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Articles
- Exploring Cemetery Heritage: Highlights from Stories in Stone 2025
The ‘Stories in Stone’ cemetery heritage conference held in Brisbane on August 16 was a significant success, marking the second event organized. With a diverse range of passionate presenters, excellent logistics, and a strong attendance of about 90 people, the event showcased the importance of cemetery history. Plans for a third conference are underway. - Scenes From a Cemetery Industry Conference
I was intrigued to attend the Mid-Year Conference of the Australian Cemeteries and Crematoria Association (ACCA) at Mt Gravatt CemeteryContinue reading “Scenes From a Cemetery Industry Conference” - A History of Queensland Bunyips (Part One): The 19th Century
‘There being so little variation regarding the bunyip in the accounts of these men, is it not reasonable to suppose that there is truth after all in what not a few only scoff and jeer at? The blacks to a man believe in the bunyip, and look horrified when it is mentioned.’ (Brisbane Courier, 12 December 1868) - Stories in Stone: A Conference for Taphophiles
In late 2023 I co-presented a talk about South Brisbane Cemetery at a conference organised by the Annerley Stephens HistoryContinue reading “Stories in Stone: A Conference for Taphophiles” - The Everywhere Plant: Why is the Acanthus so Common in Funerary and Civic Architecture?
We’ve all seen them somewhere before, although most of us would not have given them a second thought. Weird, curly,Continue reading “The Everywhere Plant: Why is the Acanthus so Common in Funerary and Civic Architecture?” - How Many ‘North Brisbane Burial Grounds’ Were There?
This article is a reminder of why the mindful use of historical placenames matters. The former convict settlement of BrisbaneContinue reading “How Many ‘North Brisbane Burial Grounds’ Were There?” - Is This the Lady in Black… or Something Else?
A closer look at a particularly striking image of a ‘ghost’. Is it what it seems? - The 50th Guardian Angels Day
An article commemorating the 50th ‘Guardian Angels’ grave cleaning day at the South Brisbane Cemetery. - Colonial Columns: Woogaroo Lunatic Asylum (1869)
A vivid description of the ‘Woogaroo Lunatic Asylum’, written back in 1869. - A Boggo Road Great: John Banks, 1939-2014
A look at the legacy of John Banks, one of the true champions of Boggo Road heritage. - Constance Clyde of Dutton Park: Author and Suffragette
Learn about the life of Constance ‘Clyde’ McAdam – author, sometime Suffragette, and eventual Brisbanite. - Colonial Columns: Consecration of the Church of England Burial Ground (Brisbane, 1862)
An article describing the consecration of the Church of England Burial Ground in Brisbane, 1862. - Colonial Columns: The Lost Graveyard of Terranora Creek
A look at a lost graveyard with links to some tragic events near Tweed Heads. - The Strangest Case Ever Made Against Capital Punishment
Learn about the Queensland MP who claimed that the ghosts of hanged prisoners might control the living. - Australia’s Next Top Bizarre Death-Contraption
Read about the bizarre methods of execution proposed by 19th-century Queenslanders. - Colonial Columns: The Chinese in Camooweal (1892)
An article displaying the racism surrounding the movement of Chinese immigrants in the far north of Queensland during the 1890s. - Slim Halliday: Man or Spiderman?
Did Arthur ‘Slim’ Halliday REALLY jump from a cellblock roof to escape from Boggo Road? - The Tale of the Logan Crocodile
There were rumours of a saltwater crocodile near Logan in the early 1900s. But were they true? - Colonial Columns: ‘Cleveland Point’, by John Dunmore Lang (1854)
A case against making Cleveland the capital of Queensland, written by John Dunmore Lang in 1854. - Citation Needed: Evil-Clown Fakelore in Brisbane
Another case of fakelore is exposed in Brisbane, this one involving a non-existent ‘urban legend’ about an ‘evil clown’. Who believes this stuff? - ‘To Preserve and to Protect: Policing Colonial Brisbane’ – Book Review
Book review for ‘To Preserve and to Protect: Policing Colonial Brisbane’ by Anastasia Dukova, 2020. - The Woman in Black: Solving the Mystery of a Vanishing Ghost
Learn about yet another bit of ‘paranormal industry’ fraud, this time the invention and sudden disappearance of a cemetery ghost. - The Ghost That Haunted South Brisbane Cemetery… From 1,000 Miles Away
Read about how a photo from Tasmania was passed off as a ghost in Queensland… and what happened when the truth was exposed. - When Steele Rudd Met the Kenniff Brothers at Boggo Road
Author Steele Rudd had the unenviable task of informing the Kenniff brothers about the mixed outcome of their appeal against their death penalties. - One Million Thanks
My ‘Heywood in History’ website just hit one million views. There’s a surprisingly big market for the history of small towns. - Three Men (and a Humpback) in a Boat: The Yeppoon Whale Tragedy of 1928
Read about a tragic incident involving a breaching Humpback Whale near Rockhampton in 1928. - Tigers, Roller-Coasters and Special Effects: Brisbane’s 19th-Century ‘Dreamworld’
Discover a 19th-century Brisbane theme park with tigers, giant aquariums and roller coasters. - Whaling Days at Tangalooma
Read about the years when the Queensland whaling industry killed thousands of whales off Moreton Island. - A Visit to the Church of St John the Baptist, Bircle, Lancashire
A visit to the old graveyard at the Church of St John the Baptist, Bircle, Bury, Lancashire. - Queensland Cemetery History: A Varied Body of Work
Looking back at an extensive record of working in Queensland cemetery history. - A Grave Scandal in Ipswich and Goodna
Why are Goodna and Ipswich cemeteries the only ones in the world to allow commercial ghost hunting in them? - Colonial Columns: Pre-1893 Floods in Brisbane and Ipswich
Written in 1893, this is a look back at the many different floods to have hit Brisbane and Ipswich before that time. - Colonial Columns: Diary of the German Mission at Moreton Bay, 1841 (Part Two)
Fascinating accounts of day-to-day life in 1841 at the first (non-convict) European settlement in the Moreton Bay region. - Colonial Columns: Diary of the German Mission at Moreton Bay, 1841 (Part One)Fascinating accounts of day-to-day life in 1841 at the first European (non-convict) settlement in the Moreton Bay region.
- Did Johnny Cash Really Play a Concert at Boggo Road?
Did Johnny Cash really play a concert at Brisbane’s Boggo Road Gaol? Read about the facts behind the story here. - The Boggo Road Burials Mystery
Were bodies once buried within the grounds of Boggo Road prison? Find out here. - Colonial Columns: The Brisbane River of the 1820s
A vivid description of the Brisbane River as it was circa 1830, at the height of the local convict era. - The Fakelore Finger of the Old Printing Office
Doubts have emerged over a tragic story told to customers on a Brisbane ghost tour. Was a youth really crushed to death in an old Printing Office? - Here’s Why a Boggo Road Heritage and Arts Hub Would Be a Good Thing
Is it time for a change of management at the Boggo Road heritage prison, and to create a Heritage and Arts Hub there? - Fixing Brisbane Cemeteries
A discussion about some of the demands for big spending to improve a Brisbane cemetery. - Fake History and Wolston House
Another expose of the ‘paranormal industry’ getting history wrong in Queensland. - Ghost Hunting, Ethics, and the National TrustShould the National Trust of Queensland really be allowing unethical commercial activities in their properties?
- The Moon Man, the Headless Murderer, and Me
The extraordinary story of a Russian scientist visiting Queensland and what he did with the heads of four executed prisoners in Brisbane. - The Burleigh and Bilinga Sperm Whales
Read about the problems caused for Gold Coast authorities when dead Sperm Whales washed ashore in the 1920s and ’30s.
Christopher Dawson 