Q150 COLONIAL FAIR SUNDAY, 19 JULY, 2009

Good Morning ladies and gentlemen, girls and boys, it is my distinct pleasure to welcome you all to the Gladstone Regional Council Q150 Colonial Fair.

In addition to being a way for the Gladstone Region to celebrate a milestone in our State's rich history, our 150th birthday, the Q150 Colonial Fair is an opportunity for young and old to step back in time to experience life in 19th century rural Australia.

Through a full program of carefully selected exhibitions, demonstrations, activities and events, the Q150 Colonial Fair organising committee hopes you will appreciate and experience what life was like for our ancestors, whose efforts laid the foundations to allow the establishment of the Gladstone Region.

So, what was life like for those living in the Gladstone Region in the 1850s and 1860s? The small settlement founded with such high hopes in 1854 began its first decade as a Queensland town with a population of only 215. What is more, it was a male dominated society with only 93 females, including children. Two years later the Chinese population was said to be increasing more rapidly than the European, but by 1864 another hundred European men, women and children were added to the community. Both these increases were largely the result of the discovery of payable gold right here at Calliope. Astonishingly, fifty babies were born in Gladstone in 1867 and another sixty-one in the following year. There were also nineteen marriages during those two years. It was a young community in more ways than one.

A Victorian visitor in 1863 described the town as consisting of eight or ten houses 'and a few of these of some pretensions are going to decay'. Among the more pretentious were Toolooa House at Barney Point, the former government residency, and Dr Brown's house. Dr Brown, forced out of

Gladstone by the decline in population following the Canoona rush, had built a mansion which he was obliged to lease to the chief constable for $56 a year. The eight or ten houses referred to would have been those visible from the wharf in Auckland Creek. Most people at that time lived in The Valley. The people themselves were said to be 'a well-to-do contented class of people, not aiming to achieve great success in a limited space of time, but content to travel at a steady pace…'

Employment was limited in the early years. In 1864 unskilled men worked as 'hired servants' for the seventeen merchants, store-keepers, inn-keepers, carriers and teamsters, or as shepherds, hut-keepers and grooms. But a high proportion of the male population were skilled tradesmen in metal, wood, stone and leather. In other words they were the town's tinsmiths, blacksmiths and wheelwrights, cabinet makers, carpenters, stonemasons or boot makers. There was very little choice for women and teenage girls. Of the seventy-eight females in the town in 1864, sixty stayed at home, thirteen worked as domestic servants, one was a producer of food and drink, one was a school teacher and the other four had miscellaneous occupations.

The employment situation for men and women changed little until the coming of the railways and meatworks in the 1890s. Undoubtedly there were lean times when families depended upon the fish they caught and home grown vegetables, also goats' milk for sustenance. This was certainly the case when returns from diggings were low as in 1870 when reference was made to 'the present terrible depression'. Opinions on the town itself and its economic prospects differed. It was described as a 'sleepy hollow' in 1871, a tag it did not finally shake off for almost a hundred years.

That was then, this is now. Queensland has come a long way since being declared a State in our own right by Queen Victoria in 1859 - from being a location in the antipodes deemed fit for convicts to becoming one of the world's most popular holiday destinations, from having a nine-pence treasury to becoming one of Australia's fastest growing economies.

Queensland has grown into a state of over four million residents. We lay claim to amazing people doing incredible things in tourism, the arts, health, research and development, science and innovation, mining and agriculture. We have a lot to celebrate. Our 150th anniversary year is an opportunity for us to take stock, reflect back, think ahead and move forward.

On behalf of the entire Gladstone Regional Council I would like to thank everyone who has been involved in the organisation, preparation and planning of the Q150 Colonial Fair. Your efforts have been much appreciated and you deserve a round of applause. Secondly I must recognise the State Government's Q150 Community Funding Program for its support, without which the fair would not have been made possible. Thirdly to all the performers, demonstrators and exhibitionists who are set to entertain us today with everything from song and dance to poetry, whip-cracking and butter churning, thank you for taking the time out to share your knowledge, experience and talents with us. And lastly I would like to thank all of you, the visitors to the fair, for making the effort to share in this most memorable day, your involvement is what will truly make this day a success. And without further a-do let's get on with the business of celebrating our 150th anniversary and feeling good about being a Queenslander, enjoy!