By Jennifer High, Senior Curator of Transport and Energy On 11 April 1921, Bert Hinkler flew non-stop from Sydney to Bundaberg, Queensland, in his Avro Baby aircraft, G-EACQ. The flight was a new distance record in Australia, with the 1287 km journey completed in 8 hours and 40 minutes. One hundred years later, Hinkler’s Avro Baby is part of Queensland Museum’s collection and on display … Continue reading Hinkler’s Avro Baby
In her position as Assistant Curator, Anthropology Sophie manages and cares for the unique, complex and extensive anthropology and social history collections at Museum of Tropical Queensland in Townsville. What is your favourite object/species in the collection and why? This is always a hard question – I have too many favourite objects to count! One of them is this incredible protest sign that we collected … Continue reading 5 minutes with Sophie Price, Curator of Anthropology
Across the world on 17 March, Irish expatriates and those who share Irish ancestry celebrate St Patrick’s Day. But what is the story of the Irish in Queensland? Queensland has been holding celebrations in honour of St Patrick annually since the 1880s. It seems a non-sequitur to see residents of contemporary Queensland rejoicing a 4th century Romano-British missionary credited with bringing Christianity to Ireland. However, … Continue reading It’s a great day for the Irish
This blog post is part of an ongoing series titled Connecting with Collections. There are so many ways to celebrate and honour incredible women around the world. In the museum, we’re always looking for opportunities to bring out objects and tell their stories – and this month, it’s time to feature some of the iconic items held at Museum of Tropical Queensland, that were made, … Continue reading Women’s History Month
By Jeff Powell, Curator, Cobb+Co Museum Cobb & Co delivered mail and passengers to some of the most remote and dusty corners of Queensland such as Boulia, Croydon, and Thargomindah, but Cobb & Co was just as important to settlements around Brisbane and southeast Queensland. The opening of the railway between Brisbane and Ipswich in 1875 spelled the end of Cobb & Co’s original route … Continue reading To the beach, by Cobb & Co
by Judith Hickson, Curator, Social History One of the focal points for the women’s rights movement, the first ‘Women’s Day’ was declared by the Socialist Party of America in 1909. On 18 March 1911, amid increasing and widespread calls for women’s rights and suffrage, the first International Woman’s Day was held in Germany, Austria and Denmark. The first Australian International Women’s Day rally was held … Continue reading International Women’s Day 2021
by Isabella Zust-Sullivan, Student Intern, The University of Queensland When dealing with fragmented plates, saucers and cups, backstamps can be really useful in providing more information about these artefacts. However, with successful investigation also comes the inevitable mystery that arises when cases go unsolved. A Sea of Ceramic Over the past couple of weeks, I have worked at Queensland Museum as a University of Queensland … Continue reading Investigating Backstamps: The Trials and Tribulations
Few things change our life more than getting married. It binds us legally or emotionally to a person, a family, a community and a shared future. Currently on display at Queensland Museum are more than 40 ensembles from the museum’s collection together with loans and commissioned artwork that explore the significant rolefashion plays in revealing the diverse, rich, heartbreaking and hopeful stories behind wedding garments. … Continue reading Seven Fascinating Stories to Discover at I Do! Wedding Stories from Queensland
2020 has been a year when many accepted practices have come under review; commuting to work, socialising with friends and family, how and where we take holidays to name a few. Covid-19 has also focused scrutiny on the origins and reliability of commodities we have come to expect as necessary for life. There was concern about the supply of toilet paper, antiseptic hand wash and … Continue reading Once Made in Queensland (including the kitchen sink!)
How many couples do you know celebrate their wedding anniversary on Christmas Eve? One married couple whose wedding story features in the museum’s exhibition I Do! Wedding Stories from Queensland did so throughout their married life. Mary Ann and John Dunlop were married 157 years ago today in 1863. What a big day it must have been for the couple to travel from Oxley down … Continue reading A Wedding Anniversary on Christmas Eve!
Cobb+Co Museum has always wanted a Queensland buckboard, and we think we have one… By Jeff Powell, Curator, Cobb+Co Museum The American buckboard was about as simple a four wheeled vehicle as it was possible to build. They looked like someone had taken a section of picket fence, attached a wheel in each corner and placed a seat on top and halfway back. Comfort was … Continue reading Is it a buckboard?
By Dr Brit Asmussen Let’s celebrate World Bread Day with a peek inside the Queensland Museum’s Antiquities collections! Celebrating World Bread Day For millennia, bread has held an important place in many cultures. World Bread Day is an international observance celebrated on October 16 dedicated to this culinary staple, enjoyed by communities around the world and throughout history. Ancient Egyptian bread in the Queensland Museum … Continue reading Ancient Egyptian Bread and Beer for World Bread Day
How It All Began Gardams Fabric Store has been part of a long-held tradition of dressing brides in Queensland for 90 years. The family business was started by Bert Gardam who arrived in Queensland as a ward of the state in 1921. At just 16 years of age and with only 10 shillings in his pocket, Bert obtained work on a sheep station and began … Continue reading 90 Years of Gardams – The History of the Queensland family business
One of Queensland Museum’s resident tenants took the stress of moving to a whole new level, as the giant squid found his tentacles being transported to a new abode. Past Life Before calling Queensland Museum home, the supersized ocean dweller was discovered lurking in the deep ocean off New Zealand, measuring a staggering 6.75 metres. The life of the preserved Architeuthis dux has spanned vast … Continue reading Relocating a Supersized Squid, Tentacles And All!
While researching for my paper Duty, Debt and Picket Lines: the Queensland Railway Department during the First World War for the Queensland Museum Memoir volume 11, I found a large amount of material that, due to space constraints, I was unable to include. Therefore, I thought writing a blog might be a good opportunity to publish these unused images and documents. The paper investigates the … Continue reading What didn’t make it into “Duty, Debt and Picket Lines: the Queensland Railway Department during the First World War”
Dr Geraldine Mate, Principal Curator – History, Industry and Technology, Queensland Museum Where better for a solar powered bicycle than the Sunshine State? In October 2020, the Brisbane International Film Festival will be premiering a new documentary – A Moment in the Sun. The documentary explores the inspiring and fascinating story of the development of a solar-powered tandem bicycle, designed and built at the University … Continue reading A Moment in the Sun
Did you know only 250 sets of John Gould’s The Birds of Australia were published? The Queensland Museum library has one complete set of the seven volumes and supplement, as well as an incomplete set that was one of the first acquisitions for library in 1876. Gould acknowledged in the preface that it was mammoth ten-year effort creating this work. There are 602 … Continue reading John Gould’s The Birds of Australia
During Biodiversity Month, the Museum Library has taken a deep dive into our rare oceanography books on the voyage of the HMS Challenger, renowned as being the pioneering expedition of modern marine science. The voyage had only one intent – to investigate “everything relating to the ocean”, the first to do so. Naturalist’s John Murray and Charles Wyville Thomson spearheaded the expedition, made achievable with … Continue reading Oceanography in the Rare Books Collection
Collections: Australian South Sea Islander Kastom Collection Imelda Miller, Curator – Torres Strait Islander and Pacific Indigenous Studies, Queensland Museum Network Australian South Sea Islander history and heritage is an important part of Queensland history. This year, 2020 will mark the 20th anniversary of the Queensland Government’s official recognition of Australian South Sea Islanders’ continuing contributions to Queensland. 20 years ago today Early in my … Continue reading Queensland Australian South Sea Islanders embrace 20th Anniversary
The mobilisation of the people of Australia and their possessions means that the country will be turned into one vast war machine. Every person whether civilian or soldier will be a cog in that machine… Women and children according to their individual capabilities, have a place in the wartime economy… ‘Mobilisation’, Queensland Times Ipswich, 14 March 1942. A pair of pilot’s goggles sit quietly on … Continue reading Remembering Queensland Mobilised
