Wyandra, Qld
There is nothing quite like tiny towns. Those little dots on the map that most people drive through very quickly. Yet, we have found time and again that if we stay a night or two those little dots leave big imprints on our hearts.
Wyandra in Western Queensland was one of those places. With a population of 99 (2016) and 1 galah it’s located on the Mitchell Highway (Matilda Way) roughly halfway between Charleville and Cunnamulla. One blink and you’d miss it.
itchingforhitching 
Great drawings. So many typical old houses and shacks in small country towns: it’s a great idea to document them this way.
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Thanks Rose. It’s only when you get down to looking at them board by board that you realise that someone might be living in a house that you thought was derelict.
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Reblogged this on Queensland Stories and commented:
I’ve never been to Wyandra, but it seems that like many western towns it has a lot of old character houses and cottages with no one living in them – an indication of loss of population. I like these sketches of the old houses of Wyandra.
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Thanks Rose.
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Are these your drawings? A great record!
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Yes they are Margaret, I’m fascinated with old buildings be they grand or basic.
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And a talent for showcasing them!
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Thanks Margaret.
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Good drawings I agree
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Thanks Derrick.
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I love it!
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Fascinating town.
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Lovely record of a town that probably cannot be sustained. Do the youngsters tend to move away to the cities and larger towns?
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It’s an interesting situation and was explained to us by an old farmer once. Australian farmers aren’t supported by the government in the way that they are in other countries. They choose what they produce and sink or swim. Where once it took a family to run a maybe 100acres, over time improvements in machinery and methods and differing economic factors mean that when the neighbour retires their property is acquired / absorbed. It doesn’t take long for the hamlets, villages, then towns to disappear not having enough community to support them. And yes, there is too the movement to the cities of the kids to seek education and work. It is good to see the current trend of city folk moving to the country and Covid seems to have accelerated that trend. At the very least it eases the sprawl of our major cities at best it brings new ideas and new and varied industries.
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Take that to the next level and the farms become bigger and bigger, with fewer people to support them locally and they then become unable to sustain the workload required to produce sufficient income to survive. We just don’t learn that we all need to support our communities for them to survive. What a mess we have made of our world, but it’s still beautiful and worth fighting for!
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It certainly is and these two difficult years have given us all time to think about doing things differently. Maybe a boom in cottage industries and small businesses with fresh ideas perhaps.
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I love your drawings!!! 🙂
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Now I’m embarrassed, your work has been my inspiration.
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