Proserpine

Proserpine is a town and a locality in the Whitsunday Region, Queensland, Australia.

Proserpine is a town and a locality in the Whitsunday Region, Queensland, Australia. The town was settled by Europeans in the 1890s. At the 2016 census, Proserpine had a population of 3,562.

The Gia people are the traditional Aboriginal Australians of the Proserpine area. Giya (also known as Kia. See also related Birri languages) is a language of North Queensland. The Giya language region includes the landscape within the local government boundaries of the Whitsunday Regional Council, particularly the towns of Bowen and Proserpine.George Elphinstone Dalrymple named the Proserpine River on an expedition in 1859. Proserpine derives from the legend of the Greek goddess Persephone (whose Latin name is Proserpine).The first British colonists arrived in the early 1860s with Daniel Emmerson forming the Proserpine pastoral station. Frederick Bode and William Dangar took up land at Bromby Park and Goorganga Creek, while Charles Bradley and James "Terrible Jimmy" Colling established properties along the Gregory River.Two of these pioneers were known to shoot Aboriginal people at "the slightest provocation." In 1866, Inspectors John Marlow and John Isley of the Native Police, a government funded paramilitary organistion, conducted patrols through the Proserpine area. They and their troopers "dispersed" around six "large mobs" of Aboriginal people during this mission. Marlow used Daniel Emmerson's property for his stock-yard and bought horses from him. After the spearing of cattle at Goorganga Plains, some Aboriginal people were giving "a very salutary lesson." In 1875 after the killing of a settler named Ben Toll and several of his workers at Lethebrook, the local colonists rounded up a group of Aboriginal people and killed them at Slaughter Waterhole. When Albert Setter was attacked and wounded with spears in 1883 while transporting goods through Crystal Brook, Native Police troopers and local settlers conducted probably the last punitive expedition in the area resulting in a "wholesale massacre." Setter lived to an old age and died in Proserpine in 1951.The Crystal Brook Sugar Company was formed in 1882 and established a sugar industry in the region a year later. A sugar mill was built and the labouring on the plantation was performed by imported South Sea Islanders. In 1893 the plantation, which was located at Glen Isla close to the present Proserpine township, was closed and smaller sugar farms run by white owner-operators were established.

The township of Proserpine was created in the 1890s. The Postal Office opened in 1886. The town experienced high growth in the 1900s as the local sugar industry grew and exported raw sugar via the Proserpine Landing from here it was sent to refineries.

In 1944 the Australian Field Experimental Station was constructed at Gunyarra just south of the town, this accommodated 600 staff from the AIF, AMF, RAAF, Australian Women's Army Service (AWAS), Australian Army Medical Women's Service (AAMWS), Women's Auxiliary Australian Air Force (WAAAF), United Kingdom (UK) Royal Army Medical Corps (RAMC), UK scientists from Porton, England, Australian civilian scientists, and observers from New Zealand Navy, South African Army, United States, and Australian Chemical Defence Board. It was constructed to test and research the effectiveness of Mustard Gas in tropical conditions.In the 1950s the Proserpine Airport was opened which increased the towns accessibility by air. In 1986 construction commenced on the Peter Faust Dam 25 kilometres (16 mi) north-west of the town to be used for flood mitigation during the wet season and irrigation during the dry, the dam was completed in 1990 and was expected to take decades to fill but a passing cyclone helped boost levels close to maximum capacity. The 1990s saw the Proserpine Sugar Mill crush a record amount of cane in 1996.

The Proserpine Library opened in 1998 and had a major refurbishment in 2011.

Proserpine Historical Museum is at 192-198 Main Street (20.4054°S 148.5925°E? / -20.4054; 148.5925? (Proserpine Historiclal Museum)). The museum collects, preserves and presents the history of the Whitsunday region.