Towns in Australia

Exploring Australia, town by town

Currajong QLD

Currajong

Postcode: 4812

Currajong is significant for demonstrating the lifestyle of several families who were prominent in the development of north Queensland. Its conversion for use as a military medical facility in World War Two reflects the importance of Townsville in the conduct of the war in the Pacific.

Although it has been relocated, Currajong is a good and early example of a large, late nineteenth century timber residence in Townsville.

Currajong is now located at 5 Castling Street, West End as part of a museum complex which includes a miner’s cottage and a 1920s farmhouse. Currajong backs onto the street, overlooking Council parkland. It is a large, single storeyed timber dwelling raised on low brick piers. It has a hipped roof clad in corrugated iron. The house is surrounded by wide verandahs supported by timber posts with decorative brackets and cross braced balustrading. There is a timber staircase with matching balustrading at the side of the house. The main stair to the front entrance is cement rendered and curves to widen at ground level.

The house contains seven rooms, two with verandah annexes. The core consists of four rooms paired on either side of a hall. An arched opening divides the rooms which originally were dining and drawing rooms.

It is interpreted as a conjectural Townsville interior furnished to demonstrate the lifestyle of an affluent family of the period.