Maryborough. The School of Arts designed by Adelaide architect John Grainger. Built in 1888.
Image by denisbin
The town actually began with a wharf as once prospective settlers learned that the River Mary was navigable white pastoralist and cotton and maize farmers moved into the district upstream from around 1848. Then in 1859 as the colony of Queensland was created from New South Wales a new international port was created at Maryborough. The town had moved from West Maryborough to the present site. Consequently the first Customs House was erected in 1861. In 1860 the first vessels arrived at the port of Maryborough direct from Europe with a load of immigrants. In 1869 nearly 7,000 immigrants had landed in Maryborough and by 1878 nearly 16,000 had landed here. In fact between 1860 and 1900 around 22,000 immigrants arrived directly in Maryborough from England and Europe. Maryborough also had a coastal steamer service to Brisbane and Rockhampton. From 1867 it also handled all the goods going into and the gold coming out of the goldfields at Gympie. In the last quarter of the 19th century the port of Maryborough handled saw timber, sugar, wool, meat, gold, maize, etc. Before the end of the 19th century when river ports like Maryborough were about to be forgotten because they could not handle larger steamers its imports and exports were roughly in balance in terms of value. The most valuable exports were: gold, silver, copper, fruit, hides and skins, sugar and wool. Of these the most valuable were sugar £50,000, raw and refined, followed by silver/lead £33,000, gold/silver £9,000 and skin/hides £8,000.
Among the early immigrants were shiploads of German settlers from 1860. As the numbers grew the first Lutheran pastor arrived in 1864 followed by a second in 1867. These and later pastors came from Germany or Denmark, mainly the Schleswig district, which was occupied by Germany from 1864 after it defeated the Danes. Between 1860 and 1891 around 180,000 immigrants arrived in Queensland with an assisted government passage and some rights to lease land. Around 16,000 were non British mainly Germans, Danes, Norwegians and Swedes. Other Australian colonies only gave assisted passages to British immigrants except for Tasmania and Queensland. Most of the non-British immigrants were German but the QLD government’s agent I Germany also recruited Scandinavians, Swiss etc. Queensland became the colony with the greatest number of Danes and it had almost as many Norwegians and Swedes as NSW. Some of these non-British immigrant’s landed in Maryborough with the first ship load arriving in March 1871 on the Reichstag from Hamburg. The Scandinavians especially settled at Tiaro and Tinana near Maryborough, around Bundaberg, Pialba at Hervey Bay and in other places like Kingaroy where Sir Jo Bjelke-Petersen lived. The town of Eidsvold, near Gayndah is a Norwegian name and it was established by the Archer brothers from Larvik in Norway. As most of the Scandinavians were Lutheran (but some were Catholic), Danish, Norwegian and Swedish names are often linked to the Lutheran churches of the Maryborough district. Some Scandinavian names (mainly Danish) of Maryborough early settlers include the Jocumsen, Claussen,Madsen, Kehlet, Weinberg, Okeden, Boge, Möller, etc. Many Danish and other Scandinavian names can also be found in the Polson cemetery at Pialba Hervey Bay such as Christensen, Hansen, Mortensen, Nielsen, Petersen, Thomsen etc.
