Official Opening of the 110th Lowood Show

The Honourable Shayne Newmann MP; Mr James Madden MP; our Mayor, Councillor Graeme Lehmann; other distinguished guests; ladies and gentlemen; girls and boys.

I acknowledge the Traditional Custodians of these lands, expressing respectful greetings to Elders past and present.  

It is Kaye’s and my great honour to join you all at the Lowood Show on this patently historic day.

There is some circularity to my being here.

While I was born in 1948 in Brisbane, my mother and I soon returned to Lowood – no doubt by what were then called the ‘service car’ and the railmotor. And I lived here from birth until the mid 1950s, thence Coolabunia near Kingaroy, and after that, Maryborough and Longreach.

All my memories of Lowood and the Lockyer Valley – my earliest living memories – are uniformly fond and optimistic, rekindled when as a young boy I would spend a few days at Norman and Ester Sippel’s dairy farm during school holidays.

Those memories have also been wonderfully rekindled today, as Kaye and I have moved through the Main Pavilion, viewing the farm produce, the fresh fruit and vegetables, and please, taking in the aromas of that comforting country cooking! We very much look forward shortly to viewing the Grand Parade!

This is a beautiful and vibrant part of Queensland. I have been so pleased to visit as Governor, and over these last few years I have re-met many of you wonderful citizens: we’re all a bit older now, and probably the better for that! 

I warmly congratulate past and current members of the Lowood Show Society – formerly the Loowod and Tarampa Pastoral and Agricultural Association – for ensuring the continuation of these defining Annual Shows, now in their 110th year.

I further commend the recipients of Life Memberships and Honorary Life Memberships I will shortly present.

All of you here together – committee members, award recipients, exhibitors, enthusiastic show-goers – you are all emblematic of the generous, big-hearted spirit which denotes our regions: and here distinctively today, the people of Lowood and the Brisbane and Lockyer Valleys.

It is Kaye’s and my great honour to acknowledge and support you all.

And so, fittingly, the Governor’s personal Standard can be seen flying above the Showgrounds today, indicating that the Governor is in town. Wonderful show-goers, I can assure you that he is very proud to be here!

It is now my grand privilege to declare officially open the 110th Lowood Show.