Summary

This photograph depicts three children posing in front of a rough bark hut with corrugated-iron roof, as well as a man, an older girl, and a young woman busy with other occupations in the background. This photograph was taken in North Queensland but the exact location is unknown. The three girls posing are all wearing to-the-knee smocks and have bare feet. The hatted man dressed in workaday clothes, caught mid-stride to left of photograph, is carrying something metallic in his right hand and looking towards the children. The older girl is sweeping the dirt outside the hut. Her hair is neatly tied back and she wears a light-coloured long-sleeved blouse with a darker coloured skirt and has bare feet. The young woman, who is standing in the doorway, also wears a light-coloured long-sleeved blouse with a darker coloured skirt, topped with a half apron, and has bare feet. The hut, possibly on a cattle property, is crudely built of bark and sapling branches, with its corrugated-iron roof held down by a couple of thin saplings. A corrugated-iron extension is partly visible on right. Outside the hut and extension are slab benches holding domestic items such as pots and pans, scrubbing brush, jugs and other unidentifiable items. A straw broom and mattock rest against the hut while on the ground in front are a hooped barrel, straw hat, and various cloth items that appear to be clothing and linen. Partly visible on the left is a very basic open structure of unhewn sapling poles and corrugated-iron roof.

Early twentieth century houses in North Queensland mining towns frequently consisted of two rooms, often with balustraded verandahs front and back, and outbuildings such as kitchen, bathroom and toilet. Due to the high cost of transport and labour, the houses were commonly constructed by erecting a timber frame with belt-rails and braces, set upon timber stumps, with corrugated-iron gabled roofs, and cladding of corrugated-iron and perhaps timber. These simple constructions were often extended and added to over time.

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.