facility

Two Australian Aboriginal women working in the laundry at the Coen Telegraph Station, 1936

from State Library of Queensland

• Vesna Verencevic said:

  A telegraph station had been erected at Coen in 1886, when the overland telegraph line from Laura, at the southern end of Cape York Peninsula, to Thursday Island at the northern end, was being constructed. At Coen, a carrier station was erected adjacent to the 1886 telegraph station and connected to it. Like the buildings erected at Mt Surprise, Fairview and Cape York, the Coen Carrier Station was of pre-fabricated steel frame construction, with outer walls of corrugated iron, concrete floors, and fibrous cement roofing. They were partitioned internally with fibrous-cement sheeting to provide equipment, power and battery rooms, and living accommodation for two or three maintenance staff. It is thought that these buildings were designed and pre-fabricated in one of the PMG's workshops in Melbourne, Adelaide or Sydney. Paste: apps.des.qld.gov.au/heritage-register/detail/?id=601485

• Vesna Verencevic said:

  Men, women, and children living on reserves and missions were used as a cheap source of labour. Aboriginal children were considered wards of the state, and removed from their parents’ care to live in segregated male and female dormitories on the reserves. Formal education was limited to fourth grade, followed by training in farm or domestic duties. At the age of twelve, Aboriginal children were usually placed on mandatory twelve-month work contracts with local farms and stations. They were not given a choice about who they would work for, and allegations of physical and sexual abuse and cruelty were the common experiences of many young Aboriginal people. Source: www.qhrc.qld.gov.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/0013/10606/Abo...