1847 Former Sydney Theatre Royal performer and tightrope walker George Croft opens Australia's first amphitheatre in Brisbane.

1849 Qld School of Arts founded.

1853 Aboriginal Tetaree (alias James Alexander) gives Brisbane School of Arts concert after being tutored in England.

1855 Brisbane (later Qld) Museum, right, founded.

1858 Ex-convict William Wilkes has first of seven short stories published in Moreton Bay Courier under name of Jack Bushman.

German pianist Otto Linden forms Brisbane Philharmonic Society.

1865 Musician and hotelier George Mason draws 300-400 to opening night of his Concert Hall in Brisbane (later Victoria Hall).

1871 Wandering photographer William Boag produces images of Moreton Bay region; right, his horse-drawn darkroom.

1881 Brisbane's Theatre Royal in Elizabeth St opens, designed by Andrea Stumbuco.

1882 Helen Mitchell (later Dame Nellie Melba) marries pastoralist Charles Armstrong at Brisbane's St Ann's Presbyterian Church; lives briefly near Mackay.

1888 Her Imperial Majesty's Opera House, right, opens in Queen St, Brisbane; also designed by Andrea Stumbuco.

1892 William Lane publishes The Working Man's Paradise to raise funds for shearers convicted at Rockhampton for striking over wages and contracts.