Cobb+Co Museum

Fast facts

  • Cobb+Co Museum opened as the Toowoomba campus of the QueenslandMuseum in 1987 on the site of the old Toowoomba Showgrounds.
  • Cobb+Co Museum now houses the National Carriage Collection of nearly 50 horse-drawn vehicles including 28 from the original Collection of Mr. W.R.F. Bolton.
  • In 2001, Stage Two of the Museum was developed in conjunction with the local community to provide displays on the cultural heritage and natural environment of the Darling Downs. Funded as part of the Queensland Heritage Trails Network the expansion includeda children’s activity centre, The Coach Stop, Binangar Indigenous Centre, temporary exhibition space and Toowoomba Gallery.
  • The opening of Stage Two was also the beginning of an innovative initiative with the then Toowoomba City Council to provide free access for all local residents. This has since been expanded to include all residents of the amalgamated Toowoomba Regional Council.
  • Stage Three of the Cobb+Co Museum development opened in September 2010. It included the redevelopment of the National Carriage Gallery and the National Carriage Factory Development. The Factory is a custom built facility designed to showcase heritage trades and skills.
  • The redevelopment was recently awarded the 2011 FDG Stanley award for Public Architecture by the Queensland Chapter of the Australian Architects’ Institute.
  • The Museum’s popular heritage workshops program is conducted in the new custom-built Factory space. Workshops are conducted in skills, trades and crafts including blacksmithing, millinery, silversmithing, sandstone sculpture and leadlighting.
  • Cobb+Co Museum conducts its popular annual Have A Go festival every Sunday in February. Visitors of all ages have the opportunity to watch and try a range of trades, skills and crafts.
  • More than 500,000 people have visited Cobb+Co Museum since it opened nearly 25 years ago in 1987.
  • QueenslandMuseum’s Regional Services program is also based at Cobb+Co Museum, along with a Museum Development Officer whoprovides assistance and advice to local collecting organisations regarding significance assessment and the development of displays.
  • Cobb+Co Museum is also a distribution point for the Queensland Museum loan kits which provides a range of outreach services for local nursing homes and educational facilities.

Collection

  • There are 47 vehicles on display including the originalW.R.F Bolton Collection of 28 horse-drawn vehicles.
  • Bill Bolton ran a bus and trucking company called Cobb & Co. Transport until his death in 1973. He also collected old Cobb & Co. coaches and other horse drawn vehicles for his private museum which opened in 1965.
  • Ferguson's coachworks in Russell Street Toowoomba restored many of the coaches, carriages and wagons in the Museum.
  • Bill Bolton also collected a vast array of archival material. This included interviews of old Cobb & Co. employees.
  • A fire ravaged the private museum in 1981. The collection was then donated to the QueenslandMuseumby Banks Pty. Ltd. in June 1982.
  • The collection includes three Cobb+Co Coaches including one that operated out of Charleville and was later used as a drovers wagon by Hart’s, the all Aboriginal droving team.
  • Also on display, but not part of the Cobb+Co Museum collection is the “White Coach” which is on loan from the National Museum of Australia and is believed to be the coach that travelled the last Cobb & Co trip from Yuleba to Surat in 1924.
  • Harkaway, on display at the Museum is a 140 year old wooden horse that is believed to have been displayed at the Paris Exhibition of 1889. He stood outside Ferguson’s Coachworks in Russell Street for many years, and is considered a Toowoomba icon. Col Ferguson was the last coachbuilder in Toowoomba andhe worked at his trade until the late 1970s. Col restored many of the horse-drawn vehicles in our collection. In the mid 90s Harkaway was to be sold and exported overseas. The Toowoomba community rallied together to help the Museum save the horse. Harkaway was then conserved by the Queensland Museum.

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