Beauaraba
Beauaraba on the Darling Downs means place of dry bushes
Beaudesert
The name Beaudesert comes from
Beau Desert, the name Edward Hawkins gave to his property in
commemoration of his birthplace, Beau Desert Park, Staffordshire,
England. He had already used it of a property further south. Beau
Desert Park, in turn, gained its name from a Cistercian monastery
nearby, Beau
Desir, meaning beautiful wish.
Beau Desert Station was leased
by Joseph Phelps Robinson and later by William Duckett White who made
it the headquarters for his extensive grazing interests along the south
coast of Queensland.
Beechmont
The early timbergetters seem to have given it this name after the beech trees growing there in abundance. This was probably
Pennantia cunninghamii or brown beech, although what is known as white beech,
Gmelina leichardtii was also in the area.
Beenleigh
Beenleigh is often associated
with rum, and that is not surprising because John Davey and Frank
Gooding who began to grow sugarcane there about 1865, opening their
sugar mill five years later, in 1884 started the beginnings of the
Beenleigh Rum
Distilliary. These men were brother-in-law and they named their
plantation Beenleigh after the name of Davey's family estate in
Devonshire, England. The town got its name from the plantation.
The
area has had other names. As a result of the efforts of J. C.
Heussler, a number of German settlers moved into the area so that it
came to be known as German Pocket. The Aboriginal name for the area was
Woabbummarjo, meaning boggy clay.
Beerburrum
Beerburrum
was an Aboriginal word
(Undambi language) meaning parrot, apparently arrived at by imitating
the sound made by the parrot's wings in flight. It is the name of one
of the Glasshouse Mountains, and the district gained its name from the
mountain. This mountain was climbed by Matthew Flinders way back in
1799 when he made an overland expedition away from his sloop, the
Norfolk, left moored in Pumistone Passage. He commented on the
extensive view of the bay and the neighbouring country from the summit,
and described the country they walked through to get there as 'low,
swampy and brushy, and in the latter part of the way somewhat uneven.'
He described the mountain as 'a pile of stones of all sizes, mostly
loose near the surface.'
Beerwah
Mount Beerwah was climbed by Andrew Petrie and his son John, and years later John named his Brisbane residence
Beerwah in memory of that occasion. But in Aboriginal legend
Beerwah was the pregnant mother left by her cowardly son to fend for
herself as floodwaters rushed across the coastal plain. In the
Turrbal language the name meant up in the sky. The mountain gave its
name to the nearby township.
Bell
Bell, on the Darling Downs, is named
after Sir Joshua Bell of Jimbour station who served in several Queensland
cabinet positions and was President of the Legislative Council.
Bellbowrie
In
early years, Aboriginal names were borrowed or adapted from the local
dialects, but of later years developers wanting to give their
subdivision an Aboriginal name have had to rely on books of Aboriginal
words. This is what J.D.Booker did when he chose this Aboriginal word,
not of local origin, supposed to mean a red flowering tree. Is has been
a recognized place name since 1972.
Belli Park
When his favourite horse died in 1867,
the surveyor Jardine gave its name to this district.
Bells Creek
Bells Creek was named after Mary Alice Bell, a governess for
William Landsborough's children. She took up land in this area south of
Caloundra.
Belmont
Belmont House stood
on land where the big and bustling Carindale Shopping Centre now
stands. It was built
and named by by Colonel Carl Berneker (1876), but later became
the home of Colonel W. Mackenzie. Belmont, in its English and Scottish
origins, derives from the French and means beautiful mountain. It is a
name to be found throughout the British Isles.
Benarkin
Benarkin is an
Aboriginal word for the blackbutt tree, and this name was officially
recognized in April, 1912, when the township which had grown up at the
Well Hole was so named by the Railway Department.
Benobble
When the railway station was given this
name, 28 January, 1915, it was borrowed from an already existing sawmill. It is
claimed to be derived from bunahba gurara, the place of the tall
bloodwood trees, in the Bunjalung Aboriginal language.
Benowa
The original Benowa
post office was at Muir's sugar plantation where there was also a sugar
mill and a sawmill. In 1875 it was moved to Bundall. The
name is derived from the Aboriginal word boonow which referred to the
bloodwood tree.
Bergin Creek
Named after J. D. Bergin, holder of the
original title deed for Pors 31 and 58, Parish of Bunya.
Bergin's Hill
Thomas Bergin was a bailiff in Ipswich around 1868.
Berrinba
Adopted by the Queensland
Place Names Board in 1971 the name means to the south, although it is
not known from which Aboriginal dialect it comes.
Bethania
Some of the German
families who arrived in the young colony of Queensland in 1864 settled
at Bethanien from which the present Bethania has emerged.
Biddaddaba
The district gained its name from the
creek, which was given the Aboriginal name of burubu-da meaning the place of
koalas. There have been many different attempts to spell and
to pronounce this name, but it was so named by the Minister for Natural
Resources 24 April 1997.
Biddeston
John Little named his property after a
town in Wiltshire, England, and the Darling Downs locality gained its name from
that property.
Biggera Waters
The area was named after the creek,
which derived its name from the Yugambeh language word bigera referring to the
red iron eucalypt (eucalyptus sideroploia).
Bilinga
Bilinga on the Gold
Coast was named by the Surveyor General, 17 October, 1918. The name is
Aboriginal and means the place of bats, or maybe parrots.
Previous page
Next page
Place Names of South East Queensland home page
|