The Busuttin family played a pivotal role in opening up Whitsunday islands

The Busuttin family played a pivotal role in opening up Whitsunday islands

Busuttin Home, on Brampton Island. Picture: William Fair Collection

Joseph Busuttin was one of the first Maltese to settle in North Queensland and, in 1907, he and his wife Sarah took up an occupation licence for St Bees Island to run sheep.

Then, in 1916, they leased Brampton Island to breed horses for the Indian Army.

By 1926 St Bees was accepting local and southern visitors.

In 1931 a weekend on St Bees cost 20/- ($2).

Before World War II, the Whitsunday islands and the Great Barrier Reef were viewed as remote by the general public and consequently accommodation and facilities for tourists was very sparse.

Attention was focused on the region in 1936 with the film ‘White Death’ starring the famous American novelist Zane Grey playing himself.

His son Arthur and wife Jess were the founders of Brampton Island Resort.

In 1930, Jess Cummings met her future husband Arthur Busuttin. She and two friends decided to holiday on ‘Lovely Lindeman’ and travelled to Mackay.

The party was taken to Lindeman in the launch “Florence” owned by the Busuttins and skippered by Joseph, known to all as Pidge.

It took them eight hours from the Pioneer River to Lindeman.

There was no Mackay Outer Harbour in those days. Jess remembers the accommodation on Lindeman being “like a cane cutters barracks”.

Arthur Busuttin arrived at Lindeman in the Laura to take the party of girls for a cruise and that was the beginning of a wonderful life together and the beginning of Brampton Island Resort.

Jess and Arthur were married in Cairns in 1932 and returned to Mackay where Arthur and brother Pidge decided to build a resort on Brampton Island which had plenty of flat ground.

Arthur and Jess Busuttin. Picture: Supplied

A main hall was built with just a roof and floor. Later it was stuccoed and a ceiling added.

A Sydney newspaper in 1933 advertised “Total cost for three weeks’ holiday from Sydney, first class return steamer fare, 11 days on Brampton Island, the Great Barrier Reef Tourist Paradise – £27.3.0” ($54.30).

The first tourists arrived on “Canberra” for Christmas 1933.

There was plenty of water, fish, poultry, mutton, pork, home baked bread and power for lights but not enough power to run appliances so huge blocks of ice, packed in sawdust, were shipped in twice weekly from Mackay.

In 1934, Arthur and Jess moved to Brampton as owners and managers.

Arthur skippered Woy Woy carrying cargo and passengers between the Pioneer River and Brampton, Lindeman and Bowen and running Sunday excursions to Brampton.

With communications non-existent and visitor numbers unknown, pigeons were used between Lloyd Williams of Radio 4MK and Brampton but sometimes the pigeon arrived late or perched up in the highest tree so catering became guess work.

The opening of Mackay Harbour in 1939 provided a major access for the island. The first jetty with good access for small ships was built in the harbour in 1950.

Busuttin Home, on Brampton Island. Picture: William Fair Collection

Before this, passengers scaled a ladder and sometimes had to cross a sugar ship loading at the wharf.

The Busuttins and their launches were crucial to Mackay’s shipping and tourist industry.

They transported waterside workers and sugar lighter crews to Flat Top anchorage before the harbour was built and supplied transport for the islands.

During WWII, the resorts closed but the families remained on their islands.

They were often visited by American and Allied warships, patrol boats etc. and after the war, the servicemen spread the word about the beauty of the islands so building increased in 1946 on Brampton, a truck and cold room was brought to the island by barge and two-way radio was installed.

Brampton was the first island to install a radio transmitter to contact the coastal passenger ships by Morse Code but, proving unsatisfactory, two-way radio was installed instead.

The first phone call to the island was made by the Mackay Postmaster on April 21, 1959.

To develop tourism further, the Queensland Government built jetties on Hayman, Brampton, South Mole, Daydream and Lindeman in the 1950s as until then, landings were by dingy on to the beach.

After 25 years, in 1959, Arthur and Jess sold the resort to Carapark Motels keeping a five-year lease on their home and surroundings.

They left Brampton in 1960, retiring to Harbour Road, North Mackay.

When their family home on Brampton, built c1934, was demolished in the 1980s, the foundations were found to be of solid teak collected from shipwrecks.

Arthur died in Mackay in 1995.

Originally published as The Busuttin family played a pivotal role in opening up Whitsunday islands