New Farm State Butchery (former)

The Queensland Post Office Directories first list a shop on this site in its 1902 edition. As the survey for each edition was conducted in the year prior to publication then the shop was built in 1901. This was the same year as the New Farm school opened (21 January) in Heal Street. The first business to operate from the new shop was Baynes Brothers butchers from 1902-1913. T & A Scarborough then ran the butchers shop at this site from 1913-18. An aerial photograph of New Farm shows the shop in existence in 1919. 

In 1918, this shop became the New Farm State Butchery. State butcher shops were established by the Queensland Labor Government as a means of influencing prices of household staples such as meat and sugar. From 1915 to 1925, the state government established or acquired a number of business enterprises in order to provide competition against possible business monopolies as well as a means offering products at cheaper rates. This was done under the auspices of the State Enterprises Act of 1918. These businesses included State Fish Shops, the ‘State’ brand jam and sauce factory, a sugar mill, cold stores and some cattle stations. With the latter two enterprises, the state government was able to offer meat at fair prices through the establishment of State Butcher Shops known as state butcheries.

Ninety state butcheries were established in Queensland between 1915 and 1929. The peak number of state butcheries totalled 72 in the years 1922-23. The majority of the state butcheries utilised existing butcher’s shops that were acquired by the Commissioner for Trade in Queensland. Only seven of ninety state butcheries were purpose built and to an individual design. Initially the state butcheries continued to obtain their meat from privately owned meatworks but this changed from 1921 when state meatworks began supplying the butcheries. But the state butcheries, as a whole, were a drain on the state economy, losing £6,000 during the 14 years that they were in operation.1 Commencing in 1926, the Labor Government began disposing of the majority of the state butcheries and after the 1929 election of the Country, Progressive and Nationalist Parties coalition government, the remaining 39 butcheries throughout Queensland ceased operating as state enterprises on 30 June 1929. The New Farm State Butchery was amongst this last batch of state butcher shops.   

In preparation for the disposal of the New Farm State Butchery at 105 James Street, a new title deed was issued to the Commissioner for Trade in Queensland on 13 July 1929. That same year, on 20 September, the butchers shop and land was sold to Issiah Chadwick Burrows and James John Burrows. Initially they leased the shop to butcher George Lemkie who operated his business there from 1929 to 1933. By 1934 though, the shop was operating as Burrows Butchers. When James J. Burrows died on 8 July 1934, his share of the property had been transmitted to Issiah C. Burrows, who was identified as a Master Builder.  After Issiah’s death on 8 November 1940, the property was transmitted to Alexander Samuel Burrows and a widow Doris Gertrude Rogers. On 1 April 1941, the title was transferred to Minnie Gertrude Burrows, also a widow. Another widow, Catherine Alma Burrows took ownership on 3 December 1951. She mortgaged the butchers shop and land through the Bank of New South Wales (now Westpac) on the same day. Burrows Butchers participated in Brisbane-wide closure of butchers shops that were a protest against state government price-fixing. A legacy of World War Two rationing rules, Queensland Government price controls had, by 1951, increasingly made butcheries unprofitable. A three pence per pound price increase was granted by the state government and the butchers’ shops reopened.  

On 25 August 1989, the property was transferred to Noel (‘Bunny’) Alexander Burrows. Noel’s widow, Leslie Burrows is the current owner and while 105 James Street continues to operate as butcher’s shop, the Burrows lease the property to Alan Alexander Petersen and Beris Alwyn Petersen. Alan Petersen began his butchery business in 1952 at Springsure and he has operated a butcher shop at Rockhampton, Maryborough, Ipswich and Chermside. In 1971 he leased a butcher shop elsewhere in James Street but when the lease could not be renewed, Noel Burrows rang Alan Petersen and offered him a lease on the butcher shop at 105 James Street. Alan’s family business AA & BA Petersen Quality Butchers includes his son Neil.    

The Burrows family have been associated with this butchers shop for 80 years. They made a number of changes to the butchers shop. The Brisbane City Council approved repairs to the shop in March 1952. Further repairs were made in August 1963. In November 1963, builders Christie & Walkers made alterations to the shop. In 2009, the building contains two shops – A.A. & B.A. Petersen Quality Meats and the New Farm Hypnotherapy Clinic.

The butchers shop at 105 James Street has been identified as having local heritage significance in a number of publications. In early 1995, the Brisbane City Council’s Heritage Unit conducted the first survey of heritage buildings within New Farm. This shop was identified in Sector 6 of New Farm as being of having heritage significance, and at that time the real property description for 105 James Street was Lot 1 on RP 9196. In October 1995, architects Kaylee Wilson and Elizabeth Musgrave produced a report, New Farm and Teneriffe Hill Heritage and Character Study for the Brisbane City Council. This report noted the significant structural features of the two shops at 105 and 107 James Street. These were: 

Corner shops with tiled shop front, lead lighting over doors, stainless steel doors and counter joinery to butcher’s shop. Huge plate glass windows.2   

Subsequently this property was given heritage protection by the Council through its Town Plan. The property was then transferred to the new City Plan Heritage Register on 30 October 2000. It was given a second layer of protection by being entered onto the City Plan Commercial Character Building Register also on the 30 October 2000.

The property located at 105 James Street, New Farm has operated continuously as a butcher’s shop since 1901. The history of this property reflects the changing developments in butchers’ shops in Queensland during this extensive period. Beginning as a private butchers shop of the type that serviced Brisbane residents before the advent of modern supermarkets; it was then converted to a State Butchery before returning to private ownership but retaining its status as ‘the local butcher’.

1. Environmental Protection Agency, “Walkerston State Butcher’s Shop” citation, p. 6

2. Musgrave, Elizabeth & Wilson, Kaylee, New Farm and Teneriffe Hill Heritage and Character Study, (Brisbane: Brisbane City Council, October 1995), p. 110

3. Brisbane City Council, 1946, 2001 & 2005 aerial photographs

4. Brisbane City Council, post-1946 Building Cards

5. Brisbane City Council, Properties on the Web, Applications/Site History

6. Brisbane City Council, Sewerage Map No. 191, 28 July 1927

7. Brisbane City Council, New Farm Heritage Survey, (Brisbane: Brisbane City Council Heritage Unit, 1995)

8. Department of Natural Resources, Queensland Certificates of title and other records.

9. Environmental Protection Agency, “Walkerston State Butcher’s Shop” citation

10. John Oxley Library, photographic collection.