| The 1871 census recorded Maroon as having two houses with 20 people living there, so presumably the original homestead became the workers' quarters.((Collin Pfeffer, //The Fassifern Story: a history of Boonah Shire and surroundings to 1989//, Boonah Shire Council, c.1991, p.20.)) By 1880, the local council's rate book valued the buildings at £52.10.((Collin Pfeffer, //The Fassifern Story: a history of Boonah Shire and surroundings to 1989//Boonah Shire Council, c.1991, p.27.)) As with all such properties, there were quarters for the employees, stores for meat and other goods, and workshops. The local //Fassifern Guardian// described it as one of Queensland's 'most historic homesteads', with 'walls of locally dressed cedar, its impressive fireplaces of Ipswich limestone slabs and its shingle roof'.((//Fassifern Guardian//, 19 November 1947, p.1.)) Maroon by this stage was more like a small village. TLM-P's children, his grandchildren, neighbours and relatives lived there and/or visited. As well, there were employees and their families. The result, Nora wrote to Rosa in 1881, no-one could 'go around a corner ... without tumbling over a child'((Nora to Rosa, 29 October 1881)). The employees' names were not always recorded, though in his 1888 diary, TLM-P noted that he was welcomed home by "Mrs Smails and the children'.((24 August)) \\ | The 1871 census recorded Maroon as having two houses with 20 people living there, so presumably the original homestead became the workers' quarters.((Collin Pfeffer, //The Fassifern Story: a history of Boonah Shire and surroundings to 1989//, Boonah Shire Council, c.1991, p.20.)) By 1880, the local council's rate book valued the buildings at £52.10.((Collin Pfeffer, //The Fassifern Story: a history of Boonah Shire and surroundings to 1989//Boonah Shire Council, c.1991, p.27.)) As with all such properties, there were quarters for the employees, stores for meat and other goods, and workshops. The local //Fassifern Guardian// described it as one of Queensland's 'most historic homesteads', with 'walls of locally dressed cedar, its impressive fireplaces of Ipswich limestone slabs and its shingle roof'.((//Fassifern Guardian//, 19 November 1947, p.1.)) Maroon by this stage was more like a small village. TLM-P's children, his grandchildren, neighbours and relatives lived there and/or visited. As well, there were employees and their families. The result, Nora wrote to Rosa in 1881, no-one could 'go around a corner ... without tumbling over a child'((Nora to Rosa, 29 October 1881)). The employees' names were not always recorded, though in his 1888 diary, TLM-P noted that he was welcomed home by "Mrs Smails and the children'.((24 August)) \\ |
| {{:maroon_drawing_room_with_col_portrait_crop.jpeg?350|}} An undated photograph of the drawing room at Maroon.**to redo**((Provenance: T.A. & M.T. M-P)) The player piano remains in the family, along with the large painting of TLM-P's father, two of the ornamental vases on the mantelpiece, and the three swords and battleaxe hanging on the wall.((pers. comm. M.T.M-P)) Sadly the homestead was destroyed by fire in 1947, some 27 years after [[thomas_bertram_and_lizzie_m-p|Thomas B. M-P]] sold it.((//The Courier-Mail//, 14 November 1947, p.3))\\ | {{:clearer_drawing_room_thumbnail_img_2245.jpg?400|}} An undated photograph of the drawing room at Maroon.((Provenance: T.A. & M.T. M-P)) The player piano remains in the family, along with the large painting of TLM-P's father, two of the ornamental vases on the mantelpiece, and the three swords and battleaxe hanging on the wall.((pers. comm. M.T.M-P)) Sadly the homestead was destroyed by fire in 1947, some 27 years after [[thomas_bertram_and_lizzie_m-p|Thomas B. M-P]] sold it.((//The Courier-Mail//, 14 November 1947, p.3))\\ |
| In the 1860s, with governments resuming land to break up into smaller farms, landowners such as TLM-P secured their (leased) land by buying it freehold. TLM-P had been 'freeholding [i.e. converting to freehold] parts of his run, including 2560 acres on 16 November 1868 alone. In 1876 he allowed what was left of the leasehold to lapse or revert to the government.' From then on, Maroon comprised entirely of freehold land.((Angella Collyer, //Rathdowney: federation history of an Australian rural border community// Rathdowney, Qld.: Rathdowney Area Development and Historical Association, 2001 p.17.)) In his 1888 diary, TLM-P notes that 'the scrub around Mt Maroon is almost if not all taken up'.(Diary, 3 July) \\ | In the 1860s, with governments resuming land to break up into smaller farms, landowners such as TLM-P secured their (leased) land by buying it freehold. TLM-P had been 'freeholding [i.e. converting to freehold] parts of his run, including 2560 acres on 16 November 1868 alone. In 1876 he allowed what was left of the leasehold to lapse or revert to the government.' From then on, Maroon comprised entirely of freehold land.((Angella Collyer, //Rathdowney: federation history of an Australian rural border community// Rathdowney, Qld.: Rathdowney Area Development and Historical Association, 2001 p.17.)) In his 1888 diary, TLM-P notes that 'the scrub around Mt Maroon is almost if not all taken up'.(Diary, 3 July) \\ |