Good to see that the late historian , journalist , author , publisher -Glenville Pike- is still remembered in North Queensland , while he appears to have been completely forgotten in the Northern Territory where he, his mother and aunt (actually his mother’s cousin) lived for years. They ran the Emerald Springs Roadhouse , near Pine Creek, also lived at the 23- mile south of Darwin , and Glenville started the North Australian Monthly magazine , painted Territory scenes, produced Christmas cards and published a variety of books about the NT. An early book on NT history was printed at the NT News in Darwin in the l950s.
Some of his books are on sale at the must see Museum of Tropical North Queensland in Townsville and the North Queensland Register reruns his popular Round the Campfire by Sundowner column which he wrote for decades. The insert of Pike above shows him in his book filled Mareeba , NQ , office with a trunk containing all the items he had written or edited and had published for others. The Northern Sun , one of a number of publications he started , is still going , run by a close friend , Reg Starkey.
Glenville amassed a large collection of North Australian photographs, now in the Cairns Historical Society. Over the years he had many dealings with journalists, editors and publishers and produced and wrote books about Australian history and pioneers when local publishers were not interested in the subjects. A popular book of his is Queensland Frontier ; he also wrote about various parts of the last frontier in the North. A German woman who moved to North Queensland said Pike’s books were wonderful and made her realise what an astonishing country she had come to after reading his accounts of the early days in the North . (Graphic and text - Peter Simon . )
