General regret was expressed last month at the news of the death of Mr. John Cameron, ex-M.L.A. for Brisbane. He was born in 1845 in British Guiana, South America, a State in which his family for many years were engaged in the sugar-growing industry. He did not remain there long, however, but while still a boy migrated, with his parents, to Victoria, and was educated at Scotch College, Melbourne, and the Geelong Grammar School.
In 1863 he left Victoria in company with his father and the late Messrs. J. and W. Crombie (late of Greenhills Station) to travel a small mob of mixed sheep into Western Queensland, and arrived at Barcaldine on 10th June, 1864. They took up what is now known as Barcaldine Downs, and the station was worked by them until it was sold to the Fairbairn family. In 1877 Messrs. Cameron and Crombie purchased Kensington Downs and Greenhills Stations, near Muttaburra. After four years the partnership was dissolved, the former retaining Kensington Downs and the latter Greenhills. Both these properties are still in the possession of the same families.
In 1893 Mr. Cameron was elected to the Legislative Assembly as member for the Mitchell district, and retained the position until 1896. In 1901 he was elected unopposed to fill the vacancy at Brisbane North in the State Parliament and represented that constituency until his retirement in 1908.
The late Mr. Cameron also occupied a number of important positions in pastoral and mercantile life. He was president of the United Pastoralists and Grazing Farmers' Association of Queensland for a period of over thirteen years, was president of the Pastoral Employers' Association of Central and Northern Queensland for fourteen years, was chairman of the Queensland Meat Export and Agency Company Limited for upwards of ten years, was a member of the Stock Board, the Central Rabbit Board, the Chamber of Agriculture, the National Agricultural and Industrial Association. He was also a director of the board of the Union Trustee Company of Australia, and chairman of Moreheads Limited. He was one of the sturdy pastoralist pioneers, who laid the foundations of present prosperity on solid and secure lines.
Mr. Cameron is survived by his widow and three sons—Mr. D. C. Cameron, of Kensington Downs; Mr. John Cameron, of Rainscourt, near Hughenden; and Mr. P. L. Cameron, of Caledonia, Aramac. A photograph of the late Mr. Cameron will be published in our next issue.
'Cameron, John (1847–1914)', Obituaries Australia, National Centre of Biography, Australian National University, https://oa.anu.edu.au/obituary/cameron-john-1167/text1162, accessed 12 November 2024.
State Library of Queensland, 68335
13 March,
1847
New Amsterdam,
Guyana
29 June,
1914
(aged 67)
Albion, Brisbane,
Queensland,
Australia
Includes subject's nationality; their parents' nationality; the countries in which they spent a significant part of their childhood, and their self-identity.
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