All monthly meetings are held at the Wynnum Ambulance Museum Auditorium, Cnr Tingal Road & Cedar Street, Wynnum (entry is via Cedar Street) on the third Thursday evening of each month (except January and December).

​

Meetings commence at 7.00pm and conclude around 9pm with tea and coffee. Interesting speakers attend each meeting and there is a raffle and a door prize on offer as well as our bring and buy table. The meetings are open to members and visitors. Cost of attendance is a gold coin donation. Visitors are always welcome.

​

February 19 2026 Bruce Pattison will talk about the history of the Waterloo Bay Rescue Association and their rescue boat The Dauntless. Bruce is a long-term resident of Wynnum. He attended Wynnum Central State School and Wynnum High School. Leaving school at 14, he worked at Forsyth Rope Works in Mowbray Park. Called up for National service in 1966, he served for two years as an army seaman in Vietnam and PNG. Involved with boating all his life, he is a life member and patron of the Darling Point Sailing Squadron. He served as a crew member and as a skipper on the rescue boat Dauntless.

​

March 19 2026 Dr Ian Patterson "History of St Helena Island". St Helena Island National Park is a heritage listed island in Moreton Bay, situated off the coast of Wynnum and Manly that has a rich history that includes its transformation from a quarantine station to a penal settlement between 1867 and 1921, to a heritage listed national park in 1992. Ian will look at the early history of the penal settlement when it was regarded as a model prison, to its decline in 1921 when it was reclassified as a prison farm and its eventual closure in 1932. He will also look at the history of several prisoners who were incarcerated at St Helena as a result of the Australian Shearers Strike of 1891.

​Ian Patterson PhD was an Associate Professor in the School of Business (Tourism) at the University of Queensland, St Lucia Campus, Queensland between 2001 and 2015.  Previously he worked as a Senior Lecturer at Griffith University between 1991-2000. He has published over 100 publications in textbooks, book chapters and peer reviewed journal papers. Co-Editor, Annals of Leisure Research Journal, 2004-2011; Life Membership Australian and New Zealand Association for Leisure Studies (ANZALS) 2015.

​

April 16 2026 Alan Beswick "Those Old Photos". Alan will discuss photographic history. Ever wondered how those old time photos were taken? Certainly not on a smart phone. Their history is littered with dead photographers, dead from mercury or cyanide poisoning. Thankfully, the chemicals used today are now far less toxic. How about point and click? It took five or six decades for the box camera to become a reality, but the highest quality images still required specialist exposure, developing and printing. Join Alan on a fascinating trip through photographic history and the development of cameras, from the huge and cumbersome plate cameras to the super capable camera you have in your pocket.

Alan developed his first photo when he joined the photo club at Brisbane State High in 1961. A combination of art and chemistry appealed to the teenager and it has never left him. In later life, he took to science with post grad qualifications in remote sensing, the very technical manipulation of photos taken from space using satellites. He has given several courses on photography through U3A, always with one eye on the science and the other looking through the viewfinder.On the artistic side, Alan joined the Mt Gravatt Photographic Society, where he rose through the competition ranks to A Grade. With MGPS’s encouragement, he has had several images exhibited in international competitions, but has yet to win a prize at the Ekka.

​

May 21 2026  Chris Seymour. "History of Wynnum to 1925". October 1st 2025 marked the centenary of the formation of the Brisbane City Council - the largest local government area by population in Australia. Prior to the amalgamation

Wynnum Town covered present day Wynnum, Manly and Lota and had its own council and mayor. Chris will discuss significant events in the history of the town. Chris is a mining engineer with experience in Africa, Chile, Australia and the US, and has an interest in local history. He has written the Wynnum chapter of a forthcoming book about the 20 local goverment areas that became Brisbane City Council. He is a Fellow of the Australasian Institute of Mining and Metallurgy.

​