Members of the heritage committee of the Mount Isa Landcare Group have marked another piece of local mining history with improvements to the old mining settlement of Kuridala.
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On Saturday 10 members travelled to Kuridala, 60km south of Cloncurry to do some work on the cemetery.
This abandoned mining town thrived during the copper boom of the First World War with a population of around 2000 people at its peak and its cemetery contains about 120 graves.
Mark Van Ryt, secretary,Mount Isa Landcare Group said an advance party removed the shrubbery and burnt away the grass before they waited out the heat of the day in the shade and had a couple cool drinks before resuming work at 4pm at the cemetery.
"It did not take us long to install the three posts with two plaques," Mr Van Ryt said.
"One plaque was for a Scottish miner named John Wright the other was for a Chinaman Thomas Ning."
Mr Van Ryt said that no one knew the true location of "Ningy's" grave so they chose a vacant plot near the Scotsman's plot.
"After the installation we had a look at what remained of the historic copper smelter," he said.
"Most of the massive structure was stripped in World War Two to start up the Mount Isa Copper Smelter."
On the following day they drove West to another grave found along the abandoned MacGregor train line to Ballara.
"This lone grave was unmarked so we bought with us a prefabricated fence to install around it," Mr Van Ryt said.
"The grave held the remains of an Irishman from Tipperary named James Ryan who died of typhoid in 1914 when he was only 45 years old. So far we have been unable to trace back to his family."
The group returned to Mount Isa via Duchess where they stopped for a beer at the pub.
Their next outing is in early December where they will get back to treating the weeds on the Leichhardt River.
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Derek Barry
Editor of the North West Star Mount Isa since January 2016. Prior to that, an editor at several regional southern Queensland newspapers. Passionate about telling local stories. Comes with a strange accent to due an Irish accident of birth.
Editor of the North West Star Mount Isa since January 2016. Prior to that, an editor at several regional southern Queensland newspapers. Passionate about telling local stories. Comes with a strange accent to due an Irish accident of birth.
