Stage Number: MBSH.05.07.02
Group: Western
Local Study Area: Durack- Doolandella-Willawong-Pallara-Larapinta
Epoch: Early 20th Century
Street Address: Junction of Blunder and Bowhill roads, Durack
Latitude & Longitude: -27.58822222,152.98686111
Time Link: 1950
Map Link: 1951
Image Time Point: 1951
Brisbane’s roads – even main thoroughfares such as Ipswich Road – were narrow and generally comprised of dirt and gravel until the mid-20th century. There were many small sand and gravel pits in the region, and the Brisbane City Council hired local pits for material to maintain the roads. One of these pits was owned by William Henry Price, a butcher at Station Road, Oxley, who ran cattle on his land south of Ipswich Road (then known as The Blunder or Oxley South). His pit was on the corner of Blunder and Bowhill roads, on land now occupied by the Durack-Inala Bowls Club and ‘Delbridge Park’.
Gravel was particularly needed during World War II, when roads were made worse by countless military vehicles, and there was a council staff member at the Price gravel pits every day to keep records, and Price was paid 3d per cubic yard. The pit was still working in 1949, but later became a dump for years before the Bowls Club took over.
Vicki Mynott, 150 years: Richlands, Inala & neighbouring suburbs in Brisbane’s south west, Richlands, Inala & Suburbs History Group Inc., 2009.
Price’s gravel pit, Bowhill Road, 1949. Image: Lona Grantham (nee Price).
Qimagery. Greater Brisbane Area 1951. Scale: 1:16,000.