tropical

They cut down all the trees! Greed, or need?

Pentecost Island is an uninhabited island located between Hamilton Island and Lindeman Island. It was the first island in the Whitsunday group to be named and the only one in the group named by Cook, in June 1770 with the phrase 'More remarkable than the rest (of the Cumberland Isles), being small in the circuit, very high, and peaked and lies EBS 10 miles from Cape Conway'. It was on the feast of Pentecost, during the festival of Whitsun, that the crew of the Endeavor found themselves sailing between inhabited island paradises dotted throughout the crystal clear waters of the Coral Sea. Pentecost is an ancient Jewish Festival and it was during Pentecost after the crucifixion of Christ that the Holy Spirit was visited upon the Disciples. This visitation is celebrated in the Christian Church on Whit Sunday and therefore the association between the names Pentecost and Whitsunday is obvious. The island has the distinction of being one of the features sketched by the artist on Endeavour, Sydney Parkinson, during the voyage along the east coast of New Holland. Two pencil sketches were made, one from the south-west and another from the west, both illustrating the distinctive profile of the island. Another sketch was made by crew member Charles Praval but is more distant and less detailed. The peace and tranquility of this passage belied its unpredictable and violent beginnings. Formed 110 million years prior; born of raging volcanoes and the violent realignments of the planet's tectonic plates; centuries of debris fused into solid rock, and by the time Cook ventured north through the passage the beauty of the area was undeniable. Despite its inhospitable structure, on 22 February 1934, Edward Alexander Roberts applied for occupation license 556 over the island, though it is difficult to fathom what use it could be put to as there is practically no level ground on it. In the event, the Minister for Public Lands refused the application on 7 March 1934. The island was declared a national park in 1938. In some older writings, the island is called 'Lion Island' presumably because someone saw in its profile the shape of a crouching lion, but it takes some imagination to believe anyone could see the shape of a lion here. Source: www.australiaforeveryone.com.au/files/qld-tropical/pentec...

Henry William Mobsby was born on 17 Aug 1860 at Hove, Sussex, England, and came to Queensland in 1883 with the landscape artist Isaac Walter Jenner, whose daughter, Mary Ellen, he later married. Mobsby had studied art and design at the South Kensington School of Arts and at the School of Art, Brighton. He had diplomas and certificates from the London Chamber of Commerce, the City and Guilds Institute, the Cripplegate Institute and the South Kensington School of Arts. Mobsby was an instructor in Decoration and Photography at the Brisbane Technical College before being appointed artist and photographer with the Department of Agriculture and Stock in 1897. In 1899, he was also appointed to the Chief Secretary’s Department and the Intelligence and Tourist Bureau. Mobsby’s photography gained international distinction and he officially represented Queensland at the Franco-British Exhibition in London in 1908, the Panama Pacific International Exposition in San Francisco in 1915 (where he took a motion picture certificate course), the British Empire Exhibition at Wembley in 1924, and the New Zealand and South Seas Exhibition in Dunedin in 1925 and 1926. Mobsby gave many lectures on Queensland, its history, products, scenery, buildings, etc., illustrated by lantern slides. He also made a number of radio broadcasts in the 1920s. He retired in 1930, and died on 9 Apr 1933 at his home at 100 Station Road, Indooroopilly. He is buried in Toowong Cemetery. Source: manuscripts.library.uq.edu.au/downloads/uqfl181.pdf