A ‘must visit’ for Hinterland residents and visitors alike are the Mapleton Lily Ponds, tucked in behind the township shops on Obi Obi Road, and easily missed unless you stop your car!
In the January and February editions of the Hinterland Times we provide some background to this iconic ‘natural’ feature that is regarded by many as the community jewel of Mapleton.
The Mapleton Lily Ponds recently underwent an $800,000 makeover courtesy of the Sunshine Coast Regional Council, the federal government and a well motivated local community.
Of course what you see today is a far cry from what was once a worthless quagmire full of huge swamp mahogany trees and surrounded by farms producing sugar cane, orchards, strawberries, bananas, beef and diary cattle, not to forget the timber mills and rail link.
In 1892 David John Williams lodged an application to select unsurveyed Agricultural Farm No. 2175, in the Parish of Maroochy, and a sum of six pounds ten shillings was paid as the first year’s rent.
That farm selection of about 160 acres was bounded by Delisser Road (now Delicia Rd) and extended west almost to the vicinity of the present Mapleton Cemetery, adjoining W.J. Smith’s selection on which he constructed his family home formerly known as “Seaview”, “Ocean View”, “The College” and now known as St Isidores – on Post Office Road and eastwards to the vicinity of Lantana Lane. This included the “swamp” land that is now the Lily Ponds.
By 1897 David John Williams applied to purchase his lease as he had fulfilled the specified conditions required by law to entitle him to a “Deed of Grant: under Section 7” of “The Crown Lands Act of 1884”.
In particular Mr Williams had resided on the farm for five years and he had made improvements to the value of more than ten shillings per acre or one hundred and fifty-eight pounds in total.
John Williams had worked hard to own his land because he had built a four room slab timber house, 24 feet by 28 feet with a veranda, cleared and burned about seven acres of scrub and cultivated the land with bananas and orange trees.
In 1903 Mr Williams donated land to the local council for the construction of the present curved road section at the top of the range in exchange for fencing his boundary there.
Mr Williams’ first slab hut was erected on the corner opposite the hotel where the current shops are located. He was one of Mapleton’s original selectors, and he subdivided off the present hotel site in October 1909 and sold it to Mr W. H. Rosser, who erected the hotel in 1910. The present RSL Park was a narrow unsealed section of Delisser Road with deep red soil sides.
Mapleton resident Mrs Lindsey Wareham, the grand daughter of Mr Williams, has compiled a book on Mapleton’s early history and has provided the information for this article. Her uncle Mr Charlie Williams, the second son of John Williams, told her he vividly recalled helping his father fell the huge swamp mahogany trees growing in and around “The Swamp”. Being a young lad, the koala bears clinging to branches as the trees fell always distressed Charlie, but many were fortunate to jump to safety.
A narrow and shallow gravel road traversed this swamp until recent years (now Delicia Road) and was renowned for flooding during heavier rain downpours.
This property was sold to Lounds around 1917 and there have been many owners before and since subdivision of this farm including Lounds, Tennants, Wilkinson, Rules, Hannay, Carl Ensbey, Colonel Pat Best & Ernie Setterfield. The original 160 acres has been subdivided many times and is now residential and rural residential.
The one redeeming feature of the old swamp was it provided an excellent source of cattle feed during the dry periods.
Next month: Ernie Setterfield sets out to clean the swamp and turn a refuse tip into a local attraction
Leave a Reply