The battle to create Queensland's first major national park lasted almost 20 years, but in the process, the state's system of national park conservation was born.
Aboriginal History
Prior to European settlement, the Lamington region had been inhabited by Aboriginal people of the Yugambeh language for thousands of years. The Yugambeh group inhabited the Gold Coast and hinterland, roughly between the Logan and Tweed rivers. This group lived as distinct family tribes in various regions, although interaction between them was well established. The family tribes that lived closest to Lamington National Park are the Birinburra, Kombumerri, Wangerriburra and Migunberri people. More information on the Aboriginal people of the area.
Early Days
Even as the O'Reilly boys were carving out a living as dairy farmers in the dense scrub, moves were well underway to turn the rainforests of the McPherson Range that surrounded them into what we now know as Lamington National Park.
Inspired by a visit to the world's first national park, Yellowstone in the US, grazier Robert Collins entered state parliament in 1896 with the express purpose of seeing green areas like the Lamington Plateau preserved – although his original idea was for a much more modest 'health reserve'.
Others joined him in the fight, calling the area the 'Blue Mountains of Queensland', but it was Collins who rightly earned the title 'Father of the National Parks system in Queensland'.
Collins was so enthusiastic he secured a visit to the isolated area by then Queensland Governor Lord Lamington, after whom the park was eventually named - somewhat ironically.
Lamington reportedly disgraced himself in the eyes of the lovers of Nature when barely out of the sound of applause from locals, he stopped and shot a koala out of a tree!
He is recorded as having said later in a state of remorse, '… its dying cries were terrible. They haunted me for years afterwards…'
Collins was finally able to get the 'State Forests and National Parks Act' passed in 1906.
Sadly Collins died in 1913, without realising his dream of protecting the rainforests of the McPherson Range he held so dear.
Romeo Lahey takes up the fight
Fellow staunch proponent Romeo Lahey took up the campaign, even delaying his enlistment in the army in World War I until he'd won the fight for Lamington.
Ironically Lahey was the son of a saw-miller and it was this lust for timber in the virgin rainforests that almost lost the battle.
In the end, it was people power that won Queensland's first real conservation victory.
"The reserves should be set apart for ever for the use and benefit of our people as a whole and not sacrificed to the short-sighted greed of a few" – so wrote Romeo Lahey in a letter to the Queensland Minister for Lands in May 1915, accompanied by a petition signed by more than 500 local residents.
In his book, History of Lamington National Park, J. Keith Jarrott summarises the ten points Lahey made in his passionate 11-page letter, first amongst them: "Thousands of city children view blue sky in the frame of iron roofs and blackened chimneys…give them a place where they can see the beauties of nature."
Two months later Lahey's plea was finally heard and Lamington National Park was officially declared – although it took a change of government for his entreaty to at last fall on sympathetic ears.
In his public statement of 31 July 1915, the Honourable J Hunter, Minister for lands recorded the momentous decision:
"This park is described by visitors as affording a panoramic view of magnificent scenery consisting of rugged mountains, waterfalls, precipices, running streams, forest giants and glorious flora and fauna…This country is regarded as the Blue
Mick O'Reilly - First National Park Ranger
When the park was first established, the Forestry Department, which administered national parks in Queensland until 1974, really had little idea how to manage it, or even what a national park should be. The park was barely surveyed, let alone traversed.
Some thought it should be home to 'health resorts', others envisioned walking tracks for public access, while other saw the primary purpose as preserving the natural environment.
Romeo Lahey, while supporting public access so that people could learn to appreciate the need for conservation, felt strongly that the park shouldn't be 'improved', writing to the Minister for Lands, as he prepared to depart Australia for the battlefields of WWI.
"There is only one way to 'improve' a National Park and that is to leave it absolutely alone," he wrote.
Mr Hunter replied that he supported Lahey's philosophy, stating that he was determined to preserve "an heirloom to the state as nature left it."
Lahey continued to fight the bureaucrats in Brisbane, even from the trenches of France, to ensure the park's flora and fauna were protected. He went on to establish the National Parks Association of Queensland with Arthur Groom in 1930.
In July 1918 the park was officially proclaimed a 'Reserve for the protection and preservation of Native Birds and Native Animals.'
A Christmas 1918 visit by the Queensland Field Naturalists Club to O'Reilly's started the scientific process of documenting the unique birds, wildlife and flora of Lamington – Government Entomologist Henry Tyron commented:
"These mountains improve on the famous Blue Mountains and we should call them the Green Mountains of Queensland."
The title stuck, and the north-western portion of the park, around O'Reilly's, is now known as Green Mountains.
Mick O'Reilly returned from the war to take up a position as a working overseer - officially Queensland's first national park ranger on a salary of 4 pounds, with other O'Reilly family members acting in a voluntary capacity.
Mick O'Reilly was as ardent in his defence of the park as he had been in his defence of his country, although ironically his job as working overseer was as much as about identifying viable timber reserves, as protecting the park's flora and fauna.
Initially he surveyed several stands of timber within the park, but identified that only two locations, close to the O'Reilly family selections, would be suitable for forestry work.
With protests increasing against taking any timber out of the park, by 1921, Mick O'Reilly was doing the true job of a ranger – protecting the park boundaries against illegal logging and poaching and commencing the major task of making access tracks to the beauty spots.
A World Class Track System
Many kilometres of tracks were built through the park in the 1930s, partly funded by the O'Reilly's and the owners of Binna Burra and built using Depression labour.
Workers took great care not to cause undue damage, even camping on the newly made sections of track. Soon leaves formed a carpet underfoot, disguising the cuttings. The track system established is widely regarded as one of the best.
Some of the early tracks included the famous Border Track, between Binna Burra and O'Reilly's, West Canungra Creek, Daves Creek, Ships Stern, Lower Ballanjui and Upper Coomera tracks and the rugged Stockyard Creek track, the path the O'Reilly's and early guests rode on horseback to access their isolated selections.
The border track was built in two sections – workers from O'Reilly's cutting their way towards workers from Binna Burra swinging their axes and brush hooks from the opposite direction to create the 23km link across the top of the range. It was officially opened in October 1938.
In his book History of Lamington National Park, author J. Keith Jarrott, includes a poem written about cutting the Border Track by Forestry Overseer Jack Gresty describing the arduous job.
It reads in part:
"There is gear to come from the Burra dump,
There are tents to carry and tools to lump,
And it's "Watch the log and avoid the stump",
When you're cutting the Border track."
Post World War II, Peter O'Reilly Snr recalls forestry workers living a pioneering existence to maintain and improve the tracks, including three married couples, one with a baby girl.
"They would have to walk out two miles to the campsite and lug all their food and supplies along the track, with only kerosene lamps for light and firewood for heating."
"It was cold and damp and very hard to raise a baby. They women did it really rough and it is a piece of history that shouldn't be lost."
The Conservation Battle continues
Through both wars and the Great Depression, powerful timber companies lobbied unsuccessfully for permission to remove hoop pines and other timbers from within Lamington. But despite their efforts and cabinet infighting over the issue, governments held firm: no timber would leave the park.
Proposals to release trout in the park were also fought, and some Tasmanian black possums were introduced. Koalas were introduced in 1936 to supplement the park's dwindling population.
Following World War I there was talk of an Anzac Memorial Road through the park and the agitation was to continue for many years.
As late as 1947 Mr P.M. Fitzgerald of Beechmont campaigned unsuccessfully for a bitumen highway to link the resorts of Binna Burra and O'Reillys, to allow the elderly and infirm access to the park's features.
Objection to such proposals strengthened the concept of what national parks should be, both in the public and government's eyes.
During World War II, Australian and American army units on jungle warfare training littered Lamington with rubbish, shot wildlife, started bushfires and cut vegetation.
Fearing the park would be damaged beyond repair, outraged local residents and rangers made strong protests to the authorities, resulting in stricter controls over training units.
Lamington National Park was given World Heritage status in 1994 as part of the Central Eastern Rainforests Reserves Australia World Heritage area (CERRA).
CERRA protects the most extensive areas of subtropical rainforest on the planet – with Lamington itself boasting the largest subtropical rainforest remnant in the world and one of the most extensive Antarctic beech cool temperate rainforests in Australia.
