Baffle Creek is a rural

locality Locality may refer to: * Locality, a historical named location or place in Canada * Locality (association), an association of community regeneration organizations in England * Locality (linguistics) * Locality (settlement) * Suburbs and localitie ...

in the

Gladstone Region Gladstone Region is a Local government in Australia, local government area in Queensland, Australia. The council covers an area of , and has an estimated operating budget of Australian dollar, A$84 million. In the , the Gladstone Region had a ...

Queensland Queensland ( , commonly abbreviated as Qld) is a States and territories of Australia, state in northeastern Australia, and is the second-largest and third-most populous state in Australia. It is bordered by the Northern Territory, South Austr ...

, Australia. In the , Baffle Creek had a population of 155 people. The neighbourhood of Wartburg is within the locality ().

Geography

'' Baffle Creek'' (the watercourse) forms the southern and south-western boundaries.

History

The area on Baffle Creek was first settled in 1908 by Prussian and German immigrants who were recruited by Apostle. H. F. Niemeyer of the

Apostolic Church of Queensland The Apostolic Church of Queensland is a Christian denomination founded by Heinrich Friedrich Niemeyer. The church's logo is a 4R-symbol. The four "R"s stand for: RIGHT - ROYAL - RIGHTEOUS - RICH: * RIGHT according to the bible The B ...

Hatton Vale Hatton Vale is a rural locality in the Lockyer Valley Region, Queensland, Australia. In the , Hatton Vale had a population of 1,555 people. Geography Hatton Vale is in South East Queensland and on the Warrego Highway, west of the state capit ...

near

Ipswich Ipswich () is a port town and Borough status in the United Kingdom, borough in Suffolk, England. It is the county town, and largest in Suffolk, followed by Lowestoft and Bury St Edmunds, and the third-largest population centre in East Anglia, ...

. The government land orders they had expected to receive were not available, so they had to wait for six months living on a hill that they called ''Wartburg'' meaning ''waiting place''. In 1911, a sugar mill was built by Albert Kleinschmidt (who had another sugar mill in Bundaberg). The mill produced brown sugar which was taken elsewhere for further refining. The mill was closed in 1919 as it was not a successful venture. Wartburg State School opened on 11 August 1913. In 1921, a shop storeroom off the Coast Road was remodelled to become St Paul's Lutheran Church. It was officially opened on Sunday 17 July 1921. It was from Rosedale near the Baffle Creek. It is on the south-western corner of the Coast Road and Bayfield Road leading to the creek (). The church bell was installed in 1923. The church was enlarged and the bell tower was remodelled in 1947. On 26 November 2018, the

Queensland Government The Queensland Government is the state government of Queensland, Australia, a Parliament, parliamentary constitutional monarchy. Government is formed by the party or coalition that has gained a majority in the Queensland Legislative Assembly, ...

ordered the evacuation of Baffle Creek, Deepwater and Rules Beach due to a "dangerous and unpredictable"

bushfire A wildfire, forest fire, or a bushfire is an unplanned and uncontrolled fire in an area of Combustibility and flammability, combustible vegetation. Depending on the type of vegetation present, a wildfire may be more specifically identified as a ...

wide and covering with flames of high during an extreme

heatwave A heat wave or heatwave, sometimes described as extreme heat, is a period of abnormally hot weather generally considered to be at least ''five consecutive days''. A heat wave is usually measured relative to the usual climate in the area and ...

Demographics

In the , Baffle Creek had a population too low to separately report and was aggregated with the neighbouring locality of Deepwater which had a combined population of 548 people. In the , Baffle Creek had a population of 156 people. In the , Baffle Creek had a population of 155 people.

Heritage listings

Baffle Creek has a number of

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

sites, including: * Baffle Creek Sugar Mill (remains), Coast Road * St Pauls's Lutheran Church, Coast Road

Education

Wartburg State School is a government primary (Early Childhood - Year 6) school for boys and girls at 585 Coast Road in Baffle Creek (). In 2013, the school had 55 students and 4 teachers (3 full-time equivalent). In 2023, the school had 19 students. There are no secondary schools in Baffle Creek. The nearest government secondary school is Rosedale State School (to Year 12) in neighbouring Rosedale to the south.

Geography

History

Demographics

Heritage listings

Education

References

Further reading