Christopher’s memories of Glenhaughton, of the happy days he lived there, and the stories from his father Duncan, brought him joy and peace in recent years.

Christopher David McConnel passed away peacefully, after battling a long illness, in his historic Cressbrook Station home, surrounded by his closest family on 8^th November 2025. His life was celebrated in a private ceremony at Cressbrook’s Victoria Chapel where he was laid to rest with his ancestors on 18^th November, 2025. Deepest condolences to Christopher’s wife Susan, daughter Caitlin, and sisters Robin and Dianna.
Many Taroom residents will remember Christopher from his years at Glenhaughton, where he lived from 1960 until 1979 when the large holding was broken up and sold by the company McConnel and Kirk, a casually of the beef depression and relentless drought. Like many others before him, Christopher told me his years at Glenhaughton were the happiest of his life.

Christopher was gracious with his stories, and I looked forward to our long phone conversations when he was well enough to talk. He spent countless hours transcribing old yellowed pages of historical records from the archives, content that these stories would live on for future generations through the Glenhaughton Ringers and Taroom Tales pages.  He remained interested in the Taroom district, and was keen to hear news of people and places he had known well, thankful for the opportunity to pass on his knowledge of times past, knowing I was recording his words to share one day.

RIP Chris, thank you for trusting me with your memories. You will be greatly missed.

GLENHAUGHTON GLORY DAYS… through Christophers eyes

A selection of stories from recorded conversations (2024-2025) with Christopher and ex-ringer Lex Smith (my father):

Lex Smith was a Glenhaughton ringer when he first met Christopher, a young lad visiting with his father Duncan on School holidays.  “I remember the Land Rover and your dad up at the horse yards, at the blacksmith shop, working on it,” Christopher recalled.  “I had just gone to boarding school, so I was 8, going on 9, when I first went to Glenhaughton.”  Lex was a ringer, but he had completed a mechanical apprenticeship in Ipswich before he moved to Taroom.

Lex was often called on to fix the station Land Rover and old Blitz in the Blacksmith’s shop that served as a workshop up near the horse yards. The old building with its bark covered roof and hand sawn slabs was barely standing in 1959. The original station anvil, with it’s broken tip was also there, too heavy to move and still in daily use by the ringers keeping their horse plant shod.  With thanks to Avon and Carol Hamilton, current owners, some of the big posts and part of the  building frame still remain today, standing as a reminder of past times at this historic place.

The First Toyota on Glenhaughton was purchased 1959

Two salesmen brought it out for a trial run, so Duncan took them to the challenging Mount Pleasant Jumpup, fifteen miles from the homestead.  They travelled along the end of a spur on a tableland and came to the edge. “When you looked out from the top all you could see was blue sky,” Lex said. “We walked up to the edge and looked down, seeing it just drop away, really steep.” The salesman exclaimed, “If he takes the Toyota down there, it won’t come back up!”

“Well he won’t buy it if that happens,” was the reply. “The old Land Rover you were critising earlier at the station goes down and up there all right by itself.” They thought about that, climbed into the back with Lex, and hung on! “The hood was off, and they were scared,” he laughed. With some trouble, they made it down and back up, and the first Glenhaughton Toyota was purchased.

Duncan wrote of the experience, “ These poor chaps were not game even to open their mouth. Their eyes nearly popped out of their head as we went down to the bottom, and they thought they would be stranded there. We got up alright, as I knew it was possible having driven an Army disposal Blitz down there as the first 4WD vehicle to negotiate the track after the War; and following that, some other Blitz trucks (belonging to Joe Jarvis, a local fencing and yard building contractor), and both our Land Rovers also. However, to get out to these main camps, either by horseback or vehicle, is a day’s hard work.”

“There was more than one Blitz truck at the station”

Christopher recalled the shell of an old Blitz under a tree near “The Top Hut”, an old building that was used for men’s accommodation that has since been burnt down.  His father told him that men were coming back from Belington in that Blitz and they stalled it coming out of the creek. Leaving it there they got a lift back to the station in the Land Rover to come back for it the next day. Lex laughed, “There was a big storm that night, and it got washed down the creek! We couldn’t restart it.” That was the original Blitz, so they got another one, but it was a Ford Blitz and Duncan didn’t like it. Billy Jarvis, Joe’s son – the mailman, had a Chev Blitz the same as Glenhaughton’s original, so they did a swap. The old Blitz was towed up to the top horse paddock where it sat under a gum tree just above the horse yards, with the words “RUMBLE GUTS” painted on it by someone being funny. It was stripped for spare parts until just a chassis and body remained, and there it stayed for a long, long, time. I wonder if any part of that old truck is still there today?

DUNCAN McCONNEL’S PLANE – first plane in the district

Duncan had just completed his training as an Airforce Pilot in WWII in Canada when the war ended so he was fortunate to avoid active service. When he arrived to take over management of Glenhaughton in 1959, he decided to buy a light plane to assist with travelling the large distances between Cressbrook, The Auburn, and Glenhaughton stations. 

Duncan also considered a plane would be a great asset to assist in the management of Glenhaughton. He built landing strips at most of the main camps, and he kept a few horses in the paddocks for himself to use for supervision, attending musters, checking and repairing fences, or just for having a look around the cattle and watering points. 

He wrote, “One could slip out there in a plane in a few minutes from the station to complete a full day’s work, that would have otherwise taken an extra day to get out, and another day to return. With the plane, we could pick up a few horses and ride around and be back home that same night.  It will be much more pleasant for my wife also. Instead of being away in mustering camps for a week at a time, leaving her at the homestead by herself, she will no longer be sleeping in a bed alone listening to the dingo’s howling at night, which she hates.”

“The plane was also useful for spotting and locating mobs of cattle running and poked away in difficult areas, so that the men could formulate a plan of retrieving them with coachers, without having to do an excessive amount of reconnaissance riding.”
-DC McConnel

GRAHAM WALSH was a friend of Duncan’s from Injune, and he was a respected authority on aboriginal relics. He spent a lot of time at Glenhaughton. Christopher recalled, “He was an extremely great bloke, and dad used to take him in the plane to take a lot of photos in the Amphitheatre from the air, flying so low over the escarpments that Graham could photograph the caves and paintings.”  After the property was sold, and Duncan had left Glenhaughton, Graham returned with another pilot and he was really disappointed. The pilot didn’t get below 5000 feet, he laughed, “I had to hire a bloody helicopter to get the photos after Duncan had left.”

Duncan was widely regarded as an excellent pilot, and somewhat of a daredevil.

He was known to cut the engine to drop low quickly and restart it again to fly through narrow gaps in the mountains. Not many of the ringers could stomach a flight with the boss, but they all admit to the benefits it brought to their daily lives.  

Bluey the station cowboy was up in the plane with Duncan one day, helping to spot cattle. He got sick and the only thing available was a bag of dingo traps to use. They were dropped out of the plane to the men in camp below – vomit and all!  After that, a large empty prune tin was always kept in the plane.

Bluey was a “cowboy” at the station. He is remembered for getting caught sneaking over to visit the neighbouring Glenleigh governess one night riding the station night horse.

He was unlucky enough to do it on a night when ringer Nugget Roser was camped there with his mate Ross Scantlebury, helping with cattle yarded at Glenleigh on the way into Taroom from Mapala.  In their glee, they bang-tailed the poor old night horse, leaving frisky cowboy Bluey with a bit of explaining to do the next day back at the station.

STOCKMEN & RINGERS REMEMBERED

CHRISTOPHER had fond memories of those who worked at Glenhaughton in his time, and he came to life telling stories of the remarkable things that happened out there.   

CLIVEY BRIGGS was an older man working at Glenhaughton when a young MARK GROVES (Grovesy) was there, and ROBERT BRADSHAW (Mopsy) was head stockman.  Robert’s wife JENNIFER was the camp cook, and son Dale was just a baby. Christopher recalled Duncan taking a phone call at the station with the tragic news that Roberts father Lance, the Pound Keeper on Taroom Shire, had been killed in a motorcar accident.  Duncan flew out to the 12 Mile (Nuga Nuga) to give Robert the bad news, and flew the young family back in. Robert left Glenhaughton shortly after that to take over his fathers job on the shire. 

ROY PARSONS also worked there in his time. Roys father Dave Parsons (Shadow) worked at Glenhaughton when Christopher’s mother Erica (Echo) was a new bride, and the only female on the station. A male cook took offense to taking orders from a woman and came at her with a carving knife. She was okay, but after that Shadow Parsons gifted her a .22 rifle for protection against men like that. The same rifle was still in Christophers possession at the time of his passing.

When Jim Penny almost shot Grovesy and Roy Parsons

JIM PENNY was head stockman in the early 1960s when Grovesy was first there as a young ringer with Roy Parsons. Roy was a big man with an alcohol problem and was a well liked bloke. Guns were always carried in the Land Rover and Toyota on the dash in front of the steering wheel.  Driving to a muster at Nuga Nuga one day was Roy Parsons in the passenger seat, Mark Groves in the middle, and Jim Penny driving. They were quite squashed in the front, not a lot of space between Grovesy and big Roy. Somewhere around Dough Boy Gully they saw a dingo. Jim slammed on the brakes and jumped out with the rifle, chasing the dingo, shooting at it. The dingo got away so he ran back to the vehicle to chase it some more, and he tripped over.

The loaded rifle discharged.

The bullet went through the grate on the air vent of the Toyota, through the fire wall of the glove box, disintegrated a tin of Volcaniser thermal tyre patches, busted the aluminium clamp into pieces of schrapnel, out of the glove box where it passed between Roy and Grovesy with millimetres to spare, through the passenger seat and out of the back of the cab!  That vehicle was sold with the holes welded up, but the seat upholstery forever had a hole in it from where the bullet had passed through. A very lucky escape for Roy and Grovesy!

A great deal has been recorded by Duncan McConnel about the early years and particularly of Red Palmer’s Tranquiliser muster which will have to be shared another time. “It was next level what those men were doing on a daily basis,” Christopher told me. He had the greatest respect for the work ethic, loyalty, and skills of the men working there. “An employer taking those risks today would be locked up!” he laughed, “But the thing is, those ringers were very practical people, and they avoided a lot of trouble because they were practical, and they knew what they were doing.” He added, “You didn’t read about it in the manual – they wrote the manual about it after the event!”  

STAY TUNED FOR MORE STORIES… Duncan’s Reports, Tranquiliser Muster 1959, improvising with whatever they could find… and loads more from Christopher McConnel to share!