Faces from Old Queensland.

A brief survey of photographs of Queenslanders in the second half of the 19th century.

Seen and not heard. And not happy about it.

These studio photographs show serious and perfectly posed Victorian children. Nobody fidgeted. Not even the dog. I imagine that nobody dared. (Due to certain similarities in the eye and forehead shape of the boys, I suspect that this is one family photographed over the years.)

Children actually depicted being children.

From the upper-middle class poppets in their fancy play clothes to the scamps playing in floodwaters to the remarkably healthy-looking patients at Brisbane Children’s Hospital, these children were at least permitted to be children.

Studio portraits of young men and women.

Cartes de visite were all the rage in the 1870s. I suspect that at least one of these photographs was taken with the marriage market in mind. The very photogenic young subjects below were preserved for posterity in Toowoomba (left), Rockhampton (centre), and Brisbane (right). Often, Victorian sitters would look like overstuffed sofas, but these faces would not be out of place in today’s world.

It was a man’s, man’s, man’s world.

Men ran the world of the 19th century. Wherever two or more men gathered, a camera was sure to record their presence. Whether it was a group of chaps in spiffy suits in a parlour, or a gang of shearers mucking around in front of a shed, their activities were recorded for posterity.

“Do we look daft, Charlie?” “Not at all, Willie. We’re the most up-to-date chaps in Rockhampton.”

Charlie Tilledge (left) and Willie Mennie on their penny farthings. In a studio. In Rocky.

Uh, Ladies? Anywhere?

Women were rarely pictured on their own outside the photographer’s studio. The ladies who sat for the professional’s camera were posed and dressed as worthy matrons. The few who happened to be photographed alone or out of doors were part of the scenery, like “wife of Robert Vievers on horseback at their property,” and “Edith Delfer at her home in South Street, Toowoomba.”

Photographs from the digital collections of the State Libraries of Queensland and Victoria. Out of copyright.