The train that changed the Murchison.

The first railway arrival was treated as one of the great civic events in Cue's early history. A special train carried invited guests north, while a crowd of around 1,500 people gathered in Cue to welcome the new connection.

Among the locomotives associated with the opening were engines carrying the names Day Dawn and Murchison — names that made the railway unmistakably local to the goldfields it had come to serve.

For miners and merchants, rail dramatically reduced the difficulty and cost of moving heavy supplies into a remote district that had previously depended heavily on teams and camel transport.

The station sat at the edge of a booming town.

This early view shows the station in its original railway landscape, with sidings, rolling stock and the growing township behind it.

Today the rails have disappeared from the Cue townsite, but the station building and platform remain in almost the same elevated position — giving visitors a rare chance to compare the modern town with a view taken more than a century ago.

Even Cue's earliest graves had to make way.

Some of Cue's first burials had taken place around what later became the Railway Street and Town Oval area. As the railway reserve developed, the graves conflicted with the new infrastructure.

In November 1898, ten known graves were exhumed and reinterred at the Pioneer Cemetery near Cue Hill so railway development could proceed.

Then the railway pushed west toward Big Bell.

The development of Big Bell in the 1930s brought another major railway project to Cue. Construction of the spur line began during the renewed mining boom, linking the purpose-built mining town and its mine back to the main railway at Cue.

The surviving construction photograph records the hard physical work of building the line across open Murchison country. The branch later opened in 1938 and operated until the mid-1950s.

The trains are gone. The people are not.

The former station is now part of the Cue Sports Oval precinct and home to the Cue Youth Centre. A building created to connect the district with the outside world has found a new role connecting local young people and the wider community.

The long railway platform is still used as a spectator area during sporting occasions and community celebrations. Instead of passengers waiting for trains, it now fills with people watching football, fireworks and events on the oval.

That continued use is part of what makes the station special: it is not simply a heritage building preserved behind a fence. It remains part of everyday Cue.

Old Cemetery

Discover why ten of Cue's earliest graves were moved when the railway reserve expanded.

Big Bell

Follow the story of the spur line to one of Australia's most fascinating abandoned mining towns.

48 Hours in Cue

Include the station in a two-day journey through Cue's heritage, mining towns and surrounding country.