Foto Nun River

Longreach. Sunset over the Thomson River at Longreach. dengan denisbin

Early Pastoral Runs around Longreach. William Landsborough and Nat Buchanan wanted to establish a run called Bowen Downs in 1860 along the Thomson where Longreach now stands. But the Queensland Runs Act of 1860 made the financial backing of others necessary as all leasehold runs had to be stocked to an estimated quarter of the running capacity from the start of the lease and the lease rate was set at 10 shillings a square mile. So Bowen Downs required a lease of £750 and 37,500 sheep (or 7,500 cattle) which would have been worth a huge sum of money. The Scottish Australia Company provided most of the financial backing for Buchanan and Landsborough but by 1870 the Company was the sole owner of Bowen Downs. The first stock was driven down from Port Denison (now the coastal port of Bowen) as it was the closest (520 kms) coastal town. Bowen Downs was added to with additional runs and soon comprised 26 runs along the Thomson River. The Company also took up Corinda, Aramac, and Rodney Downs runs. By 1866 Bowen Downs had a population of 60 people, including 3 women. It was then a well established run and the major one in the Thomson River district. In the late 1860s one of the workers on Bowen Downs was called Harry Redford. He was also a courier for William Forrester of Forrester Station. Redford, who became known as Captain Starlight, conceived the idea of doffing or stealing cattle from Bowen Downs with the intention of droving them down the Thomson, Barcoo and Cooper’s Creek to Adelaide. Redford, assisted by John McKenzie, James McPherson, G Doudney and J Brooks put the plan into action in 1870 after good summer rains. One thousand head of cattle was stolen including a conspicuous white stud bull which proved to be the nemesis of Captain Starlight. The white bull had been bought from the Archer Brothers, the founders of the city of Rockhampton. It was this bull that was first noticed as missing. As Redford and his friends drove the cattle south west they sold the white bull to Hill Hill Station. After three months their supplies were running out so the group sold all the cattle to Blanchwater Station, who immediately sold them on again. Bowen Downs sent three men to track the cattle duffers. Redford was arrested in 1871 but escaped and was then re-captured in NSW in 1872. He was tried for his crime in Roma in 1873 but amazingly the jury returned a “not guilty” verdict! The Queensland Government then closed the Court in Roma for two years for returning such an outrageous verdict. Redford was later arrested in 1877 and convicted of horse stealing in Toowoomba. Partly because of the Captain Starlight episode Bowen Downs was divided into two stations- Mt Cornish and Bowen Downs, each with a manager to watch for such things. The head station by the 1880s ran for 120 miles along the Thomson River and carried 72,000 cattle. By this time, many of the runs in the Longreach district had been bought out by companies and run by them such as the Scottish Australia Company for Bowen Downs, the Landsborough Pastoral Company, Dalgety & Co, the Melbourne Trust Company, the London Chartered Bank Trust etc. During this period many for the runs were amalgamated into even bigger runs, and there was a shift away from cattle to sheep production. After the 1884 Dutton Land Act was passed, up to one quarter of the runs were resumed by the Government for selector runs and properties from 1,000 acres up to 20,000 acres were sold by the government. The increasing number of runs and population boosted the development of towns like Longreach. The stations needed towns as they relied on couriers and transport deliveries to move goods into the stations and cattle and sheep out of the stations. Settlements grew up around water holes where teamsters could water their horses or bullocks and themselves! The wayside pubs became social centres and eventually small towns. Although the big runs dominated the district some of the selectors tried to grow wheat or lucerne on their small properties. In the whole district there were only about 350 selectors and their impact was not too significant. The big runs were huge and one station employed 270 shearers one year to shear 228,000 sheep. The 1891 and 1894 Shearers’ Strikes affected the local pastoralists who were in turn being affected by the collapse of funding banks. Police escorts were used by the pastoralists, and some violence ensued. It was out of this major clash of unionised workers and large company run stations that the Australia Labor Party was formed. It was the first labour political party in the world and it stemmed directly from the 1891 strike which was centered on Barcaldine. A shearer Tommy Ryan was elected to the Queensland Parliament after this and a new labour party was formed around this achievement. In 1894 the strike centre was near Winton and shearers burn down shearing sheds and armed themselves with rifles. One unionist was killed and around 40 shots were fired. In the end the shearers accepted a pay cut. Banjo Paterson later that year wrote a song about these strikes whilst visiting Dagworth Station. The first public performance of Waltzing Matilda took place in Winton in April 1895, but the headquarters of the Shearers’ Union was in Longreach. Droughts and devastation were common on the runs. When the summer rains did not come, the Thomson dried up or became a series of water holes. In bad years the stations suffered huge losses of stock. After the droughts of the early 1890s and again between 1900 and 1902 many stations decided to afford the cost of sinking bores to tap into the Great Artesian Basin. A Brief History of Longreach Township. Longreach was a planned government town which was to be the terminus for the central west railway. After the rise of the north Queensland separatist movement in the 1880s when the north wanted to secede and form a new state, the Queensland government decided to invest more money in the northern areas. The railway was gradually pushed out from Rockhampton to Emerald in 1879, to Barcaldine in 1886, and to Longreach in February 1892. The government surveyed land and gazetted the town of Longreach in 1887 with the immediate sale of town blocks. The town had a grid pattern with the main streets named after land birds, and the cross streets named after water birds. The main street is Eagle Street. The first building erected in the new town was a hotel for Joe Willett on the corner of Pelican and Eagle Streets. There was talk of Longreach being the “Chicago of the West.” In some respects the rapid growth of the town was remarkable. The early buyers of land were residents of Barcaldine, a few Chinese traders, the churches, and the banks. Buildings went up with great speed. By 1892 the town was the headquarters for the Shearers Union; it had several hotels, 10 general stores, a brewery, 2 bakers, 3 butchers, and 4 blacksmiths. The population jumped from 150 in 1890 to 2,000 by 1896. By 1897 the town had a post office (1893), hospital, football club, a state school, Catholic (1893), Methodist (1893) and Anglican (1895) churches, a court house (1894), 2 doctors, and 10 hotels. But the buildings were all clap board and fires were common. The first major fire in 1898 destroyed several adjoining buildings in Eagle Street. More fires followed in later years. The additional area of West Longreach across the Thomson River was gazetted in 1892, and this area included the boiling down works to dispose of old livestock. The market for tallow for candles and soap was strong in the late 19th century. The wool scouring factory was opened in 1895 and employed 200 men by 1897. It finally closed in the 1920s. After 1900 conditions in Longreach began to improve as the worst of the droughts and pioneering years were behind the citizens. Reticulated water from the Artesian Basin improved the town, reduced the incidence of typhoid and other water born diseases and provided a sense of security for the town. Milk, however was a continuing source of difficulty. When droughts came the local dairy herds which provided milk for the town died hence goats were used by most residents to provide milk. But because of the goats no one could grow trees or lawns as the goats roamed the town streets and ate everything. It was not until the mid 1950s when the town got a sewerage system that conditions improved. Milk supplies were more regular by then, goats were dispensed with, and residents began planting trees and lawns to keep the dust down. Earlier improvements to the town included a Roman Catholic school and convent in 1902. It was established by nuns from Wagga. The telephone exchange opened in 1904 improving communications, and the first airplane landed at Longreach in 1919! Eagle Street was bituminized in 1917, but not the other town streets, and the Power House was erected and the town electrified in 1921. Prior to this hotels and stores had their own generators. By 1933 Longreach had a population of 3,300 people. Today it has closer to 3,000 residents.
Nun River merupakan objek wisata, salah satu Sungai di Ibia , Nigeria . Hal ini terletak: 260 km dari Port Harcourt, 323 km dari Aba, 441 km dari Benin City. Baca lebih lanjut
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