100 YEARS OLD AND STILL GOING STRONG

 

It’s time for celebration! Did you know that two buildings in the township of Ingham are 100 years old this year: The Farmers’ League Building (now Ingham Travel) and the Station Hotel?

The Herbert River Farmers’ League (HRFL) is now no longer a farmers’ representative body but provides a scholarship fund for tertiary students. The HRFL had its Lannercost Street building constructed in heady times when its activities mirrored both the prosperous times the sugar industry was enjoying and the growing dynamism of the sugar towns.

Facade of Herbert River Farmers League Limited building (Source: http://www.rgsq.org.au/19-146c Royal Geographical Society of Queensland)

Developments beyond Ingham set in motion the idea of the HRFL having a building of its own. In 1922 The Primary Producers’ Organization Act provided for any association or body of not fewer than 15 primary producers residing in a district to register as a Local Producers’ Association.  While there is no explicit evidence that the HRFL planned to register as the representative Primary Producers’ Association, nevertheless, on August 21, 1923, it became incorporated as the Herbert River Farmers’ League Ltd. in order to give it “wider scope.”  

Following incorporation in 1923, the HRFL began trading as a cooperative.  It also acted as a fertilizer agency. In 1925 the league tendered for a builder to construct a building on Lannercost Street, in Ingham’s central business district. The building was to include two brick shops and offices. After a civic reception in the Shire Hall on Friday 9 October 1925, the Governor of Queensland, Sir Matthew Nathan, laid the foundation stone. He was presented with a miniature silver cane knife as a gift by the farmers.

The construction cost of the two-storey reinforced concrete building was around £3,000. When the building was completed, it was described as adding “considerably to the attractiveness of the main street”. Soon after farmer bodies, for example, the Queensland Producers’ Association (Q.P.A.) Mill Suppliers’ Committee and Executives, were holding their meetings in the building and negotiating to rent space.

Herbert River Farmers' League Building, Lannercost Street (Source: Hinchinbrook Shire Library Photograph Collection)

Even before it was officially opened the building narrowly avoided disaster when the galvanized iron and wooden building next door, the London Café, went up in flames at 2am on Christmas Eve 1925. Considerable difficulty was experienced in saving the HRFL building, “the fascla window sashes being burnt out, but with a dousing of water assisted by the wind blowlng against the fire, eventually the League office was saved.”

Officiating at the opening ceremony on Tuesday 24 August 1926 was Dr Lewis Nott, federal member for Herbert and the Post-Master General, William Gibson. Clearly Dr Nott did not have a premonition of what the imminent creation of a district executive—Herbert River Cane Growers Association (HCGA)—of the Queensland Cane Growers Association (QCGA) would mean for the HRFL when he expressed the hope that “their membership would extend to every farmer in the district.”  A reception followed the official opening.

The steps that brought the district executive (later HRCGA) into existence are unknown. In February 1932, following negotiations, a merger was achieved with the HRFL which created the HRCGA. There were no records kept until 1933 and after the district executive became the Herbert River Cane Growers (HRCGA).  When the local district executive came into existence it not only began to hold meetings in the HRFL building but negotiated to rent office space in which to carry out the extensive administrative tasks required of it as a statutory body. The first President, George Geeson, and Secretary, Alfred Louden Musgrave, were both HRFL members.

The roles of the district executive not only duplicated those of the HRFL but transcended them with the inclusion of all matters pertaining to production and marketing.  The district executive was authorized by legislation to assume the roles that had being carried out by the league to that date.

From that point on the HRFL was no longer directly responsible for carrying out farmers’ business, though it continued to provide office space and meeting rooms for the “combined” body and shared a secretary. While at the time the HRCGA’s formation was described as “tantamount to an amalgamation with the Herbert River Farmers’ League Ltd.”, it was really its death knell as a growers’ representative body.    

The transition was not easy. From thereon in the HRFL assumed a watchdog role, “carefully observing the actions and operations of the other organization with a view where necessary, to counteract any actions that we consider were detrimental to the Industry as a whole.”

The HRFL continued to be invited by the mills, Chamber of Commerce, HRCGA and other community groups to be included in both political discussions and social events and there were many roles the HRFL did not immediately relinquish. Though the HRCGA deferred to the HRFL in some matters, the HRFL executive continued to be unhappy with the arrangement, feeling that its role as an industrial organization had been restricted, while the HRCGA had not adhered to the principles of the amalgamation.

The final break with a pretense of unity came about when the HRCGA decided that it was no longer appropriate to use another organization’s premises, and that its “status and dignity” warranted its own building.  The HRCGA obtained a perpetual lease of an allotment on the opposite side of Lannercost Street, defiantly facing the HRFL building. It was constructed in conjunction with the Capitol Building to a common design by Mr. V. A. Pidgeon under the supervision of Messrs W. and M. Hunt, architects. The new farmers' building was officially opened on Saturday 29 September 1934. The opening ceremony was performed by Mr. G. Johnson (President of the Q.C.G. A.). Mr. G. Cantamessa (President of the Herbert River Cane Growers' Association) presided. The original HRCG’s building no longer stands but the Capitol Building does.

Herbert River Canegrowers’ Association' FArmers Building, opened in 1934. Site of present

CANEGROWERS building (Source: State Library of Queensland. Image number: 96364)

From that point on, the HRFL building served as the distict office of the Australian Sugar Producers Association (ASPA). A room was reserved to be used as a boardroom for meetings of the HRFL, while the rest of the building was rented out to various tenants. With the reduction of its responsibilities and income, the HRFL became preoccupied with the maintenance and improvement of the building while keeping full rental occupancy.

In 2010, a far from unanimous decision was reached to sell the building. With the building sold, the money was invested and the scholarship scheme secured for the future.  With the identity of the building covered over by an Ingham Travel sign, nobody today would know that the building was once a proud and vital farmer organization’s headquarters.

Herbert River Farmers League building 2025 (Source: Felix Reitano Real Estate)