EIGHTIETH BIRTHDAY.

Auckland Star, Volume LVII, Issue 158, 6 July 1926, Page 5

EIGHTIETH BIRTHDAY.

! THE BRISBANE COURIER" : — HISTORICAL FIRST NUMBER. Tuesday. Juno 22. wac the eightieth anniversary of tli* foundation of the -Brisbane Courier. ,- .-ne of the foremost or Australia* daily journals, which from humble be.ginnir.g-i lias grown to great importance, hand in hiuid with the development of Queensland, wlii.h is no- . tentially the richest -tat.? in the C.fmimonwealth. The •■Courier" is thus five years older than Xew Zealand's oldest i newspaper, tho "Lvttelton Time;." which ; was established in lSol. ! With the birthday number of the "Courier" i> reproduced a copy of its first i«sue. under the title <>f the "Moreton Bay Courier," which was Drinted on a ■Saturday in June. IS4«. It is a. small. four-paged publication, the first paiae being cw-vupied with advertising, and the I remainder with news. The editor in his I leading article >ay- : "We commence our labour- at a crisis highly interesting an.l important. Our home and colonial dynasties are happily changed. The weight of tyranny, misrepresentation and neglect under which the colonists have long, bitterly and unceasingly complained, i> about to !>e removed." i There was even then much controversyI over the land question, and the "Courier' , refers to x'h-e lands administration in the vigorous language of the day: "The land fund. too. is withheld from the control of the people's representative*. We have the mortification of seeing this highly important branch of revenue squandered by a herd of overpaid official drones, in a manner that too plainlr bespeaks them ignorant of our wants ar.,l careless of our welfare." Demands are made for adequate representation—"the concession of the franchise to stock owners and others .with capital invested in the soil" —district councils, national education, the provision of a regular siipplv of labour, etc The news columns contain reports of the annual meetinz of the Moreton Bay Racing Club, in which nine race* were run: the alarming illne*-: of >ir George Oibb>. Governor of Xew South Wales (of which Queensland was then a parti: the Leichhardt exploration expedition: the opening of saw and riour mills, the expedition cf Sir Thomas Mitchell: the expected arrival of the new Governor. Sir Charles Fitzroy: the cultivation ot pineapples isold at a guinea a pain : an abstract of a. speech by Sir Robert Peel ion tarirf reform: something about the discussion of the Munroe Doctrine in the U.S. Congress: the decree of the King of Bavaria, refusing Christian burial to persons killed in duels: and a short account of several battles in India, in which the British force* gained "gloriou* victories." The commemoration number just to hand has a news section of '20 pages and a supplement of 24 pages. Among: the messages of congratulation received by the proprietors of the "Courier" was the following from the Prime Minister of the Commonwealth. Mr S. M. Bruce: "The "Courier" has earned a foremost place in the ranks of Australian journals for its steadfast loyalty to British ideals, its honesty of purpose: its feanlessnes.s, and the service it has rendered, and is rendering to the State of Queensland and to Australia by its contributions to the formation of public opinion on the greatest questions of the day."