St Mary’s Catholic Church 1978

St Marys Church is on the corner of Elizabeth Street and Roseberry Parade.

The church was originally built in 1858.

The St Marys of today had the foundation stone laid in 1900 and was dedicated by His Eminence Cardinal Moran of Sydney on October 2, 1904 on its completion.

The church was built on the plan of St Joseph’s Cathedral, Rockhampton which as designed by FDG Stanley, architect of Brisbane.

This machine from Shillito Engineering may have been used during refurbishing of the Church Hall on Mary St with St Mary’s Primary School in background.

Shillito & Sons Engineering of Ipswich was owned by Samuel Shillito and George Herbert.

Shillito was a partner in the business and was an Alderman on the Ipswich Council from 1916 to 1924.

He was the President of the Ipswich Hospital Board of Management from 1911 to 1913.

Shillitos had their premises at the corner of Limestone and East streets.

This was destroyed by fire in 1903 but re-erected before later moving to West Ipswich.

Shillitos was the first private firm in Queensland commissioned to manufacture railway wagons.

Members of the community with photographs, documents or home movies of Ipswich, whether sporting photos, leisure, families, businesses, houses, anything that gives a snapshot of the Ipswich of the past or today, can contact the Ipswich Libraries’ Digital Archivist on 3810 7272 or email [email protected]

The photographs are scanned and returned.

To view the almost 12,000 photographs on the Picture Ipswich website go to http://picture.ipswich.qld.gov.au