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The Grammar Schools Act 1860 enabled funding for secondary education in Queensland. By 1868, enthusiastic public subscribers had raised enough money to establish Brisbane's first Grammar School and first independent boys school. In that same year, Prince Alfred, Duke of Edinburgh, laid the foundation stone at Brisbane Grammar School's original site in Roma Street. The new school opened in February 1869 with 94 students and four masters under the leadership of Headmaster Thomas Harlin. In 1881, the School was moved to its present site and the magnificent neo-gothic style Great Hall and classrooms were opened that year. With the opening of the Boarding House in 1886, the School became one of the first to provide student boarding facilities on site. State-of-the-art science laboratories were built in 1912. The School consistently anticipated educational needs, providing a resource library and language laboratory in 1968, before Commonwealth funding made them standard school facilities. With the purchase of the former Primary Correspondence School in 1993 at the School's southern boundary, BGS grew to accommodate 1200 students. In 2003, the Middle School opened for Years 6 and 7 and 1400 students were attending the School. Two important and impressive sporting facilities now complement the Spring Hill campus: The Northgate Playing Fields opened in 1997 and the Indoor Sports Centre in 2000. In 2010, the School opened The Lilley Centre, which combines technology and flexible learning spaces with a well-resourced library and programs to help students navigate their learning. Also in 2010, the Centenary Building was refurbished to provide similar learning spaces for Middle School students. Source: www.brisbanegrammar.com/welcome/history

The school was also located in a place of prominence, at the top of the second hill in Mount Shamrock. The selection of this position by residents can be considered deliberate as adequate flat land was available behind the residential and business area. Churches and administrative buildings such as courthouses in nineteenth-century Queensland settlements often occupied a hilltop position but there were no municipal or administrative buildings in Mount Shamrock. Instead, the school building fulfilled these roles, being the venue for public performances, community dances, and other entertainment, the location where visiting clergymen held church services, and the venue for elections, public meetings, and receptions for visiting dignitaries. The location was not selected for practical reasons; there was considerable debate over location between residents when the school building from Paradise was moved to Mount Shamrock (QSA 15567). Despite the identification of more suitable and accessible locations, the school remained in a focal position on the hill, overlooking the town, visible to all. Source: "Streets and stamper batteries – an ‘industrial’ landscape of gold mining townships in nineteenth-century Queensland" by GERALDINE MATE AUSTRALASIAN HISTORICAL ARCHAEOLOGY, 32, 2014

For Mount Shamrock, a 19th-century gold-mining town outside of Biggenden in Queensland, we get a picture of a mining town where the mine was an important feature in the town, yet also a town where the relationships between the residents are important enough to transcribe onto a map and are features of the everyday social milieu. Government authorities saw it as “a mine of great promise” (Annual Report of the Department of Mines 1896) with the locals promoting a “settled and business-like aspect” (Maryborough Chronicle 1887). Elsie Bilbrough, a young teacher who recently arrived from England, saw wilderness, flooding, and disorder. Source: blog.qm.qld.gov.au/2017/05/16/meaning-in-maps/

The Girls' and Infants' School was built in Pattison Street, Mount Morgan, and opened in August 1897. Source: qalbum.archives.qld.gov.au/qsa/girls-and-infants-school-m...

The Central State School at Mount Morgan was opened in 1887 with an enrolment of 58 pupils, but this number rapidly grew and the first extension was begun the following year. Other buildings have been added as the school continued to expand. Both boys and girls have been taught at the school except during the period 1898-1930 when a separate girls' and infants' school operated elsewhere. Land was set aside for a school soon after Mount Morgan was surveyed in 1884. In 1870 Queensland had become the first colony to provide free primary education. A Royal Commission on Education in Queensland was set up in 1874 and resulted in a State Education Act which took effect from 1 January 1876 and provided for a Department of Public Instruction under a minister and a system of State primary schools. The government provided a teacher and books, but expected communities with more than 30 potential pupils to put up a third of the school costs. On 5 May 1885 a public meeting was held in Mount Morgan to discuss obtaining a school for the town. Soon afterwards, an application was made to the Department listing the names of 34 eligible children in the district. Fundraising began and the General Manager of the Gold Mining Company, Wesley Hall, made a major contribution to the money raised.[ The first building on the school site was opened on 16 May 1887 with 58 pupils, but within a month enrolments had increased to 115 and an extension was built only a year after the opening. This extension increased accommodation almost threefold, but by May 1888, with the population in Mount Morgan rapidly increasing as the field boomed, enrolments at the school had reached 346 children with a teaching staff of 7. The school was further extended in 1891 and by 1897 had 871 pupils. By this time, not only was the school considered unhealthily overcrowded, but there were concerns expressed about the mixing of the sexes, thought inappropriate at the time. It was decided to build a second school for girls and children of both sexes under 7 years of age. The Girls' and Infants' School was built in Pattison Street and opened in August 1897. Source: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mount_Morgan_Central_State_School