Cressbrook is a rural

locality Locality may refer to: * Locality (association), an association of community regeneration organizations in England * Locality (linguistics) * Locality (settlement) * Suburbs and localities (Australia), in which a locality is a geographic subdivis ...

in the

Somerset Region The Somerset Region is a local government area located in the West Moreton region of South East Queensland, Australia, about northwest of Brisbane and centred on the town of Esk. It was created in 2008 from a merger of the Shire of Esk and th ...

Queensland ) , nickname = Sunshine State , image_map = Queensland in Australia.svg , map_caption = Location of Queensland in Australia , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name = Australia , established_title = Before federation , established_ ...

, Australia. In the Cressbrook had a population of 117 people. It is known for its recreational aviation facilities.

Geography

Cressbrook is a sparsely populated rural area with land used for crops and grazing; there is no urban centre. It is bounded by the

Brisbane River The Brisbane River is the longest river in South East Queensland, Australia, and flows through the city of Brisbane, before emptying into Moreton Bay on the Coral Sea. John Oxley, the first European to explore the river, named it after the Go ...

to the north and east. Cressbrook Creek meanders from the west to the east of the locality where it enters the Brisbane River. The Cressbrook-Carboonbah Road traverses from the

Brisbane Valley Highway The Brisbane Valley Highway is a state highway in Queensland, Australia. It links the Warrego Highway near Ipswich and the D'Aguilar Highway about north of Harlin. Its direction follows the approximate course of the Brisbane River. It is par ...

in the north-west through the south-east of the locality towards Mount Beppo and beyond to Carboonbah.

History

The locality of Cressbrook takes its name from the Cressbrook Homestead established by David Cannon McConnel in 1841, who came from the village of

Cressbrook Cressbrook is a village in the Peak District National Park in Derbyshire. It lies in Water-cum-Jolly Dale at the foot of Cressbrook Dale. Population details at the 2011 Census are included in the civil parish of Litton. Before its Enclosure Act ...

Derbyshire Derbyshire ( ) is a ceremonial county in the East Midlands, England. It includes much of the Peak District National Park, the southern end of the Pennine range of hills and part of the National Forest. It borders Greater Manchester to the nor ...

, England. In 1877, were resumed from the Cressbrook pastoral run and offered for selection on 17 April 1877. Cressbrook Provisional School was operating in 1881 but closed in 1882 due to low student numbers; its opening date is unknown. In 1898, the McConnel family established a

condensed milk Condensed milk is cow's milk from which water has been removed (roughly 60% of it). It is most often found with sugar added, in the form of ''sweetened condensed milk'' (SCM), to the extent that the terms "condensed milk" and "sweetened condens ...

factory at Cressbrook; it was sold to

Nestlé Nestlé S.A. (; ; ) is a Switzerland, Swiss multinational food and drink processing conglomerate corporation headquartered in Vevey, Vaud, Switzerland. It is the largest publicly held food company in the world, measured by revenue and other me ...

in 1907.

Cressbrook Homestead church and cemetery, 2010

On 1 June 1901, D. C. McConnel laid the first pile for the Victoria Chapel on the Cressbrook Homestead intended for the use of the McConnel family and their employees. It was a non-denominational chapel. Regular Anglican and Presbyterian services were held there and other denominations were served by visiting ministers. Cressbrook Lower State School opened on 11 April 1916. It closed in 1953. Fulham State School opened in 1920 and closed circa 1953. It was located at 372 Cressbrook Cabonah Road (southern corner with Fulham Road, , now in Cressbrook). In the Cressbrook had a population of 117 people.

Heritage listings

Cressbrook has a number of

heritage-listed This list is of heritage registers, inventories of cultural properties, natural and man-made, tangible and intangible, movable and immovable, that are deemed to be of sufficient heritage value to be separately identified and recorded. In many ...

sites, including: * off Cressbrook-Caboombah Road: Cressbrook Homestead

Watts Bridge Memorial Airfield

The Watts Bridge Memorial Airfield is in the south-east of the locality and provides facilities for sports and recreational aviation. There are three grass runways of length , and . A number of aviation clubs operate from the airfield, flying vintage planes, gyroplanes, gliders, performing acrobatics and skydiving. Many recreational aviation events are held each year at the airfield. The airfield was established in 1942 as part of Australia's defences during

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

and known as the Toogoolawah airfield. After the war, the airfield was no longer needed for defence purposes, the buildings were removed and the land was used for grazing. In the early 1980s, the desire for recreational airfield facilities resulted in a group of recreational pilots re-establishing the runways and taxiways, and reopening the airfield in 1990 as the Watts Bridge Memorial Airfield. The name ''Watts Bridge'' is a reference to a nearby bridge that crossed the Brisbane River connecting Silverleigh Road in Cressbrook to Cooeeimbardi Road in Lower Cressbrook and was named after local dairyman James Robert Watts. Having survived many floods of the Brisbane River, the bridge was washed away in the

1974 Brisbane flood In January 1974 a flood occurred in Brisbane, Queensland, Australia after three weeks of continual rain. The Brisbane River, which runs through the heart of the city, broke its banks and flooded the surrounding areas. The cyclone that produ ...

and not replaced.

References

{{Somerset Region Suburbs of Somerset Region Queensland in World War II Localities in Queensland