Brisbane

Brisbane ( ) is the capital and most populous city of the Australian state of Queensland, and the third-most populous city in Australia and Oceania, with a population of approximately 2.6 million. Brisbane lies at the centre of the South East Queensland metropolitan region, which encompasses a population of around 3.8 million. The Brisbane central business district is situated within a peninsula of the Brisbane River about from its mouth at Moreton Bay, a bay of the Coral Sea. Brisbane is located in the hilly floodplain of the Brisbane River Valley between Moreton Bay and the Taylor and D'Aguilar mountain ranges. It sprawls across several local government areas, most centrally the City of Brisbane, Australia's most populous local government area. The demonym of Brisbane is ''Brisbanite''.

The Traditional Owners of the Brisbane area include clans of the Yugara, Turrbal and Quandamooka peoples. The Turrbal word for the Brisbane area is ''Meeanjin''. The Moreton Bay penal settlement was founded in 1824 at Redcliffe as a place for secondary offenders from the Sydney colony, and soon moved to North Quay in 1825 on the banks of the Brisbane River, so named for Sir Thomas Brisbane. German Lutherans established the first free settlement of Zion Hill at Nundah in 1838, and in 1859 Brisbane was chosen as Queensland's capital when the state separated from New South Wales. By the late 19th century, the city had grown into a major port and centre of immigration. During World War II, the Allied command in the South West Pacific was based in the city, along with the headquarters for General Douglas MacArthur of the United States Army.

Brisbane is classified as a global city,Schroders Global Cities Index
– Schroders, 2019 and is a centre of research and innovation in the Asia-Pacific, with strengths in medicine and biotechnology. A transport hub, Brisbane is served by large rail, bus and ferry networks, as well as Brisbane Airport and Australia's third-largest seaport.

A diverse city with over 32% of its metropolitan population being foreign-born, Brisbane is consistently ranked among the world's most livable cities. Galleries and museums are an important part of the city's culture, with the most prominent being the Queensland Art Gallery and Gallery of Modern Art. Brisbane has hosted major events including the 1982 Commonwealth Games, World Expo 88, the 2014 G20 summit, and will host the 2032 Summer Olympics and Paralympics.

Brisbane is a popular tourist destination. Major landmarks and attractions include South Bank Parklands, the City Botanic Gardens, King George Square and City Hall, the Story Bridge, the Mount Coot-tha Botanic Gardens and Lookout and the Lone Pine Koala Sanctuary.

Toponymy

Brisbane is named after the Brisbane River, which in turn was named after Sir Thomas Brisbane, the governor of New South Wales from 1821 to 1825. The name is derived from the Scottish Gaelic "''bris''", meaning "to break or smash" and the Old English word "''ban''" meaning "bone".

Popular nicknames for the city include "Brissie", "Brisvegas" and the "River City". An historic nickname for Brisbane was "Queen City", and from the city's topography of hills and great river, was styled "Later Rome" by H.J. Diddams.

In Turrbal Brisbane is named ''Meeanjin''.

History

Early history

Aboriginal people lived in coastal South East Queensland (SEQ) for at least 22,000 years, with an estimated population between 6,000 and 10,000 individuals before European settlers arrived in the 1820s.

At the time of colonisation the Brisbane area was inhabited by clans of the Yugara, Turrbal and Quandamooka peoples. Turrbal people knew the area that is now the central business district as ''Mian-jin'', meaning "place shaped as a spike". Archaeological evidence suggests frequent habitation around the Brisbane River, and notably at the site now known as Musgrave Park.

The rivers were integral to life and supplied an abundance of food included fish, shellfish, crab, and prawns. Good fishing places became campsites and the focus of group activities. The district was defined by open woodlands with rainforest in some pockets or bends of the Brisbane River.

A resource-rich area and a natural avenue for seasonal movement, Brisbane was a way station for groups travelling to ceremonies and spectacles. The region had several large (200–600 person) seasonal camps, the biggest and most important located along waterways north and south of the current city heart: Barambin or 'York's Hollow' camp (today's Victoria Park) and Woolloon-cappem ( Woolloongabba/ South Brisbane), also known as Kurilpa. These camping grounds continued to function well into colonial times, and were the basis of European settlement in parts of Brisbane.

18th and 19th centuries

In 1770, British navigator James Cook, sailed through South Passage between the main offshore islands leading to the bay, which he named after James Douglas, 14th Earl of Morton, misspelled as 'Moreton'.

Matthew Flinders initially explored the Moreton Bay area on behalf of the British authorities. On 17 July 1799, Flinders landed at present-day Woody Point, which he named "Red Cliff Point" after the red-coloured cliffs visible from the bay.

In 1823 the Governor of New South Wales, Sir Thomas Brisbane, gave instructions for the development of a new northern penal settlement, and an exploration party led by John Oxley further explored Moreton Bay in November 1823.

Oxley claimed, named, and explored the Brisbane River as far as Goodna, upstream from the present-day central business district of Brisbane. Oxley recommended Red Cliff Point for the new colony, reporting that ships could land at any tide and easily get close to the shore. The convict settlement party landed in Redcliffe on 13 September 1824, under the command of Lieutenant Henry Miller – the group included 14 soldiers (some with wives and children) and 29 convicts. However, the settlers abandoned this site after a year and moved to an area on the Brisbane River now known as North Quay, south, which offered a more reliable water-supply. The newly selected Brisbane region, at the time, was plagued by mosquitos.

After visiting the Redcliffe settlement, Sir Thomas Brisbane then travelled up the Brisbane River in December 1824. Governor Brisbane stayed overnight in a tent and often landed ashore, thus bestowing upon the future Brisbane City the distinction of being the only Australian capital city visited by its namesake. Chief Justice Forbes gave the new settlement the name of "Edenglassie" before it was named "Brisbane". The Corn Field Raids of 1827-1828 was a frontier conflict in the early Moreton Bay Penal Settlement. The conflict consisted of Turrbal attempts to starve out the colony by repeated plundering and destruction of the maize fields in South Bank and Kangaroo Point.

The penal settlement under the control of Captain Patrick Logan (Commandant from 1826 to 1830) flourished, with the numbers of convicts increasing dramatically from around 200 to over 1,000 men. He developed a substantial settlement of brick and stone buildings, complete with school and hospital. He formed additional outstations and made several important journeys of exploration. Logan became infamous for his extreme use of the cat o' nine tails on convicts. The maximum allowed limit of lashes was 50; however, Logan regularly applied sentences of 150 lashes.

Between 1824 and 1842, almost 2,400 men and 145 women were detained at the Moreton Bay convict settlement under the control of military commandants.

Non-convict European settlement of the Brisbane region commenced in 1838 and the population grew strongly thereafter, with free settlers soon far outstripping the convict population. German missionaries settled at Zions Hill, Nundah as early as 1837, five years before Brisbane was officially declared a free settlement. The band consisted of ministers Christopher Eipper (1813–1894), Carl Wilhelm Schmidt, and lay missionaries Haussmann, Johann Gottried Wagner, Niquet, Hartenstein, Zillman, Franz, Rode, Doege and Schneider. They were allocated 260 hectares and set about establishing the mission, which became known as the German Station. Later in the 1860s many German immigrants from the Uckermark region in Prussia as well as from other German regions settled in the areas of Bethania, Beenleigh and the Darling Downs. These immigrants were selected and assisted through immigration programs established by John Dunmore Lang and Johann Christian Heussler and were offered free passage, good wages, and selections of land.

Scottish immigrants from the ship arrived in Brisbane in 1849, enticed by Rev Dr John Dunmore Lang on the promise of free land grants. Denied land, the immigrants set up camp in York's Hollow waterholes in the vicinity of today's Victoria Park, Herston, Queensland. A number of the immigrants moved in and settled the suburb, naming it Fortitude Valleyafter the ship on which they arrived.

Free settlers entered the area from 1835, and by the end of 1840, Robert Dixon had begun work on the first plan of Brisbane Town, in anticipation of future development. The Roman Catholic church erected the Pugin Chapel in 1850, to the design by the gothic revivalist Augustus Pugin. Letters patent dated 6 June 1859, proclaimed by Sir George Ferguson Bowen on 10 December 1859, separated Queensland from New South Wales, whereupon Bowen became Queensland's first governor, with Brisbane chosen as the capital. Old Government House was constructed in 1862 to house Sir George Bowen's family, including his wife, the noblewoman Diamantina, Lady Bowen di Roma. During the tenure of Lord Lamington, Old Government House was the likely site of the origin of Lamingtons.

During the War of Southern Queensland, indigenous attacks occurred across the city, committing robberies and terrorising unarmed residents. 'Reprisal raids' took place against the 'Duke of York's clan' in Victoria Park in 1846 and 1849 by British soldiers of the 11th Regiment, however the clan had been wrongfully targeted as the attacks on Brisbane had not been committed by the Turrbal themselves but other tribes farther north. In 1855, Dundalli, a prominent leader during the conflict, was captured and executed by hanging at the present site of the GPO.

In 1864, the Great Fire of Brisbane burned through the central parts of the city, destroying much of Queen Street. The 1860s were a period of economic and political turmoil leading to high unemployment, in 1866 hundreds of impoverished workers convened a meeting at the Treasury Hotel, with a cry for "bread or blood", rioted and attempted to ransack the Government store's.

The City Botanic Gardens were originally established in 1825 as a farm for the Moreton Bay penal settlement, and were planted by convicts in 1825 with food crops to feed the prison colony. In 1855, several acres was declared a Botanic Reserve under the Superintendent Walter Hill, a position he held until 1881. Some of the older trees planted in the Gardens were the first of their species to be planted in Australia, including the jacaranda and poinciana. It is claimed that all jacaranda trees in Australia are descended from the original jacaranda tree that grew from a seed imported by Hill in 1864.

Charles Tiffin was appointed as Queensland Government Architect in 1859, and pursued an intellectual policy in the design of public buildings based on Italianate and Renaissance revivalism, with such buildings as Government House, the Department of Primary Industries Building in 1866, and the Queensland Parliament built in 1867. The 1880s brought a period of economic prosperity and a major construction boom in Brisbane, that produced an impressive number of notable public and commercial buildings. John James Clark was appointed Queensland Government Architect in 1883, and continuing in Tiffin's design for public buildings, asserted the propriety of the Italian Renaissance, drawing upon typological elements and details from conservative High Renaissance sources. Building in this trace of intellectualism, Clark designed the Treasury Building in 1886, and the Yungaba Immigration Centre in 1885. Other major works of the era include Customs House in 1889, and the Old Museum Building completed in 1891.

Fort Lytton was constructed in 1882 at the mouth of the Brisbane river, to protect the city against foreign colonial powers such as Russia and France, and was the only moated fort ever built in Australia.

The city's slum district of Frog's Hollow, named so for its location being low-lying and swampy, was both the red light district of colonial Brisbane and its Chinatown, and was the site of prostitution, sly grog, and opium dens. In 1888, Frog's Hollow was the site of anti-Chinese riots, where more than 2000 people attacked Chinese homes and businesses.

In 1893 Brisbane was affected by the Black February flood, when the Brisbane River burst its banks on three occasions in February and again in June in the same year, with the city receiving more than a year's rainfall during February 1893, leaving much of the city's population homeless. In 1896, the Brisbane river saw its worst maritime disaster with the capsize of the ferry Pearl, between the 80-100 people onboard there were only 40 survivors.

20th century

When the colonies united in a federation in 1901, celebrations were held in Brisbane to mark the event, with a triumphal arch in Queen Street. In May that year, the Duke of Cornwall and York (later King George V) laid the foundation stone of St John's Cathedral, one of the great cathedrals of Australia. The University of Queensland was founded in 1909 and first sited at Old Government House, which became vacated as the government planned for a larger residence. Fernberg House, built in 1865, became the temporary residence in 1910, and later made the permanent government house.

In 1912, Tramway employees were stood down for wearing union badges which sparked Australia's first General strike, the 1912 Brisbane General Strike, which became known as Black Friday, for the savagery of the police baton charges on crowds of trade unionists and their supporters. In 1917, during World War I, the Australian Government conducted a raid on the Queensland Government Printing Office, with the aim of confiscating copies of Hansard that covered debates in the Queensland Parliament where anti-conscription sentiments had been aired.

Russian immigration took place in the years 1911–1914. Many were radicals and revolutionaries seeking asylum from tsarist political repression in the final chaotic years of the Russian Empire; considerable numbers were Jews escaping state-inspired pogroms. They had fled Russia via Siberia and Northern China, most making their way to Harbin, in Manchuria, then taking passage from the port of Dalian to Townsville or Brisbane, the first Australian ports of call.

Following the First World War, returned servicemen of the First Australian Imperial Force were focused upon socialists and other elements of society that the ex-servicemen considered to be disloyal toward Australia.Coulthard-Clark 1998, pg. 165. Over the course of 1918–1919, a series of violent demonstrations and attacks known as the Red Flag riots, were waged throughout Brisbane. The most notable incident occurred on 24 March 1919, when a crowd of about 8,000 ex-servicemen clashed violently with police who were preventing them from attacking the Russian Hall in Merivale Street, South Brisbane, which was known as the "Battle of Merivale Street".

Over 20 small municipalities and shires were amalgamated in 1925 to form the City of Brisbane, governed by the Brisbane City Council. A significant year for Brisbane was 1930, with the completion of Brisbane City Hall, then the city's tallest building and the Shrine of Remembrance, in ANZAC Square, which has become Brisbane's main war memorial.

These historic buildings, along with the Story Bridge which opened in 1940, are key landmarks that help define the architectural character of the city. Following the death of King George V in 1936, Albert square was widened to include the area which had been Albert Street, and renamed King George Square in honour of the King. An equestrian statue of the king and two Bronze Lion sculptures were unveiled in 1938.

In 1939, armed farmers marched on the Queensland Parliament and stormed the building in an attempt to take hostage the Queensland Government led by Labor Premier William Forgan Smith, in an event that became known as the "Pineapple rebellion".

During World War II, Brisbane became central to the Allied campaign, since it was the northernmost city with adequate communications facilities, when the AMP Building (now called MacArthur Central) was used as the headquarters for General MacArthur, until his headquarters were moved to Hollandia in August 1944. MacArthur had previously rejected use of the University of Queensland complex as his headquarters, as the distinctive bends in the river at St Lucia could have aided enemy bombers. Also used as a headquarters by the American troops during World War II was the T & G Building. About one million US troops passed through Australia during the war, as the primary co-ordination point for the South West Pacific. Wartime Brisbane was defined by the racial segregation of African American servicemen, prohibition and sly grog, crime, and jazz ballrooms.

In 1942, Brisbane was the site of a violent clash between visiting US military personnel and Australian servicemen and civilians, which resulted in one death and hundreds of injuries. This incident became known colloquially as the "Battle of Brisbane".

Post-war Brisbane had developed a "big country town" stigma, an image the city's politicians and marketers were very keen to remove. In the late 1950s, an anonymous poet known as The Brisbane Bard generated much attention to the city which helped shake this stigma. In 1955, Wickham Terrace was the site of a terrorist incident involving shootings and bombs, by the German immigrant Karl Kast. Despite steady growth, Brisbane's development was punctuated by infrastructure problems. The state government under Joh Bjelke-Petersen began a major programme of change and urban renewal, beginning with the central business district and inner suburbs. Trams in Brisbane were a popular mode of public transport until the network was closed in 1969, in part the result of the Paddington tram depot fire

HOME


Content is Copyleft
Website design, code, and AI is Copyrighted (c) 2014-2017 by Stephen Payne


Consider donating to Wikimedia



As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases