|
| The statue of 'World
Champion Blade Shearer Jackie Howe (John Robert
Howe) 1861-1920 Blade shore 321 sheep in 7 hours 40
minutes at 'Alice Downs' Blackall on Monday 10
October 1892. |
Blackall
An attractive and interesting Western Queensland town.
It is not widely known now but Blackall's claim to fame was
once based on the popular, and for the time, risque
limerick:
A popular girl of Blackall / Wore a newspaper dress to a
ball / Her rig-out caught fire / And burned her entire, /
Front page, sporting section and all.
Equally 'Banjo' Paterson made much of the town's river,
the famous Barcoo, including the memorable lines: 'On the
outer Barcoo, where churches are few / and men of religion
are scanty, / On a road seldom crossed save by folk who are
lost / One Michael Magee had a shanty.'
Could he have had somewhere around Blackall in mind?
Since those heady days the town has achieved much greater
fame. It claims to be 'the home of the fair dinkum black
stump' and boasts 'You are in Jackie Howe country - the
world's greatest ever blade shearer'.
The signs outside the town also declare 'Welcome to
Blackall - you are in merino country. Blackall- the biggest
cattle selling centre in the Central West. Population 2234.'
In an area of Queensland where monotony is the norm these
are significant claims for a small town to make.
Located 1127 km north-west of Brisbane and 284 metres
above sea-level, Blackall is a rather attractive country
town with trees down the centre of the main street, lots of
old-style pubs and a lazy air which is in keeping with its
location.
The area around Blackall was explored by Sir Thomas
Mitchell in 1846. He came across the Barcoo River, which he
called the 'Victoria', believing that it flowed north into
the Gulf of Carpentaria. He returned to Sydney buoyed up by
this information. Less than a year later Edmund Kennedy
returned to the area and proved Mitchell incorrect by
following the Barcoo until it became part of the mighty
Cooper Creek.
The town was first settled in 1864 and in 1868 it was
surveyed, gazetted and named after Samuel Wensley Blackall,
then-governor of Queensland. Blackall died three year later
in Brisbane but not before he had inspected a new cemetery
at Toowong and chosen the site with the greatest elevation
for his remains.
The area around the town was taken up by huge pastoral
leases and over the next forty years the town became an
important centre for transportation. Prior to the arrival of
the rail service in Barcaldine in 1886 it was the main town
in the region.
Things to see:
Jackie Howe Statue
Perhaps the most famous event in Blackall's history was the
remarkable shearing achievement of Jackie Howe in 1892. The
event has been memorialised in the form of a handsome statue
located outside the Tattersalls Hotel in the main street.
The inscription on the plaque explains why Howe is still so
admired in western Queensland: 'World Champion Blade Shearer
Jackie Howe (John Robert Howe) 1861-1920. Blade shore 321
sheep in 7 hours 40 minutes at 'Alice Downs' Blackall on
Monday 10 October 1892'. It was a world record which was not
beaten until 1950 when electric shears were introduced.
According to local mythology Howe's remarkable abilities
came from his huge hands and the fact that he trained by
squeezing a rubber ball. In later life he became a publican
and was much liked by his fellow shearers.
The Black Stump
The black stump has always loomed large in rural Australian
mythology as a place beyond which was no man's land. Hence
the impossible location of 'beyond the black stump'. Looking
at the countryside around Blackall it would be fair to think
that some wit coined the phrase to describe the hopelessness
of life in Central Queensland. In fact the official
explanation emblazoned on a sign by the stump is far more
pedestrian:
This historic site permanently marks the original Astro
station established in 1887 by the Surveyor-General for the
purpose of survey, based on the principal meridional circuit
traversed around the town of Blackall. The circuit around
Blackall was 20 miles square and contained an area of 129
square miles. The surveyors placed their theodolites on the
stump for latitude and longitude observations. The stump was
used rather than a set of legs because the theodolite used
on such observations were of a large size. This Astro
station was used as part of the principal survey to fix the
position of principal towns extending from Brisbane to
Boulia via. Roma, Charleville and Blackall. It was designed
to establish the points of important centres with which the
survey work of the whole colony could be connected, and
enable the mapping of Queensland on a more accurate basis.
It was considered at the time that the country to the west
of Blackall was 'beyond the black stump'. This piece of
petrified wood replaces the original stump which was burnt
out.
To see the Black Stump, which looks decidedly grey, turn
into Hawthorn Street from the Landsborough Highway and go
around to the back of the school.
|
| The historic wool scour
near Blackall |
The Blackall Wool Scour
4.2 km north of town (turn north into Clemantis Street from
the Landsborough Highway) is the Blackall Wool Scour. The
process of wool scouring, which had once been done by hand,
involved putting the greasy wool through a special scouring
solution, drying the cleaned wool, then pressing it into
bales. When the wool scour was built in 1906 it was
considered a miracle of modern technology. It is open for
inspection seven days a week from 8.00am - 4.00pm and guided
tours are on offer.
Black's Palace Sites
To the east of the town lies one of Queensland's most
important Aboriginal sites. The Black's Palace artefacts,
located on Marston Station, constitute the largest complex
of Aboriginal drawings known to exist in Central Queensland.
The paintings are set on the sandstone cliff faces of a
gorge which is about 500-600 metres long and about 200
metres wide. Anthropologists have recorded some 9 471
figures in the area ranging from stencils of hands, feet,
boomerangs and axes to drawings of spears, clubs, shields,
snakes and lizards. There are also a large number of
abstract patterns. It is well worth a visit although the
road to the site is dirt and far from perfect. It is also,
realistically, a full day's outing.
The key to the padlock at 'Black's Palace', as well as
the answer to most questions touching Blackall, can be
obtained by contacting the tourist information centre which
is located in Short Street
Australian Businesses for sale
Caravan Parks for sale
Motels for sale
Hotels for sale
Broadwalk Business Brokers
Businesses for Sale in Blackall
: Buy or Sell Hotels, Motels, Caravan Parks, Bed & Breakfast,
Pubs, Wine Bars, Restaurants, Cafe, English Tea Rooms, Coffee Shops,
Deli, Catering Business, Pubs, Bars, Sandwich Bars, Pizza Delivery,
Bakeries, Hot Food Take-away, Fish & Chips, Petrol & Service Stations,
Australian Businesses for sale, Car Sales, Motor & Transport, Car/Van
Hires, Newsagents, Dry Cleaners, Salons, General Stores, Retail Stores,
Post Office, Printers, Convenience Stores, Clothes shop, Hair Dressers,
Beauty Salon, Fruit Markets, Butchers, Florist, Card & Gift shop, Sports
shop, Book Shops, Care Agency, Pharmacy, Tool-Hardware & DIY shops, Pet
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sales, Business sales, Bar for sale, Juice Bar for sale,
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Business for sale, Convenience Store for sale, Deli Businesses for
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Preschool for sale, Pest Control Businesses for sale ,Business for
sale Pet Shop, Plumbing Businesses for sale , Post Office for sale ,
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Machine Businesses for sale , Wholesale Businesses for sale,
Wrecking Yard for sale in Blackall.
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