Mysteries solved - part 3
By Myles Sinnamon, Engagement Officer, State Library of Queensland | 12 May 2022
We’ve reached Part 3 in our series of mystery photographs identified by our tenacious social media followers. Once a fortnight we feature an unidentified photograph or lantern slide from our historical Queensland collections in the hope that someone might be able to recognise it. This information is then used to update the item’s catalogue record, making the image more discoverable to other researchers. Here are four more mystery images solved….
1974 Brisbane flood photograph identified
Previously described by the generic title of ‘Houses flooded to the roofline during the Brisbane flood of January 1974’, Facebook users were able to provide an exact location for this image from the Rosemary Spenceley colour slides collection. The slide was identified as showing St Lucia, with Grace College in the background on the left. The powerlines show the position of Sir Fred Schonell Drive and the corner of Coleridge Street. Two of the roofs visible in the image appear to match Google street view of this location on Sir Fred Schonell Drive.
Houses in St Lucia flooded to the roofline during the Brisbane flood of January 1974. Rosemary Spenceley. 32027, Rosemary Spenceley's colour slides of Brisbane and Southeast Queensland. John Oxley Library, State Library of Queensland. Image number: 32027-0001-0005
Mystery aerial photo with a distinctive Tudor style building
Our next image is an undescribed aerial photograph from the W.A. Jones & Co. photographs collection, showing several buildings on either side of a road with railway track close by. One big clue was the Tudor style building in the centre of the picture. Facebook users quickly identified it as the Country Club Hotel on Gympie Road, Strathpine, near Brisbane, using other photographs from the Moreton Bay Libraries and QImagery as confirmation. It is not known when this photo was taken, though possibly during the 1960s.
Aerial view of the Country Club Hotel, Strathpine. W.A. Jones. 31557 W.A. Jones & Co. photographs. John Oxley Library, State Library of Queensland. Image number: 31557-0001-0191
Clues found in the distance
An unidentified image from the Queensland Cement and Lime Company collection showing the construction of a road with buildings in the distance was solved as a scene from the then under construction Grey Street Bridge (later renamed the William Jolly Bridge) in Brisbane's CBD. Frequent contributor to our mystery photographs, Mary Howells made this observation on Facebook - "You can clearly see St Andrew's Church which is on the corner of Vulture and Cordelia Streets, between the dutch-gable roofed house and the second pylon. South Brisbane Town Hall and Cumboqueepa are on the left hand side in the distance".
Construction of the Grey Street Bridge, ca.1929. 10189 Queensland Cement & Lime Company Limited Photograph Albums. John Oxley Library, State Library of Queensland. Image number: 10189-0002-0088
A road by the river
Our last mystery image was taken from the University of Queensland Alumni Association dry collodion negatives collection. Several Facebook followers identified the location as Radnor Street, Indooroopilly.
Brisbane River running along Radnor Street in Indooroopilly. Acc. 6129 University of Queensland Alumni Association dry collodion negatives. John Oxley Library, State Library of Queensland
Further reading -
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