Real Estate Maps
State Library of Queensland

Explanatory Information
Original maps and plans created by real estate firms from 1850s to mid 1900s from State Library of Queensland collection collections. 
 
The first version of this dataset includes descriptive information and links for 165 digitised maps. The February 2018 version includes descriptions, geographic coordinates and links for 798 digitised maps. The September 2024 version includes descriptions, geographic coordinates and links for 1259 digitised maps. 
 
Estate maps can give information about land subdivisions, including how the land was subdivided, when it was first auctioned, who the surveyors were and who sold the land. They are useful for investigating the history of urban land areas. 
 
The maps are predominantly from Brisbane but also cover some regional areas of Queensland such as the Gold and Sunshine Coasts. 

Additional information about this collection is available at: https://www.slq.qld.gov.au/blog/real-estate-map-collection-treasure-collection-john-oxley-library 
 
Also available in State Library’s library catalogue http://onesearch.slq.qld.gov.au 
 
Explore State Library’s events, programs and services at https://slq.qld.gov.au 

About this dataset
The data is provided in a comma separated values (CSV) file. The file can be opened as a text file, or in spreadsheet software such as Microsoft Excel. Please note that if you are using Excel, it is best to use the Text Import Wizard and import all columns as ‘text’ rather than ‘general’ format. This will prevent Excel making changes to numbers or dates in the file.

This file includes geographic coordinates and can be viewed on the Australian Government National Map: nationalmap.gov.au

The dataset has the following fields:

Title
This text field shows the name of the map, for example “Rosewood Estate”. Some of the titles include suburb or locality names, for example “Abermain Estate, Tivoli, Ipswich”

Description
This text field shows further information about the map. It may include descriptive text that was printed on the map or notes added by the person cataloguing the map. An example of the description is: “Plan of allotments to be sold [9th April, 1863]. Map shows area between Rainbow Street and Eagle Terrace, Sandgate.;Map has handwritten notations, including date " 9th April 1863" and signature of R. Gailey.;Cameron and Henzell no. 444QSL”

Lat
This field shows a latitude coordinate, for example “-27.469519”.

Lon
This field shows a longitude coordinate, for example “152.987372”.

Link
This field shows a hyperlink to the digitised map image or set of images.
http://hdl.handle.net/10462/deriv/420929
http://hdl.handle.net/10462/comp/3675

ID
This field shows an identification number for a specific item, for example “9912112564702061”. These identification numbers come from the State Library’s catalogue records, and can be used to find the map in the One Search catalogue.

Please send any questions or feedback about any of the datasets released publicly by State Library to opendata@slq.qld.gov.au.