The Gympie Family History Society Inc (GFHS) as it is today began in 1980 under a member’s home as a like-minded social group of community members interested in family history research, wanting to help each other. Officially beginning as the ‘Genealogical Society of Queensland, Gympie Branch’ in the Jaycee’s Hall on Apollonian Vale, it’s first Annual General Meeting (AGM) was held on the 1st October 1980 and had 21 members attend. Thereafter, weekly meetings were held at the Gympie Central School library on Lawrence Street.
The society decided its first task would be to index the records of the Gympie Cemeteries and with the cooperation of the Gympie Cemetery Trust, this was started.
Over the years, the location of the society had to move for various reasons. However in 1987 the branch adopted its own constitution and became the Gympie Ancestral Society, incorporated in 1989. It was at this time the society’s quarterly magazine ‘The Researcher’ began. This publication changed to a trimester magazine in 1994.
The society has conducted workshops, entertained guest speakers, run excursions, conducted fundraisers as well as working on preserving the many indexes and local family histories over the years and with the support of it’s members, volunteers and interested locals, hundreds of hours of activities. The first decades patronage saw the society establish itself as a reliable presence in the Gympie region and in 1990 finally came to use the rooms under the Gympie Heritage Railway Station on Tozer Street, and finally, with support, the use of the Old Ticket Office under the railway station at 1 Chapple Street. In 1999, the group was renamed the ‘The Gympie Family History Society Inc’.
Acknowledgement of Past Members
Isabelle Thompson – Secretary 1992 – 1999
A remembrance from Val Buchanan, 9th August 2024
Isabelle Thompson was secretary of the Gympie Family History Society from 1992 – 1999. In her time as secretary, she worked with three different Presidents, Neil Priddy, Lyall Ferguson and Diane Kay. She was presented with Life Membership of the Society in May 2000 by Councillor Mick Venardos, Mayor of Cooloola Shire Council. In 2005 she returned to Gympie for the 25th birthday of the Society at Gunnabul. I was told of her death on the 31st July 2024 but am not sure of the exact date of her death.
An article from the Gympie Family History Society’s magazine ‘The Researcher’ No. 16 in April 1994:
Autobiography of and by Isabelle J Thompson, present Secretary of the Gympie Ancestral Research Society, a branch of the Genealogical Society of Queensland).
“I was born and bought up in Scotland at a place named Fraserburgh in the north east of Aberdeenshire. I did all of my schooling there, and had my first job as a clerkess with the then, Aberdeen County Council before immigrating to Australia with my family in 1956. We arrived in Sydney and went to live with a relative of my mothers at Lidcombe. I obtained employment with the Modius Operandi Section of the New South Wales Police Department, where I stayed for three years with the intention of joining the Women’s Police when I turned 21. However, this was not meant to be, for by the time I reached the right age, they had raised the height and I missed out by half an inch.
From there, I went to the New Hebrides where I first had a job as a housekeeper on a plantation, then as a fill-in secretary at the Presbyterian Mission Station on the land of Tangoa. At this time, Burns Philip was building a new office and store complex, where I obtained employment as a typist, and during this time I married.
After a brief spell back in Sydney, I moved on to the Solomon Islands where I was employed by the BSI Trading Co, being a typist to the shipping and airways manager, and filling in for any other staff who were on leave. Whilst there I was offered the position of manageress of a small store on one of the outlying islands, the Island of Malaita where I spent the next two years before returning to Australia in 1966.
Here, I lived with my parents and managed a small supermarket until my second marriage. After my second husband died, I moved to the Gold Coast with my daughter and step-daughter to be near my parents. I lived on the Gold Coast for 11 years and moved to the Gympie area in February 1991.
I live on an eleven acre property which keeps me busy. Besides digging up the Family Tree, I am busy planting ‘green’ trees around the place.
Jack Crone – President 2003 – 2005
A self Profile by President of the Gympie Family History Society Inc
“The Researcher”, #45, December 2003, pg2
I was born in Mount Morgan on May 14, 1944 soon after my parents had moved from the top end of Bouldercombe, then known as Mt. Usher. Dad had found work at Mount Morgan Limited and although not the same as the care-free mining life of his single days in the Crocodile Creek region, he accepted the responsibilities of being a good husband and father and remained with MML until his retirement. I was the second of four children I recall Mount Morgan as a typical Queensland mining town with the huge open-cut mine employing the majority of workers, while the remainder of the citizens operated a variety of business ventures, providing all the goods and services that people could expect.
School days were not my greatest love and I looked forward to the day when this necessary but un-liked distraction could be put behind me. Like most kids at that age I couldn’t see why I had to learn anything because I believed I knew it all anyway. However, the crop of dedicated teachers I was fortunate to have, persisted in drumming into me information they considered might be beneficial in later years, and through no fault of their own, and to some limited extent, they succeeded in their endeavours.
Back in the fifties we didn’t have TV’s, videos, electronic games or computers so entertainment had to be created. I recall we had less vandalism, less politicians and less cane toads so perhaps the old days were the best days. Only two of our numerous antics come to mind. These consisted of teasing an elderly Chinaman who delivered fruit and vegetables to people living along the banks of the Dee river, in two huge old wicker baskets hanging from a pole across his shoulders, and teasing another greengrocer who delivered his goods in an old sulky, drawn by an old horse more advanced in years than the gentleman himself.
By 1967 I felt I had matured sufficiently to leave boyhood pranks behind me and asked my girlfriend Valerie to become my wife. Why she was foolish enough to agree to my proposal I will never know, but as far as my decision-making ability goes, it had to be the best decision I have made in my entire life. Her father referred to me as “the William Street Hillbilly” but I think deep down he thought I was not a bad sort of bloke. The level of patience and tolerance this wonderful woman has shown me in nearly forty years of marriage astounds me to this very day. On August 6, 1967 the day after we were married in Rockhampton we headed to the Northern Territory in search of a start in life. I commenced work with Morgan Mining and Industrial Co. at Mt. Bundey, which supplied regular shipments of iron ore to Japan.
“The Researcher”, #45, December 2003, pg3
Our first son Garry decided to arrive half way through a cricket match the Mt. Bundey side and ANZ Bank team from Darwin were playing. It was a case of helping the expectant mother into the Toyota ute, back across the bulldust patches, over the endless potholes and into Darwin. The ANZ boys killed us but the weekend wasn’t a total loss, for baby Garry weighed in at 91b 2 ozs and full of life. Our only daughter Raelene was born in 1971 and it was obvious even then who would assume the mantle of supreme commander within the family. The Mt. Bundey project folded in November 1972 when ore supply was finally exhausted. We moved to Jabiru in 1973 where a huge uranium orebody had been discovered. The temporary township of Jabiru East had to be constructed from scratch. Our third child, Danny, was born in 1979, also in Darwin. Our three children received a good education in Jabiru and spent their early years in an excellent community. My years with Ranger Uranium Mines found me in supervisory roles in the Environmental Dept., the Training Dept., and the Mine Dept. However, after nearly thirty continuous years in the mining industry it was time for new beginnings and I resigned in 1990 and Valerie and I relocated to Darwin. I found employment with a contract security company employed by the Northern Territory University and stayed there for nearly eight years. However, the old Darwin we once knew and loved had changed forever. What cyclone Tracy left untouched, a cavalcade of governments set about demolishing, with the aid of bulldozers, what remained in the name of progress. Suddenly the historical was gone to be replaced by glitz and glitter.
By the early months of 2003 we convinced ourselves it was “time”. The children were off our hands, one in the Northern Territory, one in South Australia, and one in Chile, South America, so we came home to Queensland. Gympie was our first choice, and a good choice it has turned out to be. My dear old Dad once told me of the location of three small gold mines in the Crocodile Creek/Mt. Usher region that showed potential. “Well Dad, I wish you were here to tell you this, I found another one, its called the Gympie Family History Society.”
Jack Crone
December 2003
scrounged by Vi Brown
For more details regarding this story, or further information on the society’s past members, please contact the society.
Sources
- “Twenty Five Years of Remembrances and Reminiscences – The story of the Gympie Family History Society, 1980 to 2005” by Marjorie Head
- “Gympie Family History Society Inc – The Last Five Years 2015-2020” by Marjorie Head
- “The Researcher”, our periodical newsletter
- Gympie Family History Society Inc, Library and Archives
- “The Gympie Times”, a local periodical newspaper
- contributions from Val Buchanan
and summary by Brett Watson, 31st August 2024.