Characters, Coves & Cliffs

About the book

Characters, Coves and Cliffs book cover illustrated with a detailed water colour painting of native flora.r

Characters, Coves & Cliffs, published in 1995, is the companion volume to Chronicles of Coochiemudlo which appeared two years earlier.

It adds much to the previous book's detailed natural history. But its real forte is the collected accounts of island life since the 19th century. Some of the stories are told first-hand. Others are related by close family members.

We owe our thanks to the skilled and devoted  historian, John Pearn, who has collected a remarkable record of how ordinary people built useful and happy lives on Coochiemudlo Island.

Each part of the book, as listed below, includes a link to a file in Google Drive. Each linked file contains the chapters listed in that section.

Enjoy the read!

  • Contents, Contributors and Introduction

  • Pioneers of Coochiemudlo

    Chapter 1: Innes of “Innis Island”

    A Pioneer of Moreton Bay who gave his Name to Coochiemudlo Island
    John Pearn

    Chapter 2: Coochiemudlo Pioneers

    Henry Wright and his son Norman Reginald Wright — The first European Settlers on Coochiemudlo
    Norman James Wright, Ronald Thomas Wright, Belinda Harvey, Phillip Harvey and John Pearn

    Chapter 3: Recollections of a Post-War Childhood on Coochiemudlo Island

    The Island World of Doug and Mary Morton
    Paul Bland

    Chapter 4: Pioneers in Paradice

    Claire and Gerald Elliot of Coochiemudlo Island
    Marie-Louise Potter

    Chapter 5: Walter Osborne (1884-1979)

    A Coochiemudlo Pioneer
    Maurine Bradby

    Chapter 6: Cally — an Island Pioneer

    A Short Profile of Isabel Callaghan (1898-1988)
    Olive Walters

    Chapter 7: The Ferries and Ferrymen of Coochiemudlo Island
    Maureen O'Connor

  • The Reptiles of Moreton Bay

    Chapter 8: The Reptiles of Moreton Bay
    Jeanette Covacevich

    Chapter 9: Where have all the Flowers Gone?
    by Rosemary Opala

    Chapter 10: Luminous Funghi

    Night Lights on Bay Islands
    Geoffrey Tilse

  • The Living World of Coochiemudlo

    Chapter 11: Fighting Island Fires
    Edward Field Jones

    Chapter 12: Norfolk Beach

    What's in a name?
    Edward Field Jones

    Chapter 13: Ceramics and Creativity

    The Potters of Coochiemudlo
    Denise Wright

    Chapter 14: The Muse of Poetry

    Haiku and other Fragments inspired by the Sea and its Islands
    Nicolaine Jordan

    Chapter 15: The Muse of Painting

    Brenda-Joy Pritchard

    ​

    Chapter 16

    A HISTORY OF THE

    COOCHIEMUDLO

    ' ART GROUP

    Lyle Bailey

    ​

    Chapter 17

    FLINDERS DAY

    A Focus for Coochiemudlo Island

    Jean Stewart

    ​

    ​

    Notes and references

    ​

    Index