Queensland Saints Look Back with Gratitude, Look Ahead with Faith

Members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Queensland, Australia gathered recently to remember the history of the early Australian pioneers and the first constructed meetinghouse in Australia, the Gibbon Street chapel. During the evening, they also watched a new documentary, “The Legacy of Gibbon Street: The History of the early Latter-day Saints in Brisbane.”

Heather Hutchinson Dodd, who affectionately calls herself a Gibbon Streeter, said, “We need to look back to our past because it is our past that often forms our future.”

The first congregation of the Church of Jesus Christ in Brisbane was formed on 30 August 1896, only a few years after the first missionaries arrived in Brisbane. The handful of saints gathered in rented halls for their Sunday meetings.

By the turn of the century membership had grown to 130, so property was obtained in 1904 to build a chapel. Construction began in late September and was completed on 3 December 1904. The first meeting in the new Gibbon Street chapel was held the very next day.

For the next 54 years the building was the centre piece of the Church in Brisbane. The baptismal font was the only one is Queensland, so families came from all over the state to be baptised.

 The Camp Hill building was completed in 1957, and the last meeting held in the Gibbon Street chapel was 3 August 1958, the end of an era.

Members who attended for years said that while the building was quite ordinary, the name, Gibbon Street, inspired nostalgia for all who met there. There was a sense of community and kinship among the early saints.

In June 2003, the Brisbane temple was dedicated at Kangaroo Point. The temple can be seen as a lasting testament to the Gibbon Street pioneers. The documentary closes with the appropriate tribute, “They built it well to the glory of their God.”