336 Sandgate Road, Albion

During the 1880s mass migration brought a huge increase in Brisbane’s population. The northern commuter rail line between Roma Street and Sandgate had been officially opened on 10 May 1882, with regular services beginning the next day. By 1892 Albion was served by 29 daily trains to the city. During the course of the 1890s the numbers of people travelling into the city from Albion, Mayne, Wooloowin, Eagle Junction, Clayfield and Hendra more than doubled. By the turn of the century tram services linked Albion with Clayfield and the city (via Breakfast Creek and Newstead).

By the late 1880s and early 1890s Albion was one of a number of prosperous suburban centres which had arisen in response to the expansion of Brisbane from its former small city core. Indicative of the rise of Albion as a prosperous suburban centre was the building of the Albion Public Hall, and the 1889 construction of the impressive Queensland National Bank branch in Sandgate Road, next to the Albion Exchange (and now demolished, the land a part of the Albion Hotel carpark).

In December 1887 Richard Porter Vizer, who raised a mortgage of £84 in June 1888, purchased the southern block. The property changed hands again quickly, with Thomas Daw and Frederick Slack buying it in November 1888. It seems likely that either Vizer used his mortgage to partially pay for the construction of the shop, or that Daw and Slack built as soon as they acquired the land. An 1890 photograph of the neighbouring Kenion’s store also shows a double-storey brick shop, with iron railings to the upper level and an ornate parapet – presumably shop underneath and residence above. This was a butcher’s shop operated by Daw & Slack from around 1890. Mary Bray Daw, wife of Thomas Daw purchased the more southerly block in February 1891, and then transferred this to Daw and Slack in February 1891. 

Daw and Slack raised two mortgages over this property, to the Queensland National Bank for £1,100 in June 1895, which was replaced a year later by £1,500 raised from the widow Barbara Jane Drury. In 1901 Daw & Slack leased the premises to butcher Thomas Joseph Higgins for five years, and several months later transferred the property to mortgagee Mrs Drury.

This butchery continued to be run by other private operators, until being leased in 1918 as a State Butchery (under the auspices of the Commissioner for Trade for the State of Queensland). This State-owned shop was one of a number of butcher’s shops acquired and run as State enterprises. After the Labor Party assumed office in Queensland in 1915, a number of social welfare projects were launched by Premier T.J. Ryan. State-run enterprises were thought to reduce and stabilise prices by providing competition at fair prices especially for commodities such as beef which had been affected by war time demand. Besides butcher shops, the State also established sawmills and joinery works, mining and fishing ventures, hotel, and cattle stations. The State butcher shop proved to be more viable than most of the rest of the enterprises, but as a whole the scheme was not successful. The 1920 Profiteering Prevention Act was subsequently used to control prices, and the State Enterprises scheme slowly came to a halt during the 1920s. The Commissioner for Trade leased this shop for a total of five years at escalating rentals, finishing at the end of 1926. It continued to operate as a butcher until sold in 1937.

Vincent Macrossan bought the property in 1937, and very soon carried out major extensions. At this time, Brisbane was in a period of recovery from the economic depression of the 1930s. Brick additions comprising three additional shops, as well as Brisbane City Council approved a second storey of two flats. This work undoubtedly resulted in the creation of the building much as is visible today.

1. Australian Heritage Commission, Ladbrook’s Butchery Roma (Register of the National Estate Database)

2. Brisbane City Council Metropolitan Water Supply and Sewerage Board, Detail Plans

3. Kerr, John 1988, Brunswick Street, Bowen Hills and Beyond: The Railways of the Northern Suburbs of Brisbane, Australian Railway Historical Society

4. Lawson, Ronald Brisbane in the 1890s: A Study of an Australian Urban Society. St Lucia U of Q Press, 1973

5. Queensland Post Office Directories, 1890-1949