). Two mature Pepperina Trees (Shinus Molle) are remnants of an early planting scheme. One is located to the south of the former Blacksmith’s Shop, and the other to the east of the former Domestic Science Building.
Murgon State School opened in 1908 as Murgon Provisional School (changing to Murgon State School in 1909) within the small agricultural settlement of Murgon, to serve its growing rural population. A new teaching building replaced the original provisional school building in 1917 and shortly afterwards, in 1925, the school began operating as a Rural School. By the mid-1930s the school complex had grown to include a range of vocational teaching buildings, including a Blacksmith’s Shop (1930, extended 1935-36) and Domestic Science Building (1935-36). Due to the loss of the southern portion of the original school reserve in 1915 for the construction of the Murgon-Proston Railway line, school expansion occurred to the north between 1959 and 1972, resuming part of Fryar Street and acquiring the former Murgon Court House (1940) for educational purposes. The school has been in continuous operation since establishment and has been a focus for the local community as a place for important social and cultural activity.
\nThe first European settlers arrived in the Murgon area, the traditional land of the Wakka Wakka people, in the 1840s, taking up land which is now known as Barambah Station [QHR 600644].[1] In 1901 part of Barambah pastoral station became the Barambah Mission Station – known as Cherbourg from 1932.[2] The nearby town of Murgon, about 6km to the north, grew around the location of an unattended timber loading siding, which opened in 1903 on the railway line from Kilkivan to Kingaroy. The railway, which facilitated the transport of local produce - maize and pumpkins, pigs, cattle and dairy products - to markets, spurred an influx of selectors who took up land excised from Barambah Station in 1902 and again in 1913.[3] Murgon was surveyed and the sale of town lots took place in 1906. Murgon's development was stimulated by the creation of the Shire of Murgon in 1914, with Murgon as its administrative centre; and the construction of a railway line from Murgon to Proston (commenced 1916, completed 1923), with a branch line to Windera (1925).[4]
\nThe early basis for the prosperity of Murgon was the dairy industry. During the interwar period dairying expanded greatly in Queensland, and by the 1930s it was the state’s most widely spread agricultural industry. While butter factories enabled the production and export of dairy products, numerous small farms, reliant on family labour to milk herds twice daily for generally modest returns, were the backbone of the industry.[5]
\nCream from Murgon’s dairy farmers was initially railed to the Tiaro butter factory, which relocated to Murgon in 1913. Murgon’s butter factory [QHR 602811] was extended in the late 1920s, and by 1931 it was Queensland's fourth largest butter producer.[6] By the mid- to late-1930s Murgon was rapidly expanding as a service centre for its surrounding agricultural community, and a new and impressive Art-Deco style civic centre was built in 1938 [QHR 602812].[7] In 1911 Murgon’s population had been 706;[8] however by 1941 it was the second largest centre (after Kingaroy) in the South Burnett, with a population of 1091.[9]
\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 community focus, a symbol of progress, and a source of pride, with enduring connections formed with past pupils, parents, and teachers.[10]
\nSteps towards the establishment of a school in Murgon began in 1906. In September of that year George Arnell, president of the Murgon Progress Association, wrote to the Minister for Education about opening a school in Murgon. A Building Committee was later formed and a site for the school reserve was selected on the north side of town.[11] The reserve of 10 acres, bounded by Gore, Fryar, Bell (now Krebs) and Stephens streets, was proclaimed in August 1907.[12] Contractors McKewan and Woods were the successful tenderers for the erection of the school at Murgon, and it was completed in November 1907. Located in the southern quarter of the school reserve, the school building comprised a single classroom with verandahs front and back.[13]
\nThe school opened as Murgon Provisional School on 24 February 1908 with an enrolment of 40 pupils, increasing to 67 pupils by the end of March.[14] Provisional schools, which could be opened with as few as 15 (later 12) pupils, were regarded as interim measures until state schools were built. If the district or town developed, provisional schools were raised to state school status, with larger, purpose-designed school buildings and teacher residences constructed, attracting better qualified and more experienced teachers. Murgon Provisional School became a State School in 1909, only a year after opening. Over time the building was enlarged and raised, with space underneath used for classes and later partially enclosed.[15]
\nIn 1914 a teachers residence was added to the site, fulfilling “a long felt need”[16] Most Queensland state schools incorporated a teacher's residence on the site, particularly in rural areas. In 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 a low wage, an incentive for teacher recruitment in rural areas and provided onsite caretakers.[17] From the 1880s they were built as detached residences and were similar to the vernacular Queensland house. Designed by the Department of Public Works and constructed to the high standard demanded by the state, teacher’s residences were typically of a higher-quality than most similarly-scaled private residences. The residence was located within the school grounds at a distance from the teaching buildings, usually with a separate, fenced yard. Residence designs varied in size and evolved to keep up with modern needs and styles.
\nIn May 1914, W Bytheway was announced as the successful tenderer for the construction of the teacher’s residence at Murgon State School, for a cost of £686.[18] A standard Department of Public Works design,[19] the residence was timber-framed and –clad with a hipped roof. The layout comprised: a front verandah with central staircase; a four room core containing a sitting room, dining room and two bedrooms; an internal semi-enclosed dining verandah (running the full width of the residence); and a rear wing containing a kitchen, pantry, bathroom and servants bedroom. The residence was located northeast of the teaching building, facing Gore Street.[20]
\nThe following year, confirmation that the route of the proposed Murgon to Proston railway line would pass diagonally through the centre of the School Reserve meant that major changes were needed at the school. The newly completed teacher’s residence could remain in place; however the teaching building was now partly overlapped by the railway reserve. A new School Reserve was surveyed in 1915 and assented to by the Department of Education. Now triangular in shape, it occupied the north-eastern half of the block, on the corner of Gore and Fryar streets, with the main entrance from Fryar Street. Construction of the Proston to Murgon Railway line began in 1916.[21]
\nPrior to the removal of the original teaching building,[22] a new State School building of a standard government design was constructed in 1917 within the new school reserve. To help ensure consistency and economy, the Queensland Government developed standard plans for its school buildings. From the 1860s until the 1960s, Queensland school buildings were predominantly timber-framed, an easy and cost-effective approach that also enabled the government to provide facilities in remote areas. Standard designs were continually refined in response to changing needs and educational philosophy and Queensland school buildings were particularly innovative in their response to climate control, lighting, and ventilation. Standardisation produced distinctly similar schools across Queensland with complexes of typical components.[23]
\nFrom 1893 the Department of Public Works greatly improved the natural ventilation and lighting of classroom interiors, experimenting with different combinations of roof ventilators, ceiling and wall vents, larger windows, dormer windows and ducting. High-set buildings, introduced c1909, provided better ventilation as well as further teaching space and a covered play area underneath. This was a noticeable new direction and this form became a characteristic of Queensland schools. A technical innovation developed at this time was a continuous ventilation flap on the wall at floor level. This hinged board could be opened to increase air flow into the space and, combined with a ceiling vent and large roof fleche, improved internal air quality and decreased internal temperatures.[24]
\nAchieving an adequate level of natural light in classrooms, without glare, became central to the design and layout of all school buildings. From around 1909 windows were arranged to provide gentle, southern light into the room and desks positioned so that the light would fall onto students’ left hand sides to avoid throwing shadows onto the pages; this presupposed that all students were right-handed.[25] In 1914 the suburban school type was introduced, combining these new features and providing an ideal, modern education environment.[26]
\nThe new Murgon State School building (now Block A) was a standard suburban school type.[27] A highset timber building with a gable roof, it comprised: three classrooms divided by glazed, folding partitions; a northern verandah with hat room enclosures at each end; and an attached teacher’s room. The arrangement of windows and desks ensured that left-hand light entered the classrooms, with large banks of casements in the end walls and in the centre of the southwest wall. The interior walls were lined with v-jointed (VJ), tongue-and-groove (T&G) timber boards and the ceiling with pressed metal. Classrooms were vented by a continuous hinged ventilation board at floor level and ceiling vents which linked to a prominent roof fleche. A concrete play area was provided beneath the school with lavatories battened off under the hat rooms.[28]
\nConstructed by day labour for an estimated cost of £1560, the building was opened on 18 October 1917. It was located northeast of the teacher’s residence, facing Fryar Street.[29]
\nLess than two years after opening, in May 1919, the school was closed temporarily due to a local outbreak of the worldwide influenza pandemic. The school building was converted for use as an isolation hospital and a kitchen erected, at a cost of £30. In early June there were over 17 patients at the hospital, with the doctor also affected. By the end of June the epidemic was abating.[30]
\nMurgon continued to prosper in the 1920s, with dairying and pig rearing the mainstays of the district. In August 1923 the chairman of Murgon Shire Council met with the Minister for Education and asked that a Rural School be erected at Murgon. The Minister responded that if the district raised sufficient money a rural school would be built. A committee of shire councillors was formed to raise the necessary funds.[31]
\nDespite the importance of the rural sector in the Queensland economy, rural education and training was slow to develop, with no significant action taken until the 1890s.[32] In 1897 the Queensland Agricultural College was established at Lawes near Gatton, providing agricultural and related scientific training for young men.[33] Under the control of the Department of Agriculture and Stock, the college was part of a wider scheme of introducing ‘scientific agriculture' to the colony that also included experimental farms and travelling model dairies.[34]
\nWithin the school system, a limited form of rural instruction was introduced in syllabus changes made in 1905 and 1915. However, the success of ‘Nature Studies’ in state schools was dependent on the enthusiasm of individual teachers. A new approach, utilising central agricultural primary schools, staffed with trained experts and drawing students from nearby state schools, was envisaged. The purpose of rural schools was to educate children to enable them to develop rural areas and to provide a means of extending country children’s education beyond the compulsory years with an additional year of agricultural and domestic studies.[35]
\nJohn Douglas Story, Under Secretary of Public Instruction from 1906,[36] believed that Queensland’s future depended on agricultural development, and between 1914 and 1916 he finalised a plan for three tiers of agricultural education – rural schools, state high schools, and a University Agricultural Department.[37] In 1910 Story appointed James Clement Stubbin to provide expert guidance as Queensland’s Teacher of Agriculture. Stubbin promoted the notion of a scientific approach to agriculture by writing a textbook on the school garden, agricultural bulletins, and constantly touring schools to personally give lessons on topics such as milk and cream testing, planting and pruning.
\nThe first rural school was established as an adjunct to Nambour State School in 1917. The success of this venture prompted the expansion of rural schools and courses in Queensland.[38] Altogether 30 rural schools opened in Queensland between 1917 and 1939, with three, including Murgon, opening in 1925. Each was located in prime fruit-growing, dairying or agricultural areas and functioned ‘as a central school for the surrounding district schools, teaching domestic, commercial, agricultural and vocational classes’.[39]
\nVocational training subjects required a variety of purpose-built facilities and were initially gender segregated – for example, woodwork, metalwork and leather work classes for boys, cooking, sewing and laundry classes for girls.[40] Many rural schools were opened in Sectional School buildings, however it was not always possible to construct new vocational buildings, with some schools altering or converting existing buildings.[41] 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.[42]
\nThe Murgon community raised the necessary funds for a Rural School by January 1924.[43] In order to accommodate the rural school classes, the understorey of the 1917 teaching building was enclosed and divided into three spaces. The external walls were clad in weatherboards, with casement windows providing light and ventilation. Domestic Science was taught in the southeast room, and had a stove alcove and a sink installed along the southeast wall. The remaining two rooms were dedicated to leather and wood work and sheet metal work.[44] Murgon Rural School was officially opened by Undersecretary McKenna on 30 March 1925, and began operating, with 160 pupils, from 1 April. [45]
\nThe new Rural School was praised as an immediate success. The school was well equipped by the Department of Education with tools and materials, and pupils were charged a few pence each week to attend.[46] The boys produced useful articles from scrap, while the girls provided a well cooked meal every day, which pupils could buy at lunchtime. As the rural school operated in conjunction with the state school, overcrowding soon resulted.[47] Transport was often an issue for those pupils who travelled to Murgon from other state schools, as train timetables did not necessarily match the days their classes were scheduled. Various attempts between 1925 and 1929 to provide a bus service for children to attend Murgon – from Boat Mountain, Windera, Merlwood and Cloyna – did not last, and for the more remote schools branches of Murgon Rural School were set up and staff were sent out to teach vocational and domestic science classes; including at Kingaroy from 1926, and Kilkivan from 1927.[48]
\nIn 1927 a playshed was constructed in the school grounds, fulfilling a ‘long-felt want’.[49] The Queensland education system recognised the importance of play in the school curriculum and the provision of all-weather outdoor space was needed. Playsheds were designed as free-standing shelters that provided covered play space and doubled as teaching space when required. Built to a standard design and ranging in size relative to student numbers, these structures were timber-framed and generally open sided, although some were partially enclosed with timber boards or corrugated galvanised iron sheets.[50] The usually hipped roofs were clad with timber shingles or corrugated iron. Playsheds were a typical school addition between c1880s and the 1950s, although less frequently constructed after c1909, with the introduction of highset school buildings with understorey play areas.[51]
\nFundraising for the playshed had been undertaken by the Murgon School Committee, who sent away for copies of plans in 1926. It was constructed by contractor J. Krebs, and an official opening was held during Arbor Day celebrations on the 5 August 1927.[52]
\nAn important component of Queensland state schools was their grounds. The early and continuing commitment to play-based education resulted in the provision of outdoor play space and sporting facilities, such as ovals and tennis courts. Arbor Day celebrations began in Queensland in 1890, and trees and gardens were regularly planted to shade and beautify schools. Aesthetically-designed gardens were encouraged by regional inspectors, and educators believed gardening and Arbor Days instilled in young minds the value of hard work and activity, improved classroom discipline, developed aesthetic tastes, and inspired people to stay on the land.[53]
\nArbor Day celebrations in the early years of Murgon State School included activities such as tree planting, gardening lessons, picnics and games.[54] The school grounds were greatly improved in the early 1920s. By 1924, 12 large experimental vegetable plots, covering about a quarter of an acre, had been laid out, with flowers planted around the edges and rose beds in the centre. An experimental plot of cotton plants had also been established, as well as seed bed boxes for vegetables. A school tennis court, ‘one of the best in Murgon’, had also been constructed by this time.[55] At some point prior to the 1940s several Pepperina trees (Schinus molle) were planted in the northern school grounds, two of which survive.[56]
\nBy April 1929 the inconvenience of holding the rural classes beneath the main teaching building, where the noise from tin-smithing and carpentry was a distraction to children studying above, prompted calls for new facilities to be constructed. The Department of Education promised that the matter would be speedily remedied, and in October 1930 two new buildings were opened – a Blacksmith’s Shop and a Manual Training Building.[57]
\nDesigned by the Department of Public Works, the Blacksmith’s Shop was a rectangular, timber-framed shed (21ft x 10ft, 6.4m x 3m) with a skillion roof and earth floor. Access was through two large double doors on the southern side, while the remaining walls were clad in corrugated metal sheeting.[58] The Manual Training Building was a standard government design.[59] It was lowset, timber-framed and -clad with a front verandah and gambrel roof, containing a large room for woodwork and a smaller room for sheet metal work. The Manual Training Building was located at the corner of Gore and Fryer streets but the original location of the Blacksmith’s Shop is unclear.[60] At the opening ceremony, the Minister for Education, RM King, said that the school was extremely lucky that the work was done, as financial difficulties within the Department meant that no more work of this class would be undertaken for some time.[61]
\nFurther additions to cope with growing student numbers were needed, however, particularly as classes still held beneath the main teaching building were ‘most uncomfortable’ due to the concrete floor and insufficient natural daylighting. In 1935-36 a major building program was undertaken, which included the extension of the 1917 teaching building (Block A), the construction of an additional teaching building (part of Block C) and a Domestic Science Building, and the relocation and extension of the Blacksmith’s Shop. Construction began in mid-1935, with the work being carried out by day labour under the supervision of the Department of Public Works.[62]
\nAdditions to Block A included two extra classrooms at the northwest end, additional verandahs to all but the southwest side, and a second teacher’s room. As part of the process of remodelling the building, banks of windows in the 1917 building were removed from the end walls and installed along the southwest wall, so that all classrooms now had southern light. This modification brought the building closer in form to the popular Sectional School type. Other alterations included relocating the hat rooms on the verandahs and removing the stove alcove from the former domestic science room beneath.[63]
\nThe Sectional School type was introduced to Queensland schools in the 1920s. This fundamentally new design combined all the best features of previous types and implemented theories of an ideal education environment. Practical and economical, it proved very successful and was used unaltered until 1950. Its most important features were that it allowed for the orderly expansion of schools over time (due to removable end walls), and that its strict east-west orientation, with large areas of glazing along the southern wall, provided maximum natural light from the south. Before the Sectional School, solar orientation was not given prominence and all school buildings were oriented in relation to the street and property boundaries.[64]
\nThe additional teaching building (now part of Block C) comprised a single classroom with verandahs on the southeast and northwest sides and windows in the end walls. A Small Timber School,[65] this type of building was constructed between 1930 and 1946 and was a continuation of earlier types of country schools. Unlike Sectional Schools, they were not designed for expansion.[66] The building was linked to the northwest end of Block A by an extension of its south-eastern verandah, which featured decorative timber brackets.[67]
\nThe Domestic Science Building, like the Manual Training Building, was a standard vocational building type.[68] It was a lowset timber building with a gambrel roof and a northern verandah. Internally it comprised two rooms – a large room with two stove recesses projecting from the northwest wall, used for dressmaking and cookery, and a narrow room along the southwest side used as a laundry and ironing room. The building was located along the Fryer Street boundary, northwest of the Manual Training building. In 1937 the verandah was enclosed and a corner cupboard constructed.[69]
\nThe extension of the Blacksmith’s Shop doubled the length of the structure and replicated the framing and materials of the 1930 section, including double doors along the southwest side. Its new location was between the playshed and the Domestic Science building, along the Fryar Street boundary.[70]
\nThe new buildings, which cost a total of £2500, were officially opened by the Minister for Education, Mr Cooper, on 21 February 1936. As part of the celebrations afternoon tea was served by the domestic science teacher and pupils. Mr Cooper was presented with a leather pocket wallet produced by the rural schoolboys, and Mrs Cooper with a ‘beautifully iced cake’ from the domestic science class.[71]
\nOn the opposite side of Fryar Street, a new Court House was completed in 1940. The court house was built to replace a 1914 combined court house and police station, which stood to the east of the new court house until being removed in the mid-1970s.[72] The 1940 court house, like most early timber court houses in Queensland, was built in a T shape, with a single courtroom as the base of the T, and offices arranged along the crossbar. From 1912, court house design included gabled and hipped roofs over the courtroom and offices.[73] Unlike the similar Nanango Court House (1936 [QHR 601571]),[74] Murgon’s courtroom was at the rear, and the portico entrance led to a veranda running along the office wing. The Murgon Court House had six offices, including offices for a veterinary surgeon, dairy inspector, Police Magistrate, Court of Petty Sessions, and a general office.[75]
\nBetween the 1940s and 1960s the rural school scheme was phased out due to a move to larger farms by the late 1940s and the consequent decline in government emphasis on closer settlement, and the transfer of domestic, vocational and commercial subjects to the curriculum of the growing number of state high schools.[76] Murgon State School ceased to be a Rural School in 1959, coinciding with the opening of Murgon High School.[77]
\nDairying declined as a major industry in Queensland after World War II. Butter consumption per capita in Australia dropped from 12.2 kg to 8.3 kg between 1957 and 1972 as margarine increased its market share. The transition towards the production of milk rather than cream, requiring larger herds and new equipment, saw many smaller scale farmers leaving the industry. Export opportunities also became restricted, culminating with the end of preferential trade agreements with Britain following its entry into the European Common Market in 1973. The late 1960s saw the beginning of closures of butter factories in the Burnett region, and with the closure of the Nanango and Kingaroy butter factories in 1977, all cream supplies were diverted to Murgon factory, the last remaining dairy factory in the South Burnett until its closure in 1995.[78] However, although local dairy farming declined, beef and pork production continued. The South Burnett Meat Works operated just outside Murgon between 1962 and 2007.
\nThe decline in Queensland dairying also coincided with the closure of most of the small state schools in a 10-15km radius around Murgon, between the 1940s to the 1970s, including a burst of closures in the 1960s.[79] Conversely, the school buildings at Murgon were extended during the 1950s and 1960s, as remaining students from the closed schools travelled to Murgon, aided by a school bus service (referred to as the ‘Monkey Bus’).[80]
\nAfter the closure of the Rural School the vocational buildings continued to be used and adapted for other purposes. In 1959 the Domestic Science Building was converted into a library. At some point the stove alcoves in the northwest wall were removed and large banks of awning windows installed in the northwest and southwest walls.[81]
\nAlso in 1959, the Manual Training Building was moved, raised, and its structure incorporated into a new linear block of classrooms (now Block B). During this process it was extensively altered, with all original linings and joinery removed. Linked by a high level walkway to Block C and extending in an easterly direction, Block B forms a courtyard area with Block A.[82]
\nBlock C, which originated with the 1936 single classroom linked to the western end of Block A, was extended to the west in stages between 1966 and 1969. In the process, features such as the northwest verandah and windows in the northeast wall were removed.[83]
\nThe south-eastern verandah of Block A (constructed in 1936) was enclosed in 1960 to form a staff room. In 1973 this verandah was removed for the construction of a new brick administration building adjoining Block A. Toilets beneath the verandah were removed and a staircase installed in the northeast corner of the 1917 verandah. In 1981 Block A was upgraded, which involved the partial removal of internal partitions and the insertion of two store rooms in the central classroom. The northern verandah was enclosed and most windows in the verandah wall removed.[84]
\nIn the early 1970s the school reserve was expanded to approximately 3.8ha. Fryar Street was closed in two stages – the western end in 1959 and the remainder in 1972, when the whole school reserve was resurveyed to include most of the land north to Dutton Street. The new grounds were landscaped to create a playing field and tennis courts.[85]
\nA new court house was built elsewhere in Murgon in 1967,[86] and the 1940 Court House building on the north side of the former Fryar Street was included within the expanded school reserve. The building was used as an Opportunity School until it was renovated to become a preschool in 1981.[87] It remains in its original location and in 2015 houses many school and community functions, including a play group.
\nToday, Murgon continues to be a service centre for the surrounding area, with a population of 2496 in 2011.[88] Murgon State School celebrated its centenary in 2008, and commemorated the event by publishing a revised school history book. Recent additions to the school grounds include the construction of ramps to improve accessibility. The school is important to the area, having been a focus for the community, and generations of Murgon students have been taught there. Since establishment it has been a key social focus for the Murgon community with the grounds and building having been the location of many social events.
","criteria":"Murgon State School (established in 1908 as a provisional school) is important in demonstrating the evolution of state education and its associated architecture in Queensland. The place retains excellent examples of standard government designs that were architectural responses to prevailing government educational philosophies.
\nThe Suburban Timber School building (1917, extended 1935-36, Block A) demonstrates the evolution of timber school building designs to provide adequate lighting and ventilation; while its 1930s modifications, in particular the rearrangement of windows to provide southern light, illustrate the adaptability of timber schools and the influence of the highly successful Sectional School type upon Queensland school designs from the 1920s to 1950s.
\nThe Teachers Residence (1914) demonstrates the Queensland Government’s policy of providing residences for married male head teachers in rural areas.
\nThe Playshed (1927) demonstrates the education system's recognition of the importance of play in the curriculum.
\nThe Domestic Science Building (1935-36) and Blacksmith’s Shop (1930, extended 1936) are important surviving evidence of the establishment of rural schools in Queensland, a popular initiative to provide a practical education for country students and encourage them to stay on the land. They demonstrate the Queensland Government’s focus on vocational education as a way of ensuring the state’s economic prosperity.
|The former Blacksmith’s Shop and Domestic Science Building are rare and important surviving examples of building types that were once common, and demonstrate the emphasis placed on vocational training in Queensland Schools in the early-20th century, particularly in rural communities.
\nThe former Blacksmith’s Shop (1930, extended 1936) is a very rare and intact example of its type. No other surviving Queensland example with this level of intactness has been identified to date.
|Murgon State School is important in demonstrating the principal characteristics of Queensland state schools with their later modifications. These include: highset timber-framed teaching buildings of standard designs that incorporate understorey play areas, verandahs, and classrooms with high levels of natural light and ventilation; and generous, landscaped sites with mature shade trees and assembly/play areas. The school is a good, intact example of a regional school complex comprising a range of standard and vocational teaching buildings.
\nThe Suburban Timber School building (1917, Block A) with its later additions (1935-36) is a good, intact example of its type, retaining its highset form with play space beneath, timber-framed and -clad construction, generous verandahs (now enclosed), gable roof, teachers rooms, surviving early joinery, coved ceiling lined with pressed metal sheeting, and natural lighting and ventilation features.
\nThe Small Timber School building (1935-36, part of Block C) retains its gable roof, southeast verandah (now enclosed), some early joinery and decorative timberwork.
\nThe teacher’s residence (1914) is an excellent, intact example of the residence type of its period, retaining its hip-roofed, timber-framed and -clad form and comprising a front verandah, a four room core, large dining verandah and rear wing containing a kitchen, bathroom and former servant’s room.
\nThe former Domestic Science Building (1935-36) is a rare, intact example of a vocational building built to a standard plan, retaining its lowset form, gambrel roof, and large, airy classroom flanked by a former laundry room and an enclosed verandah.
\nThe Blacksmith’s Shop (1930, extended 1936) is a very rare and intact example of its type, retaining its skillion-roofed and corrugated metal-clad form, earth floor, and its location away from the main teaching building to minimise noise disruption.
\nThe Playshed (1927) retains its hipped, timber-framed roof form supported on timber posts, and two walls enclosed with corrugated metal sheeting.
\nThese buildings are set within landscaped school grounds with mature plantings, including Pepperina trees (Schinus molle).
\nThe former Court House (1939-40) is an excellent, intact example of a regional timber court house, retaining its T-shaped plan of former offices and courtroom, hipped and gabled roof, generous verandahs, and early joinery and decorative features.
|Schools have always played an important part in Queensland communities. They typically retain significant and enduring connections with former pupils, parents, and teachers; provide a venue for social interaction and volunteer work; and are a source of pride, symbolising local progress and aspirations.
\nMurgon State School has a strong and ongoing association with the Murgon community. It was established in 1908 through the fundraising efforts of the local community and generations of Murgon children have been taught there. The place is important for its contribution to the educational development of Murgon and is a prominent community focal point and gathering place for social and commemorative events with widespread community support.
","criteria_letters":"Criterion A | Criterion B | Criterion D | 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 has a strong or special association with a particular community or cultural group for social, cultural or spiritual reasons"} ]}