West End is an inner southern suburb in the City of Brisbane, Queensland, Australia. In the 2021 census, West End had a population of 14,730 people.
The Aboriginal name for the area is Kurilpa, which means place of the water rat.
Before the arrival of Europeans in West End, there was an important habitual Aboriginal camp in the area around the upper part of Musgrave Park where Brisbane State High School now stands. Boundary Street in West End and in Spring Hill were named as along with Vulture Street and Wellington Road, they formed the original boundary of the Town of Brisbane. Later, when Brisbane grew out to these boundaries, police prevented the Jagera and Turrbal peoples from being within the boundaries of the British settlement at night and on Sundays. It has been questioned whether the actions of the police were legally sanctioned or not.
The entire riverbank in the West End area was covered with impenetrable rain forest. This was described as a "tangled mass of trees, vines, flowering creepers, staghorns, elkhorns, towering scrub palms, giant ferns, and hundreds of other varieties of the fern family, beautiful and rare orchids, and the wild passion flower". Along the river bank itself were sandy beaches, water lilies in thousands and dangling convolvulus.
Bush rats or fawn-footed melomys existed in large numbers in the rain forest and were hunted by driving them into nets. They were roasted and eaten by women only. They featured in various dreaming tales and tribal lore. The Aboriginal place name of Kurilpa derives from the name Kureel-pa meaning place of water rats. The name is still used for various local places, buildings and institutions in West End and South Brisbane area, e.g. West End was located in the former Electoral District of Kurilpa.
West End was named by early British settlers after the West End of London.
European settlers took advantage of the fertile soil to establish farms and orchards. There were strawberry farms where for an entry fee, visitors could eat all they wanted. A creek ran down from the Dornoch Terrace area into a reservoir at the corner of Melbourne and Manning streets from where water was sold. After heavy rain, this creek caused local flooding in West End. There was a spring near the site of the Boundary Hotel which was used by residents from the south side of Brisbane to collect water with long queues forming in dry periods.
A Primitive Methodist Church opened in Hill End in October 1873.
On 16 August 1875, three schools opened: West End Boys State School, West End Girls State School and West End Infants State School, with a total of 236 pupils. On 30 June 1936, the boys' and girls' schools were merged creating West End State School. The infants' school was merged into West End State School on 16 December 1994. The school was built on a 5-acre (2.0 ha) site originally set aside to be a cemetery. However, no burials were conducted there as the much larger South Brisbane Cemetery was established in Dutton Park in 1868.
In February 1879, the Brighton Road Congregational Church was completed. It was designed by architect John R. Hall and built by Mr E. Lewis from hardwood and chamferboard. It was 50 by 30 feet (15.2 by 9.1 m) with a Gothic roof made of shingles. It had a 10-by-10-foot (3.0 by 3.0 m) vestry, an ornamental porch and bell turret. The church closed on 21 May 1972. It was on the north-west corner of Brighton Road and Sussex Street (27°28′59″S 153°00′43″E / 27.483176°S 153.012°E). The church building is no longer extant. Tangara retirement village operated by Blue Care opened on the site in October 1980.
In the 1880s, there was industrial development along Montague Road, including the South Brisbane Gas Works, sawmills and a steam joinery.
The farms and orchards were steadily subdivided into suburban allotments which were popular due to the proximity of West End to the city, the river breezes and improving public transport.
West End Wesleyan Methodist Church opened in Vulture Street in 1884. It was designed by Alexander Brown Wilson. It was built from brick at a cost of £2850 and could seat 550 people. Following the amalgamation that created the Uniting Church of Australia in 1977, it became West End Uniting Church. It is listed on the Brisbane Heritage Register.
West End was one of the first suburbs of Brisbane to be serviced by a tram line, being opened in 1885. Initially the tram was horse-drawn and terminated in Boundary Street, but in 1897 the line was electrified and extended to the corner of Hardgrave Road and Hoogley Street, via Vulture Street. It was subsequently extended down Hoogley Street to the ferry terminus at the end of Hoogley Street in 1925. The tram line closed on 13 April 1969.
St Peter's Anglican Church was dedicated on 11 September 1888 by Archdeacon Nathaniel Dawes. The church was 58 by 31 feet (17.7 by 9.4 m) and made of Oregon pine with a shingle roof. It was designed by H. W. Martin and could seat 175 people. The church was at 18 Mitchell Street (27°29′10″S 153°00′19″E / 27.48603°S 153.00526°E). Its closure on 24 April 1995 was approved by Archbishop Peter Hollingworth. As September 2022, the church building was being used as a childcare centre. It is listed on the Brisbane Heritage Register.
The riverside area of West End was badly flooded during the 1893 Brisbane flood.
The West End Library opened in 1925.
The foundation stone for St Francis of Assisi Catholic Church was laid on 10 June 1923 by the Apostolic Delegate, Monsignor Bartolomeo Cattaneo. On 26 November 1923, it was opened and blessed by Archbishop James Duhig. It was quickly realised that the site would not be large enough to build a school, so, in 1926, an 8-acre (3.2 ha) site immediately across Dornoch Terrace from the church was purchased and the church building relocated to the new site (now 47-59 Dornoch Terrace). On 22 January 1928, St Francis' Catholic Primary School opened adjacent to the church by Archbishop Duhig; the school was operated by the Sisters of Mercy with 113 students on the opening day. In 1928, a convent and a presbytery were also built on the larger site. The school closed in 1974 due to the changing demographics of the area.
The former Tristram's Drink Factory at 79 Boundary Street was built in 1928 and is one of Australia's best examples of the Mission Revival Style architecture. It was converted into a market in the 1990s and remains a heritage landmark of West End.
The Dornoch Terrace Bridge was completed in 1941, replacing an older bridge across Boundary Street built in 1888. The 1941 bridge was a precursor to a new bridge across the Brisbane River to the University of Queensland, which was never built. The 2017 University of Queensland Master Plan is still calling for a bridge from West End.
Christian Outreach College opened on 16 May 1978 in Kurilpa Street, West End. It relocated to Mansfield in 1928, but is now within the suburb boundaries of Carindale in 1982. It is now known as Citepointe Christian College.
In 1988, the Brisbane School of Distance Education was established at 405 Montague Road. It was the amalgamation of the Primary Correspondence School (opened on 24 January 1922), the Secondary Correspondence School (opened in 1958) and the Preschool Correspondence (opened in 1974). It relocated to Coorparoo in 2011.
Scenes for the feature film Jucy (2010) were shot at the now-defunct video store Trash Video in the suburb.
The suburb was affected by the 2010–2011 Queensland floods as the Brisbane River broke its banks. From 11 January low-lying areas of the suburb and other places in Brisbane were evacuated.
In the 2011 census, West End had a population of 8,061 people; 50% male (4,029 males) and 50% female (4,032 females). Just over half (52.4%) of households were family households, 34.6% were single person households and 13.1% were group households. The median age of the West End population was 35 years, 2 years below the Australian median. Children aged under 15 years made up 11.5% of the population and people aged 65 years and over made up 8.8% of the population. The suburb has traditionally been home to Brisbane's largest Greek Australian community, with an estimated 75% of Brisbane's Greek population living in West End by 1980. The most common ancestries in West End are English 20.6%, Australian 16.8%, Irish 10.1%, Scottish 8.0% and Greek 5.2%. Indigenous Australians make up 1.5% of the population of West End. For this reason, West End has been described as one of Brisbane's most successful multicultural areas. 56.6% of people living in West End were born in Australia, compared to the national average of 69.8%. The other top responses for country of birth were England 4.5%, New Zealand 3.4%, Vietnam 2.7%, Greece 2.7% and India 1.4%. 66.4% of people spoke only English at home; the next most popular languages were Greek 5.9%, Vietnamese 3.3%, Mandarin 2.0%, Cantonese 1.4% and Spanish 1.1%. The most common religious affiliation was "No Religion" (35.3%); the next most common responses were Catholic 16.5%, Anglican 8.1%, Eastern Orthodox 7.4% and Buddhism 5.2%.
In the 2016 census, West End had a population of 9,474 people.
In the 2021 census, West End had a population of 14,730 people.
History info courtesy of Wikipedia
