[3] When Moreton Bay was opened up to free settlement in 1842 the colony did not have a sawmill and logged timber was either pit sawn and used locally, or sent south for milling and/or export.

[7] In this role he gained "first-hand knowledge of the local timber resources and the need for a sawmill to facilitate the expansion following the transformation of Brisbane from convict settlement to free society".

[4] William Sim, an experienced timber worker from Nairn, near Inverness in the Scottish Highlands, began working at the Brisbane Saw Mills in August 1854.

Pettigrew was anxious to retain his monopoly in Queensland and began to explore the Maryborough area, looking for new sources of timber and a site for a sawmill to supply the northern ports of Gladstone, Rockhampton and Bowen.

[11] In August 1862, Pettigrew explored the Mary River with Tom Petrie[12] and in October decided on the site for his sawmill - 10 miles (16 km) downriver from Maryborough.

[20] Pettigrew's men dragged the logs to the mouth of Seary's Creek, tied them into large rafts and towed them through the Tin Can Bay Inlet, Great Sandy Strait and up the Mary River.

In July 1865 Pettigrew noted in his diary that 5.5 or 6 miles (8.9 or 9.7 km) of railway, the majority of which would cross flat, "barren" sandy country, would enable the timber to be taken out of inland Cooloola to Tin Can Bay.

Pettigrew wrote to Macalister in April 1864, "setting out arguments for protecting timber-getters who made improvements such as roads for the extraction of timber, but could not then prevent others from using them".

[28] By April 1869, Pettigrew was concerned that the new selection laws might override his Special Timber Licences and allow selectors to take over his Kauri pine forests in northern Cooloola.

[1][19] The forests of Cooloola were physically difficult to exploit and remote from the settlements at Brisbane, Maryborough and Gympie,[19]: 134  however, the extent and quality of the resource first attracted independent cutters and later sawmillers to the area.

[19]: 142  However, the 2 firms that dominated the trade in Cooloola were Pettigrew and Sim at Tin Can Inlet in the north, and McGhie, Luya and Co. on the Noosa River in the south.

[36] The design of the engine was described as: "... a compact little affair, of peculiar make, the cylinder, boiler, and working parts being upright, not horizontal, as in most ordinary locomotives.

The reason for this arrangement is found in the necessity for placing the wheels at as short a distance from each other as possible in order to admit of the locomotive working smoothly round the sharp curves that must necessarily occur on a line rudely laid down in an unsettled and often rough country".

[43] An official opening and celebratory picnic hosted by the Sim family was held on 30 October with a number of Maryborough's leading citizens attending.

[18] According to Kerr[46] "the early adoption of tramways for hauling logs, and its influence on the development on the railways system in Queensland, centres on one man, William Pettigrew".

[47] For example, in the mid-1870s McGhie, Luya and Co. constructed a tramway system across their property on Lake Cootharaba to their sawmill at Mill Point to overcome swampy, low-lying and poorly drained ground conditions.

[55] At the time of Sim's death a little over half of the planned 7 miles (11 km) tramway had been constructed,[43] however, on 25 May 1875 Pettigrew ordered 2 long tons (2.0 t) of 23 pounds (10 kg) railway iron from Smellie and Co which was enough for approximately 100 yards (91 m) of rail.

[60][61][62] The design of the locomotive Dundathu differed to the Mary Ann in that it had a neat cab with iron stanchions and a corrugated roof which protected the driver from all weather.

[69] It was erected for the purpose of sawing up hardwood, principally for renewing the rails,[69] consisted of a shed which measured 60 by 30 ft (18.3 by 9.1 m), and was described as high and airy and roofed with sheet iron.

[73] Ten years later the operation did cease, and in March 1884, Pettigrew paid 2 final visits to the tramway and the timber-getters' camps at Broutha and Thannae waterholes.

[78] In the late nineteenth century, William Pettigrew, Richard Hyne and Abraham Luya spoke in the Queensland Parliament about the need for forest conservation.

Pettigrew was an elder and trustee in Presbyterian congregations and helped to establish a theological college, Divinity Hall, and the Queensland Evangelical Standard newspaper.

[1] Just north of the Cooloola Creek timber bridge, a likely deviation of the tramway leading to Poverty Point has previously been identified, evident as a distinct cutting that follows an orientation of 280 degrees.

A narrow strip of higher ground which extends to the east of the bank has previously been identified as a possible route for the tramway from the terminus site.

Unlike the skids identified at Poverty Point, this ramp features logs running perpendicular to each other, orientated in either a north-east to south-west or north-west to south-east direction.

[1] Along the north-western extent of this feature, the timber orientated north-west to south-east terminates with a stepped cut, allowing a log to sit securely underneath.

The tramway is important in demonstrating the early expansion of Queensland's timber industry and the development of private railways in the State in the late nineteenth century.

The remains of the Seary's Creek rafting ground and related corduroy crossing, and the Cooloola tramway provide rare surviving evidence of the earliest period of the timber industry in this region.

Its success encouraged other timber-getting operations to use tramways to access remote timber resources and influenced the Queensland Government's construction of cheaper railways.

This material has the potential to contribute to our understanding of the organisation and domestic life of remote timber settlements that existed in late nineteenth century Queensland.