 |
| The Black Stump (Blackall) and The Tree of Knowledge (Barcaldine)
The Black Stump - Blackall
Nestled on Thistle Street behind the Blackall State School is a petrified wood memorial stump erected in 1988 to commemorate of the bi-centennial of Australia. The site represents the observation used when surveying was done to gain a more accurate basis for maps of Queensland, back in 1888. The surveyors used the stump for the placement of their transit to gain latitude and longitude observations. As time passed any country to the west of Blackall was considered to be 'beyond the Black Stump'.
The Tree of Knowledge - Barcaldine
The Tree of Knowledge site, located in the centre of Barcaldine in central west Queensland, marks the first significant labour struggle in Australia’s history. The 10 metre tall Ghost Gum was used as the meeting place for shearers during their unsuccessful Great Shearer’ Strike in 1891. At the time the wool industry was the unrivalled economic pillar of the colony of Queensland and the great strike was a tremendous and tumultuous event. Australia was going into its worst-ever depression due to a global financial crisis. Unemployment was rife, the wool price had fallen and shearing was one of the most demanding and lowest paid of occupations. The Great Shearers’ Strike became the first significant struggle between organised labour and capital in Australia. Tension arose between the shearers and the pastoralists who proposed reducing the shearers’ wages of £1 per hundred sheep. The shearers protested by going on strike, a crippling blow to the wool industry. Barcaldine—the end of the rail line from Rockhampton, and at the centre of richest pastoral area of the colony—was the focal point for thousands of shearers and bush workers striking for better conditions. The unions took radical action to pursue their claims for better pay including setting fire to grass, burning down woolsheds and abducting and intimidating ‘scab’ (non-union) labour. After four months the colonial administration, with the backing of the New South Wales and Queensland governments, bought in the Queensland Colonial Army and the strike was broken. The leaders were tried for conspiracy, rioting and sedition and sent to St Helena prison in Moreton Bay for three years. While the strike was unsuccessful, it led to calls for a new political party to represent the interests of working people, which later led to the formation of the Australian Labor party. The strike committee issued its final manifesto on 20 June 1891, calling for unionists to register on the electoral rolls. As a result of losing the strike, the unions and others in Queensland formed the Labour Electoral Leagues, which later became the Labour Party and eventually the Australian Labor Party. The formation of the Labour Electoral Leagues led to the election in 1892, in Queensland, of a shearer, TJ Ryan, who became the first 'Labour' representative in any government, anywhere in the world. During that strike, as well as the maritime strike of 1890, a crucial and historical connection was forged between the union movement and politics. In April 2006 the Tree of Knowledge was poisoned and did not recover. It was felled on 29 July 2007, and a memorial was opened at the site in 2009. |
 |
| Muttaburra |
