Ipswich Railway Station 1865 – images courtesy of Picture Ipswich
The above picture is of the first Ipswich Railway Station, which was also the first Queensland Railway Station. It opened in August 1865 and the first station master was John Scorra. He lived in the upstairs part of the building. The staion’s walls were corrugated iron, with an inside lining of wood, leaving a space for ventilation. A wide verandah was built around the entire building over the ground floor, with an ornamental balcony-railing and supported by a lattice girder. On the upper floor the roof overhangs and forms a verandah similar to the one below. There was also a balcony round the inside of the building giving access to the office and other rooms. The roof was made of zinc supplied by the London office of the Vielle Montagne Zinc Mining Company, who also had supplied the zinc roofs for London Railway Stations.
The railway station was replaced in 1887 with the station pictured below. In 1918 a new Ipswich Railway Station was planned for the top of town but it never eventuated. The station below serviced our community right up until the 1980’s when the current Ipswich Railway Station complex was built.
Ipswich Railway Station 1887 – image courtesy of Picture Ipswich
Information taken from numerous articles from “The Queensland Times” & “Ipswich in the 20th Century” by Robyn Buchanan