Ravenshoe Queensland |
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Ravenshoe Town Hall
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Coordinates | 17°36′33″S 145°29′01″E / 17.60917°S 145.48361°ECoordinates: 17°36′33″S 145°29′01″E / 17.60917°S 145.48361°E | ||||||||||||
Population | 860 (2011 census) | ||||||||||||
Postcode(s) | 4888 | ||||||||||||
Elevation | 930 m (3,051 ft) | ||||||||||||
Location | |||||||||||||
LGA(s) | Tablelands Region | ||||||||||||
State electorate(s) | Dalrymple | ||||||||||||
Federal Division(s) | Kennedy | ||||||||||||
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Ravenshoe (/ˈreɪvənz.hoʊ/ RAY-vənz-hoh) is a town and locality in the Tablelands Region, Queensland, Australia. At the 2011 census, the town of Ravenshoe had a population of 860. This figure refers to the immediate township area only. The locality has a population of 1,442.
Ravenshoe is on the Atherton Tableland in Far North Queensland. It is located 123 kilometres (76 mi) south west of the regional centre, Cairns.
At 930 metres (3,050 ft) above sea level, Ravenshoe is the highest town in Queensland, with Queensland's highest pub "The Ravenshoe Hotel" (formerly the Tully Falls Hotel until 2014) and highest railway station. It also has the Millstream Falls, the widest waterfall in Australia. Traditionally the main industry in Ravenshoe was timber, but since 1987, when the government made 900,000 hectares (2,200,000 acres) of surrounding rainforest world heritage listed, the main industries have been tourism, beef and dairy farming.
The traditional owners of the land in the Ravenshoe district are the Jirrbal people who speak a dialect of the Dyirbal language. The site of the present day Ravenshoe was first settled by pastoralists prior to 1881 but when stands of red cedar (Toona ciliata) trees were found at nearby Cedar Creek, the mining entrepreneur, John Moffat purchased the pastoral properties in 1897. A village called Cedar Creek was established. By 1910, the nearby mining town of Herberton has been connected by railway to Cairns and Cedar Creek had been renamed Ravenshoe. The name is supposed to have been chosen because a copy of Henry Kingsley's novel Ravenshoe was found discarded nearby.