Summary

This photograph depicts two young women and one boy posing on large rock formations while on a bush picnic. The rock formations are most likely somewhere in the Newcastle Range, a 150km volcanics group that runs north-south roughly 50km east of Georgetown. As Reverend Hall was appointed as Curate (and later Curate-in-Charge) of the Georgetown parish, the Newcastle Range may have served as an excellent option for day trips as it is not an unreasonable distance to travel by carriage from the townships of Georgetown, Forsayth and Mount Surprise. The two young women are well-dressed in light coloured dresses belted at the waist, with high collars, and both wear decorated broad-brimmed hats. The dress of the young lady higher up on the rocks is decorated with tucks and pleats and has full, gathered sleeves. The other young lady's dress also has full, gathered sleeves and tucks but appears to be of a more lightweight material, perhaps muslin, in a print pattern. The boy, perched up higher upon a thin rock ledge, appears to be wearing a "school-boy"-style uniform of a simple collared shirt and dark pants, without the dark-coloured short coat that usually accompanies the outfit.

The photographs in this collection were taken by the Reverend Frederic Charles Hall (1878-1926) during the period 1902-1909 when he was the Anglican Curate appointed to Georgetown in North Queensland. Hall's foremost hobby was photography. He used both a half-plate camera with tripod made by J. Lancaster & Son, Birmingham and a quarter-plate Austral No. 3 made by the Australian company, Baker & Rouse. Glass negatives from Ilford and Austral were used; developing was done by the photographer himself and printing by exposure to sunlight.