One hundred years ago, spare parts for aircraft were difficult to find. There were few operational aircraft in Australia, and the new era of air travel was only just dawning around the world. So when Sir Ross Smith and Sir Keith Smith needed new engine components and a new propeller for their Vickers Vimy, in which they had become the first people to fly from … Continue reading Aircraft repairs at the Railway Workshops
While working on a small collection of cricket trophies that had been donated to the Museum a few years ago, I began to research the man who had been awarded them. What I discovered was the remarkable story Ray Argus; a fast bowler and very handy slogger for the Ipswich Railways Cricket Club. The Second World War interrupted his remarkable career and he did not … Continue reading The Railway’s Own Cricket Champion
The year 1969 saw most steam locomotives in Queensland drop their fires for the last time. These machines had been a part of life in Queensland for over a hundred years. Harnessing the elemental forces of fire and water they had carried foreign armies on their backs, fed entire cities and made countless awestruck children late for school. But by the end of that year, … Continue reading Farewell to Steam in Queensland
In 1920, General Sir William Birdwood, warmly known as the ‘Soul of Anzac’ or the ‘Digger-in-Chief’, toured Australia to meet and present medals to soldiers who had served in World War I. An Englishmen who could relate to and appreciate the Australian character, Birdwood was greatly admired by the Diggers he commanded in Gallipoli and on the Western Front. Birdwood arrived in Ipswich on Tuesday, … Continue reading Foundations of Remembrance in Ipswich
September means football finals. Expectations are high for teams that have been up the top all year and fans of these teams are cautiously optimistic. But for everyone else, it’s just another wasted year and the fresh promise of next season cannot come soon enough. In the 1940s a Rugby League side from the Ipswich Railway Workshops experienced the highs and lows that are all … Continue reading The worst Rugby League team ever?
Here at The Workshops Rail Museum, we’ve been working hard to clear the backlog of little jobs necessary to keep our locomotives and rolling stock looking clean and well maintained. Whilst polishing brass on a steam locomotive is something even a curator can do, many of these jobs require outside knowledge and expertise. This was the case with one of our passenger carriages – BV … Continue reading Railway Carriage Secrets
“I remember clearly the Christmas my parents decided I was old enough to have a model railway all of my own. Saturday mornings were spent in the local hobby shop. I was awe struck by the rows of gleaming model locomotives in glass display cabinets, with little handwritten price tags propped up neatly next to each engine. The present I opened up on Christmas day … Continue reading A Toy Train for Christmas
The Workshops Rail Museum has installed a new exhibit 12 years in the making: Hunslet locomotive 327.
In 2005 the Museum was donated a 2 foot gauge tank locomotive that had operated between the early 1920s and the mid-1960s at the North Eton Mill, in Mackay, Queensland, hauling sugar cane. However, the locomotive was originally built in England in 1916 for use on the Western Front during the First World War.
Written by Dr Geraldine Mate, Principal Curator, Industry, History and Technology.
It’s a nerdy boast, I know, but I love maps! Colourful touristy maps, contour maps, historic maps with wheat, sugar and gold country blithely shaded out, hand-drawn maps with names of people as important as names of places, and even the busy cadastral maps – dimensioned and officially (officiously?) denoting gazetted reserves, roadways, property boundaries and survey points. They all somehow convey a little bit about the landscape they depict. So what do maps have to do with archaeology?
Continue reading “Meaning in Maps”
Written by: Geraldine Mate, Senior Curator, The Workshops Rail Museum In the last two months, the grounds at The Workshops Rail Museum have been reminiscent of scenes almost 100 years ago. Our heritage listed War Memorial has been undergoing a face-lift, with the installation of new paving and walkways. Watching the transformation, the busyness of the construction workers has evoked the activities that would have … Continue reading Remembrance Day… Ipswich Railway Workshops Memorial
Written by: Rob Shiels, Assistant Collection Manager, The Workshops Rail Museum In July 2016, Pompey, the black locomotive in the grounds at The Workshops Rail Museum will be moved to an undercover area at the Museum. Pompey has been a popular display item since the Museum opened in 2002 and has been climbed on by thousands of adults and children alike in the last 14 … Continue reading Pompey’s next chapter
Written by: David Mews, Curator, The Workshops Rail Museum Whenever I drive over the Bremer River bridge on the Warrego Highway, I imagine the little paddle steamers as they chugged their way to Ipswich or back to Brisbane. This year celebrates the 150 years of Queensland Rail and my imagination takes me back in time trying to picture what it must have been like. Ipswich … Continue reading Anticipation in Ipswich
Written by: Geraldine Mate, Senior Curator, The Workshops Rail Museum
One of the most exciting parts of pulling an exhibition together is seeing an idea that has been in your head turn into a full colour, three-dimensional solid entity. A lot of time goes into the writing of text for labels and panels, the identification and selection of objects and choosing from the myriad of photographs available.
Continue reading “Behind the scenes of exhibition development: In three dimensions and full colour”
Written by: David Mewes, Curator, The Workshops Rail Museum
During my holidays in August 1968 I had the opportunity to see and hear the famed 610 mm gauge Hudswell Clarke 0-6-0 steam locomotives used by the Colonial Sugar Refining Company at their sugar mills in Queensland and Fiji. The last ten of these locomotives at that time worked in the Ingham District at the CSR Victoria and Macknade mills. The oldest was also the smallest, the Homebush, built in 1914. The remainder ranged in size and weight with the last built in 1953 being the largest and most powerful. Continue reading “Homebush turns 100”
Written by: Dr Geraldine Mate, Senior Curator, The Workshops Rail Museum
As a Curator, I am often asked “What’s your favourite object?”. Now to me this is a difficult question to answer – it’s a bit like being asked “who’s your favourite child?”. There are so many great objects in the collection that it’s impossible to pick one.
Written by: David Mewes, Curator, The Workshops Rail Museum
No, this is not about famous sleuths solving a puzzling crime. Agatha Christies’ characters Hercule Poirot and Miss Marple have never been involved in cases involving Queensland Railways although they have solved murders on famous European trains like the Orient Express or the Blue Train.
Written by: David Mewes, Curator, The Workshops Rail Museum
“Billy Sheen and his C16” was the title of a song recorded by Brisbane folk group The Moreton Bay Bushwhackers in 1959 as part of Queensland’s Centenary celebrations. I often think of this song whenever I come across references to Queensland Railways’ C16 Class locomotives, the prototype of which was designed and built here at the Ipswich Railway Workshops in 1903.
Written by: Rob Sheils, Assistant Collection Manager, The Workshops Rail Museum
In May 2012 “I’ve Been Working on the Railway – Stories and experiences of Torres Strait Islanders, Aboriginal people and Australian South Sea Islanders” opened at The Workshops Rail Museum. We were lucky enough to later receive a grant from the Australian Government through the Australian Council for the Arts, its funding and advisory body, to travel the exhibition around Australia between 2013-2015.
Written by: Geraldine Mate, Senior Curator, The Workshops Rail Museum
Each year on ANZAC Day the Memorial on the grounds of The Workshops Rail Museum is the scene of ANZAC Day commemorations by the Ipswich Railway RSL Sub-branch.
Continue reading “ANZAC Day and the Ipswich Railway Workshops Memorial”
Written by: Geraldine Mate, Senior Curator, The Workshops Rail Museum
Every day when I walk into The Workshops Rail Museum, I look at the buildings! It sounds a bit obvious, I know, but how often do you walk into work, look at your watch, greet colleagues and not think about the place you are going into?
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