2018 Houses
A little background on the houses highlighted in 2018
Thornburgh House
Completed in 1890, Thornburgh House was described at the time as “the handsomest and most convenient dwelling house in the North”. Influenced by the Victorian architecture of the time, Plant engaged architects Walter and Oliver Tunbridge to design a grand and stately villa, and Page and Sherlow to build it. He named it after his mother, whose maiden name was Thornburgh.
In 1919 the magnificent house, for so long a centre of social life in Charters Towers, was sold to the Presbyterian and Methodist churches to become a boarding school. By this time Mr Plant was 75 years old, gold mining had suffered a decline and he retired to his property in Ingham. He died in Sandgate in 1926.
Tower Villa
One of the finest outlooks in Charters Towers has to be that from the verandah of Tower Villa, nestled on the edge of Centenary Park.
The late Victorian 40 square home, with its gabled roof and wide cool verandahs, was typical style of the properties built on the goldfields before Federation.
The house was constructed between 1887 and 1888 for butcher Joe Harvey on the block which was initially purchased by Amelia Moore in 1884 for £17/6s/3p. Harvey owned one of the local slaughter houses, which was located where All Souls St Gabriels School is today. For many years the park in front of the home was known as Harvey's Reserve.
Church of Christ
Charters Towers is among a small number of towns with a large number of listed buildings with the Queensland Heritage Register. One of those properties is the Church of Christ, which was constructed in 1885-87 as the first Lutheran Church for the German community on the burgeoning goldfields.
The foundation stone for the building was laid on December 5, 1885 and the church was opened in June the following year. Reports from the time say that Mr Paradies and Mr Riederich presented the font, alter and sacred vessels to the church community.