Author: Ken Gray

Editors: Margaret Remilton, Rhonda Jarvis, and Diane Bull.

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Bananas. Yep. That's how Mission Beach clawed its way back to life in the 1950s after most residents left the place after the 1918 cyclone. The Rick family had a big part to play in the town’s banana-led recovery.

This is an abridged story of Frank Rick (1918–2000), his wife Marion McEachan (1922–2019), and their immediate family during their years at Mission Beach, Queensland. The full version of the story has images and more details of the family history.

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Author: Ken Gray

Editors: Margaret Remilton, Rhonda Jarvis, and Diane Bull.

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The story of the Buntings begins not with triumph but with heartbreak. When Margaret Eakin stepped onto Australian soil in 1877 aboard the Scottish Bard, she had already buried two lives: her first husband, lost overboard during the voyage from County Leitrim, Ireland, and her baby, who died the very day they landed. She was just twenty years old.

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Author: Ken Gray

Editors: Margaret Remilton, Rhonda Jarvis, and Diane Bull.

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In the tropical heat of Mission Beach, far from the cobblestoned streets of Denmark, the Wildsoet family has had roots planted for more than a century. Only the Porters and the Wildsoets can claim ancestors of the same name who arrived here more than 110 years ago, settling in 1908. Today, three streets bear their name: quiet monuments to a family that should never be forgotten.

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Author: Rita Mitchell nee Brett

Editors: Ken Gray & Diane Bull

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 Most of north Queensland’s histories are written by male authors and their focus is often on the lives of males. Here we have a female author relaying what it was like for women living in the north in the early 1900s. Rita depicts the day to day life of Nell and her family as they struggled to make good with few resources or comforts. 

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Author: Ken Gray

Editors: Diane Bull & Chris Forbes

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Margaret and Joe Collins are part of an iconic Mission Beach family that started in Australia when Joe’s grandfather, Edgar Collins, arrived in North Queensland as an 18-year-old seeking great adventure in 1887. He found it in bucket loads.

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Author: Peter Alexander & Ken Gray

Editors: Margaret Remilton & Diane Bull

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The Mission Beach Historical Society published Bicton: The Cuttens of Clump Point in 2021 and this included some history of the Alexander family when they lived in the district on and off from 1885 to 1954. While this gives us some understanding of the Alexander family at Bingil Bay, it says little about how they got here and where the family came from. Peter’s story fills in many gaps in the Bicton story.

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