Mount Cuthbert is 100 kilometres north-west of
Cloncurry, Queensland
Cloncurry is a rural town and locality in the Shire of Cloncurry, Queensland, Australia. It is informally known by local people as The Curry. Cloncurry is the administrative centre of the Shire of Cloncurry.
Cloncurry is known as the ''Friend ...
. It was once a
copper mining
Copper extraction is the multi-stage process of obtaining copper from list of copper ores, its ores. The conversion of copper ores consists of a series of physical, chemical, and electrochemical processes. Methods have evolved and vary with coun ...
town, booming in 1918, when
Pugh's Almanac
''Pugh's Almanac'' was an annual almanac published in Queensland, Australia. It provided a guide to Queensland, and information about the events of the previous year and included several directories of commercial and non-commercial organisations. ...
Queensland Directory estimated Mount Cuthbert's population at 750. It recorded six
boarding house
A boarding house is a house (frequently a family home) in which lodging, lodgers renting, rent one or more rooms on a nightly basis and sometimes for extended periods of weeks, months, or years. The common parts of the house are maintained, and ...
s, a hotel, a racing club and several stores in the town. Mount Cuthbert's population quickly declined mainly due to the global collapse of the copper market. Mt Cuthbert in the 1921
census
A census (from Latin ''censere'', 'to assess') is the procedure of systematically acquiring, recording, and calculating population information about the members of a given Statistical population, population, usually displayed in the form of stati ...
had population of only 267 and by 1924 Pugh's notes that most storekeepers had left. The Railway branch line to Mount Cuthbert was closed in 1949.
Mount Cuthbert region still had copper. With roads and developing mining techniques, the copper of Mount Cuthbert found renewed interest in 2009. Cape Lambert secured Queensland copper company Matrix Metals, including a mine and a copper
cathode
A cathode is the electrode from which a conventional current leaves a polarized electrical device such as a lead-acid battery. This definition can be recalled by using the mnemonic ''CCD'' for ''Cathode Current Departs''. Conventional curren ...
plant at Mount Cuthbert.
See also
Mount Elliott mine,
Mount Elliott Mining Complex and
Mount Elliott Company Metallurgical Plant and Mill.
Cloncurry mining town
Cloncurry
Cloncurry is a rural town and locality in the Shire of Cloncurry, Queensland, Australia. It is informally known by local people as The Curry. Cloncurry is the administrative centre of the Shire of Cloncurry.
Cloncurry is known as the ''Friendl ...
was named by the explorer
Robert O'Hara Burke
Robert O'Hara Burke (6 May 1821c. 28 June 1861) was an Irish soldier and police officer who achieved fame as an Australian explorer. He was the leader of the ill-fated Burke and Wills expedition, which was the first expedition to cross Australi ...
after Lady Cloncurry, an Irish friend. Copper mining between 1910 and 1920 boosted its population to over seven thousand people. Mining output attracted listings on both the Melbourne and London
Stock Exchange
A stock exchange, securities exchange, or bourse is an exchange where stockbrokers and traders can buy and sell securities, such as shares of stock, bonds and other financial instruments. Stock exchanges may also provide facilities for ...
s. Three companies dominated the industry: Hampden-Cloncurry Cooper Mines Ltd., Mount Elliot Ltd. and Mount Cuthbert No Liability. Germany was the major customer until 1914.
Mount Cuthbert and Dobbyn branch railways
State Parliament approved a 68 kilometre branch railway from Cloncurry to Koolamarra in late 1911. Construction did not commence until late 1912 and the line did not open until 16 November 1914. Koolamarra (formerly Longamundi) was then the terminus.
The line to Mount Cuthbert was not officially opened until 1 September 1916. En route it passed through
Kajabbi
Kajabbi is a rural town in the Suburbs and localities (Australia), locality of Three Rivers, Queensland, Three Rivers, Shire of Cloncurry, Queensland, Australia.
Geography
The town is on the Leichhardt River in the remote north-west of Queens ...
(apparently derived from an Aboriginal word indicating a kite hawk) and
Oona
Oona is a feminine given name. It is an anglicisation of the Irish-language name ''Úna''. Apart from in Ireland, it is also a popular name in Finland.
People with the name Oona
* Oona Brown (born 2004), American ice dancer
* Oona Chaplin (born ...
(formerly named "Kalkadoon". Rail traffic was heavy because firewood was conveyed to Mount Cuthbert to fuel
smelters
Smelting is a process of applying heat and a chemical reducing agent to an ore to extract a desired base metal product. It is a form of extractive metallurgy that is used to obtain many metals such as iron, copper, silver, tin, lead and zinc. Sm ...
, and copper was railed east to the Queensland coast.
Further mines were located a short distance to the north-east of Mount Cuthbert around Dobbyn. A 33 kilometre extension from Oona to Dobbyn opened on 21 May 1917 so that additional copper could be accessed. Spur lines were built to the Orphan and Excelsior mines.
Dobbyn was the