[1] Searches for pastoral land in Queensland extended north in the early 1840s after the Moreton Bay region was opened for selection following the closure of the penal colony.

Initial leases were taken up in the Moreton Bay, Darling Downs and Brisbane Valley regions and by 1842, explorations such as those led by Henry Stuart Russell had spread further north.

In November 1855, Alexander Robertson Lawson married Emily Mountford Ball and the following year a son named Robert was born.

Station correspondence from this period reveals building supplies and furniture being ordered in September 1855, including door hinges, locks, handles, window glass, wallpaper, calico for the wooden walls, a drawing room table and chairs, a hand basin, cooking stove, and bath.

The stone building was constructed from roughly coursed local rock obtained from a nearby quarry, sawn timbers, logs, and antbed, and was built by Wilhelm Brill, a stonemason.

In the mid-1850s, the Lawsons were actively recruiting German workers owing to the general "scarcity of labour and the satisfaction those already in our service have given us" and the Boondooma wages book shows Brill was employed as a stonemason from 24 May 1856 to 21 July 1857.

It was a three-panelled building originally used as a dairy, wash house and cook's room, and the only extant physical remain is one standing post.

Adjacent to the dining room was a cooling shed built at much the same time from Cyprus pine and with a wooden shingle roof which has since been replaced by corrugated iron.

The McConnel family were pioneer pastoralists in the Brisbane River Valley, establishing Cressbrook in 1841, the first sheep run in the district.

Three years later a further 42 square miles (110 km2) of land was resumed from Boondooma, at which time the station was released from the mortgage acquired in 1904 and operated by the Marshlands Pastoral Company, which had 3 McConnel family members as shareholders.

[1] Over the years since the establishment of the Boondooma Run in 1846, land resumptions and tenure changes have resulted in the reduction of the homestead site to its present size.

[1] The principal surviving buildings in the homestead complex include a stone building and timber house from the 1850s; a dining room erected during the 1870s, a walkway between the house and the dining room; a cooling shed; cow bails (prior to 1939 used as stables); a structure which functioned as a postal receiving office from the 1860s; and a garage built in the 1950s.

In plan it comprises a rectangular core of random rubble laid in rough courses, which is flanked by a verandah on each long side.

[1] The walls of the central core are constructed of large sections of stone arranged roughly in courses, between which smaller pieces have been inserted.

The stonework continues to the underside of the main roof, except at each gable end where roughly sawn, vertical timber slabs have been fixed.

A 1997 archaeological investigation suggests that the timber posts remaining adjacent to the south-western facade were part of the adjoining meat house.

This structure links the house to a dining room to its north-west, and is constructed of a post and sapling frame with a curved corrugated iron roof.

Unpainted, horizontal timber boards clad the south-west facing walls of the kitchen building and the small extension next to the walkway.

The floor to ceiling height is generally about 3 metres (9.8 ft), however in the larger room on the south- east end of the house it follows the slope of the roof for part of its length.

In the main room there is a picture rail fitted at approximately 2.5 metres (8 ft 2 in) and above this the walls are lined with horizontal timber boards to match the ceiling.

[1] The other remaining timber structures on the homestead site are similar in terms of design and construction techniques; incorporating post and sapling frames, corrugated iron roof sheeting, and walls lined with vertical and horizontal slabs and weatherboards.

Some of the walls to the covered walkway are clad in corrugated iron, while parts of its floor is made with wide, roughly sawn timber slabs apparently laid on the ground.

This is also a small gable-roofed structure, however its gables are filled with weatherboards, and its walls are clad in rough-sawn timber slabs fitted horizontally between the exposed frame.

This building is a long rectangle in plan, is gable-roofed and its end walls are clad in rough-sawn timber slabs fitted vertically.

Boondooma station was established in 1846 by the Lawson brothers and Robert Alexander in the wake of Henry Stuart Russell's exploration of the Burnett River district in 1842.

The principal historic buildings include an 1850s stone storehouse, which is both rare in its method of construction and an early example of the use of the metric standard in Queensland.

The site remains a good example of the early vernacular homestead and contains a range of ancillary buildings in varying states of preservation.

The Boondooma site is an example of a homestead setting, with remnants of other structures including various outbuildings, graves, fences and mature trees.

The relationship between these elements contributes to an understanding of early station life and as such it is important in demonstrating the principal characteristics of a particular class of cultural places.

Boondooma remains valued by the local community for its strong and very important links with early pioneers of the Burnett district, including the Lawson family.