Stanthorpe historian embarks on a new book

Following the complete sell-out of his book Misty Mountain: Stanthorpe through time, local historian Rod Adams is now embarking on another work, this time linking a famous Australian family with Stanthorpe and surrounding areas.
Mr Adams said he was totally delighted with the acceptance he received from Misty Mountain, and it was from this response that his new work was born.
Misty Mountain was launched at the Art Gallery in Stanthorpe in February 2008 and has sold out in little over three years.
The family he is now retracing is that of the Chauvels, whose most prominent association with Stanthorpe itself is the house “El Arish”.
This is a heritage listed home, which was built by the wife of one of that family, between the first and second World Wars.
Other members of it, however, have ties stretching from Tabulam in northern New South Wales to a property near Harrisville and another near Killarney, a link with Glenlyon station; another property near Texas, a business in Texas itself, and yet another small house in Stanthorpe.
There is also a special relation in Stanthorpe due to the founding of the area’s first crèche by the much-loved Jean Chauvel, prior to her death in Toowoomba in 2004.
Mr Adams’ new work (as yet unnamed) will be the biggest undertaking he has yet attempted and the research for it is substantial.
To assist him in this, he approached the Southern Downs Regional Council’s Regional Arts Development Fund (RADF) committee for a financial grant and was delighted to have received approval for $4000, which enabled him to visit such far flung venues as the Charles Sturt University archives in Wagga Wagga, the Australian War Memorial in Canberra, Corryong, the Puckapunyal Army Base, Chauvel family members in Melbourne and Fremantle, and archive resources in Broken Hill and nearby Silverton.
Much correlating of material has yet to be completed by Mr Adams before the book makes its appearance but he is greatly looking forward to the challenge of it all.
He said this would be his fourth book, with his first two works on Noosa.