Historical documents & archives
Blueprints, lighthouse registers, expedition journals, and the extraordinary 1893 photographs of William Saville-Kent.
The Great Barrier Reef of Australia: Its Products and Potentialities
William Saville-Kent worked as a curator of coral at London's Natural History Museum and dreamed of seeing the live animals "in their native seas and wonderful living tints." In 1884 he travelled to Australia, spending the next twenty years laying the foundations for fisheries development.
His 1893 book was the first to extensively depict a coral reef in photographs — pre-dating the legendary 1928 expedition by 35 years. Using a specially constructed four-stand, Saville-Kent waded into waters at low tide to photograph coral from above as large-format prints. 48 photographs were reproduced by the London Stereoscopic Company, with 16 colour lithographs from his original watercolour sketches.
A copy was brought to a LIPS meeting in April 2023 by local commercial fisherman Billy Dunn, revealing to members and guests the extraordinary beauty and vibrancy of the Low Isles reef in the 1890s.
📖 View the book online (Archive.org)
Great Barrier Reef Expedition 1928–1929 journals
The expedition itself published seven volumes of scientific material in addition to articles in scholarly journals. Great Barrier Reef Expedition 1928–1929 by C.M. Yonge is available to view at the Douglas Shire Library in Mossman, and also digitally via the Biodiversity Heritage Library.
Maurice Yonge also published a book aimed at a general audience — A Year on the Great Barrier Reef (1930). The expedition team's research pioneered studies into coral physiology and continues to be vital reference material for contemporary reef science.
📖 View digital copy of the journals"the greatest marine science venture on a global scale since the Challenger oceanographic expedition more than fifty years earlier."— James Bowen and Margarita Bowen, The Great Barrier Reef: history, science, heritage (2002)
Lighthouse records & historical documents
