Monto - Culture and History

It is thought that the word 'Monto' is probably a rough translation of an Aboriginal word meaning 'plains with ridges on them'. The same sources suggest that 'cania' means 'spear'

The area consisted mostly of large pastoral holdings until the 1870s. Gold was discovered in 1871 causing a rush to the Cania field, though yields were intermittent. The population quickly rose to 252 but by 1876 it was back to four people. Mining continued throughout the 1880s, with one reef yielding 2 395 ounces, and finally ended in the early 1900s. It is recognised that there is still gold in the area and this attracts fossickers who pan for alluvial gold in the local streams.

Inevitably the goldrushes produced a mythology of luck and wealth. It is claimed that one of the largest nuggets found in the area weighed 2.7 kg and was trampled upon again and again by miners oblivious to what lay under their feet.

Near Mulgildie there was a waterhole which, according to both miners and settlers, was the home of a bunyip. It was said that cattle which drank from the waterhole disappeared and that the hole was so deep that no one had ever reached the bottom.

Around the 1870s the area was infested with speargrass which resulted in sheep being replaced by cattle. Today the cattle industry is so successful that the Monto Branch of the Port Curtis Co-op Association is a major producer of butter, casein and dried buttermilk. In 1983-84 it processed 16 million litres of milk.

The real change in the area came after 1919 when a Royal Commission was set up to investigate the possibility of closer settlement in the northern Burnett River region.

Subsequently 1.4 million acres of the large properties were resumed by the Queensland government and the town of Monto was established in 1924. Monto was the first town in Queensland to be designed under town planning techniques and it was gazetted in 1924. The experiment was a dramatic success. By October 1923 the Government had received 1773 applications for land in the Monto area. The establishment of the town led to a dramatic improvement in the provision of services to the area. In 1925 a post office was built. In 1929 the railway arrived, connecting the district to Maryborough and two years later a connecting line was built through to Gladstone. The story of this period of Monto's history is vividly told in A New Province? The Closer Settlement of Monto by W. Ross Johnston, available from the Monto Shire office.