The search for ancient Queensland is a journey through deep time, revealing its unique landscapes, a fascinating geology and, most importantly, its incomparable fossils. This beautifully illustrated book charts the complex evolution of life over the past 250 million years, set against a backdrop of momentous geological events and dramatic environmental change. It offers tantalising, but incomplete, glimpses of the primeval environments that have shaped modern Queensland and, in doing so, signposts understanding of our largely unknown future. In Search of Ancient Queensland celebrates the... View More...
The Drover by Alice Mabin - droving captured through the lens of a camera. The red dust swirls around you, filling your lungs and coating your face, the cattle low as they march onwards, you crack a cold one at the end of a long hot day. The path of a drover is a long and difficult one. Droving is woven in the fabric of Australian history, but droving cattle long distances is a rare event today. Now you can view the epic Brinkworth drove, as captured through the lens of photographer Al Mabin in her new book The Drover. During 2013's severe drought, South Australian farmer Tom B... View More...
The essential companion for the urban explorer. Walking Brisbane reveals the city's colonial past and vibrant present. Part of a series of Australian city walks, Walking Brisbane is a lively personal guide featuring:- 30 Walks through the most famous sights and interesting areas off the tourist track. Easy-to-follow maps detailing each route. Essential information on transport, opening times and walk lengths. Local insights and suggestions for refreshment stops. Access notes for wheelchairs and less mobile walkers. About the Author: Alison Cotes, an experienced and widely-published ... View More...
When Branko stepped onto the deck of the Mohammedi, a displaced person refugee, he left behind him a war torn home land and loving family. In the sweat and dust of a North Queensland cane field youthful hopes and ambitions died. But there, at least, he breathed freely and moved without looking over his shoulder. He could dream that when he made good money and his country was free he would go home. Bianka Vidonja Balanzategui, historian and daughter of a displaced person cane cutter, takes the reader on a graphic and authentic journey from International Refugee Organization (IRO) Assembly Camp... View More...
Details the story of one of Queensland's most loved and most eventful rail services, the Sunshine Express, which travelled from Brisbane to Cairns from 1935 to 1953, and includes many historical photographs of the train, and the locations that it visited. In telling this story, the book follows the construction of the North Coast Line or 'Sunshine Route' which took over 35 years to complete and stretched over 1,600 kilometres. 154 pages. View More...
One hundred years ago, striking tramway workers brought the sleepy colonial city of Brisbane to the edge of anarchy in an unprecedented general strike. This publication, by prominent railway historian David Burke, tells the story of American Joseph Stillman Badger, who electrified the trams, and of the events that led to the 'Black Friday' clash between 15,000 strikers and 2000 police on 2 February 1912. 126 pages. View More...
Have you ever been on the CityCat and wondered what heritage lies beneath the buildings that you are looking at along the river? This book explores the Brisbane River Heritage Trail one section going upstream and the other one downstream. Let the book be your guide. View More...
In this book, author Deborah Tranter traces the rise and decline of Australia's legendary coaching company. For more than 70 years, Cobb & Co. coaches and horses travelled over millions of kilometres of unmade outback roads. Through the recollections of the people who build, drove, serviced and used the coaches, Deborah Tranter has created a fascinating visual panorama of days gone by. 159 pages. View More...
Apart from the history of the old Town Hall and City Hall, this book provides an analysis of Council’s policies and the delivery of services and infrastructure that shaped Brisbane between 1985 and 2013. It provides a permanent record of Council accomplishments during a period of enormous change. Established three months before Queensland separated from New South Wales in 1859 one of the first issues that faced the new Brisbane Municipal Council was the need for a Town Hall. This publication brings to life the shortcomings of the old Town Hall and the forty-year battle to erect a mo... View More...
The Cooroy-Noosa Genealogical & Historical Research Group has produced this book to crystallise its oral history project undertaken between 1999 and 2000. The men, women and children mentioned within these pages have all made a significant contribution to the cultural life of the local towns and to Noosa Shire. View More...
The first printed English translation of the German explorer and scientist Ludwig Leichhardt’s diaries from 1841-1844. During the 30 months covered by the diaries, Leichhardt arrives in Australia as a diligent student from the lower strata of Prussian society without connections, capital or prospects; and by the closing passages he reveals his intentions to mount the first expedition across the north-eastern quarter of the continent. The diaries reveal how Leichhardt navigated his way through Sydney society and then found his confidence as a scientific traveller, along the way a... View More...
The Ipswich Workshops had a pivotal role in the development of Queensland's railways. This detailed study documents the hard work, innovation and skills of the thousands of men who contributed to the proud history and traditions of the Workshops. It provides a valuable insight into the evolution of the Workshops, including the construction of the North Ipswich Roundhouse and the later development of the Workshops Rail Museum. 192 pages. View More...
Voices from Brisbane Rugby League is an oral history based on interviews with some of the legends of the game from the 1950s to the 1970s. Greg Mallory presents the stories of these greats - the memories, the achievements, the disappointments, and the characters they met along the way - in their own words, in a tribute that derives from Greg's own love of 'the greatest game of all'. View More...
Travel on a journey which weaves a path through the stories of the Scenic Rim's original inhabitants, the first European explorers and settlers to the changing face of the region's industries and towns today. A great introduction to the Scenic Rim's fascinating indigenous, colonial and contemporary history. 68 pages. View More...
The Great Barrier Reef is one of the world's last great wilderness areas. Its unique environment supports an astonishing and almost unequalled biodiversity, from microscopic plankton to whales. The human history of the Reef is no less intriguing. Indigenous Australians have known the Reef for millennia and their Dreaming stories offer tantalising glimpses of a truly ancient world. Europeans first encountered the Reef some 500 years ago, but have only recently begun to understand its almost unimaginable complexity. This book weaves these equally vibrant strands of natural and cultural heritage ... View More...
The houses of Queensland are unique in Australia. Broad verandahs shaded by gracefully curved expanses of roofing iron, tall stumps, lattice, roof ventilators, and a host of the subtleties combine to give the Queensland house of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries its own special qualities and visual character. It might be thought that determining why Queensland houses are so very different from those found elsewhere in Australia would be a simple matter. But it has taken years of research to unravel a very complex story and find the answers to some fundamental questions about the... View More...
Mephisto: Technology, War and Remembrance is the latest addition to The Queensland Museum Discovery Guide series. The bloody battles of the First World War were fought with many new and increasingly destructive weapons. One of the most significant of these was the tank. Only a single type of German tank was used in action, the A7V Sturmpanzerwagen, and it was a formidable opponent for the Allied forces. 506 Mephisto, the world’s sole surviving A7V, was captured on the battlefields of France in 1918. Under cover of darkness, with gas shells falling around them, a small group of soldiers — Q... View More...
Sometimes myths and legends can appear in the most unexpected places. The Brisbane Central Business District is one such unlikely setting. It is here that the young George Kiprios found accidental and enduring fame in his public persona of Rock 'N' Roll George. Many people who have grown up, or lived, in Brisbane have a story to tell about George. For more than 50 years, he was constant presence in a city that was evolving rapidly from sleepy country capital to modern metropolis. George touched the lives of Brisbane residents from all walks of life and our collective memories of him are nosta... View More...
Cape York Peninsula is arguably the most exotic wilderness region in Australia. Its history is as colourful as its geography and as steamy as its climate. The era covered is 1845-2003, but historian Lennie Wallace also tells us of early Chinese, Indonesian, Spanish and Portgugese mariners and of many shipwrecks and daring escapes along its dangerous coastline. View More...
When Silvester Diggles arrived in 1855 there was little artistic or scientific talent in the small frontier town of Brisbane. By the time of his death in 1880, his paramount legacy was a large book on Australian birds, profusely illustrated with hand-coloured lithographs. Acting as his own publisher from 1865 onwards, Diggles produced the first substantial zoological work to commence publication in Australia. The compilation and content of this rare work of art and natural history is examined here in the light of Diggles' life and times, as well as his ornithological predecessors and contempor... View More...