Welcome into the tumultuous corridors of Cardwell and district history.
Having survived during the darkness of February 2nd-3rd 2011, the largest and most powerful cyclone in Australia’s modern era, the people of the district are now grappling with enormous challenge to re-build in time for Cardwell’s 150th birthday.
Cardwell is the oldest white settlement in Queensland’s far north, the first landing party having sailed from Port Denison (Bowen) and raised the Union Jack on the mainland beach of Rockingham Bay on Friday, January 22, 1864.
Located between Australia’s Great Dividing Range and the mountainous splendour of Hinchinbrook Island, Cardwell is a seaside town caressed by a natural beauty that has both inspired and soothed the souls of countless generations.
Within this exquisite embrace of nature in surrounding valleys and hills are native flame trees: a vivid symbol of an unbroken link with an ancient era when Aboriginal people were the ancestral occupiers of these abundant tropical lands.
The flame tree (Brachychiton acerifolius) was the emblem of the historic Cardwell Shire Council that commenced in 1884 and was housed in the building pictured above: a building that became Cardwell’s J. C. Hubinger Museum and our Historical Society’s home until it was ravaged by cyclone Yasi.
Venerated by Aboriginal people of our region to this day, the flame tree has travelled with Cardwell throughout its history, and is a treasured signature of the Cardwell and District Historical Society and a feature on the Society’s formal seal.
In 2007, San Franciscan artists sponsored by the nine tribal groups of Girringun Aboriginal Corporation, sculptured an eight metre high copper flame tree erected near the jetty on Cardwell’s foreshore, a monument broken by cyclone Yasi.
This modern sculpture depicting our native vegetation and our land’s ancient culture needs to be restored in full, with its flowing water and sprouting fire, as a steadfast symbol forever enlightening the human spirit.
