Water. The subject of great deliberation each year.
Subscribe now for unlimited access.
$0/
(min cost $0)
or signup to continue reading
Water. Without it we would perish; as did many a prospector and gouger in their search for the early mineral fields. For without regular drinking water to alleviate some of the thirst of a parched throat and put a deplorable death at bay, the early explorers and gougers would suck on a pebble to keep the mouth saliva flowing.
Perhaps John Campbell Miles was doing just that when his horses stumbled onto a natural water soak in the otherwise dry hot sandy bed of the Leichhardt River.
Drought is rarely mentioned when reference is made to when John Campbell Miles founded, Mount Isa, in 1923, although it was one of the most devastating dry ‘wet’ seasons on record.
And it was to be another ten months of searching for water soaks along the dry Leichhardt River bed before the early gougers and miners had a natural shower when the heavens opened for an overdue ‘wet’.
Water was so precious in those early years that men were recorded as fighting over discarded food tins that could be filled at the soak and stored.
But it was rejoicing not fighting in the streets when word came through that the dam wall at Rifle Creek was near completion in late 1928. And only two years later, it was storm water which caused excessive flooding of the man and supply shaft not once but twice in one month. A by-product of a good down fall (rain) is mosquitoes and disease.
Yearly, the Cloncurry Advocate would warn readers “… the female mosquito bites and she is conniving in attacking her victims while they sleep … so look after your mosquito net and mend any holes for a safe night’s sleep.” In January 1935, the paper herald the news that the west was experiencing the biggest ‘wet’ since summer of 1917. Then in 1938 during yet another dry summer, Mount Isa residents were up in arms when a rumour went around town that Mount Isa Mines (MIM) was closing the water supply from Rifle Creek Dam.
Fortunately, it was only a rumour and one that was quickly squashed by the mine and water continued to flow to the community.
Water took a back seat in January 1945 when Cloncurry Shire Chairman, Mr Clarke received word that a RAAF British made Beaufighter bomber would be named after the town.
The dry summer months are not a good time to prospect in amongst the Argylla and Selwyn Ranges, as any old gouger will attest. It was a lesson hard learned by two Finnish miners and amateur gougers when they went in search of uranium and got lost near the old mining town of Ballara in 1954.
With their own supply of water falling they filled their water bag with contents from their Jeep’s radiator before slowly driving through the spinifex and rocky terrain, northwards through the hills to the Cloncurry road and back home.
The completion of the Leichhardt River Dam was another reason for locals to smile in the New Year of 1959, as the £1,700,000 construction replaced the inefficient Rifle Creek Dam water supply to residents. And it was the water sport of swimming that has spawn four local Olympic and one Paralympic team members.
Over the decades, as each year drew to a close, the main question on everyone’s parched lips would inevitably be … ‘where is the wet?’ It is the time of year, regardless of the summer month, when old timers recalled how the big rains would cut the main roads in and out of town, especially the Flinders Highway before it was fully sealed.
A time when supermarket shelves quickly began to show their painted nakedness, with no stock to hide their scrapped markings, as people madly scrambled for the last bottles of milk and essential food items. Long term residents and pioneers say that only when the Isa Street Bridge goes under and the Leichhardt River laps the underside of Sir James Foot Bridge is there a bob of a chance of a decent ‘wet’ that year.
Water is regularly the topic of conversation from the falling water levels of Lake Moondarra, to water restrictions for gardening and to the supply and demand for bottled water during both floods and drought periods. Over the past 96 years there have been both joyous and sad memories of the Leichhardt River in flood.
Joyous for the abundant water, as a result of a good ‘wet’, that flows north from the catchment through off shoots to Lake Moondarra before it meanders through to the Gulf of Carpentaria ensuring a new year of fodder and grasses for the beef industry and continued water supply for both the mine and township of Mount Isa.
Sad for lives lost in the raging currents of the Leichhardt River.
The ‘big wets’ of 1974, 1993, and 1998 will be remembered by many with mixed blessing for the mining and pastoral industries in the north-west.
For many, the green lawns and countryside and blossoming flowers are tangible evidence of the best rains in many decades.
For others, only heartbreak and thwarted hopes on the variable Plains of Promise.
Mount Isa has experienced the highs and lows of climate change during the past 95 years and together with its citizens, the weather will continue to be lambasted and regaled depending on the arrival time of the rains.
Where is the ‘wet’? It is here – in 2019.
Researched and written by Kim-Maree Burton. www.kimmareeburton.com Photographs supplied by North Queensland History Collection. Information sourced from the archives of the Cloncurry Advocate, The Courier Mail, The Townsville Daily Bulletin and the North West Star.