The Indispensable Goat Queensland Pioneers and their Goat by Errol Beutel and Faye Schutt CQU Press RRP $25.95 http://www.outbackbooks.com/ By David Myers, Publisher, CQU Press.

Nowadays we tend to hear only bad news about the menace of feral goats. But from the 1870s to the 1960s it was a totally different story. As the pioneers and settlers made their historic treks to the furthermost corners of the outback, they were always accompanied by herds of goats. Goats provided the fresh milk and meat that ensured survival in the harsh interior. As the settlement towns grew on the frontiers in the north and the west, so too did each town’s resident herd of goats.

Goats became inextricably linked with the daily rituals of country life. They became much loved family pets and sometimes much hated community pests. They were adventurous, curious, invasive and indomitable. They took over school verandahs and playgrounds. Harnessed to home-made goat carts, they were children’s loyal workmates, hauling water and wood for the family. Harnessed to speedy gigs with child jockeys they became the celebrated racing and jumping champions of a whole state.

The Indispensable Goat gives an entirely new perspective on what it was like in daily life to pioneer and settle the outback. Hundreds of people from every corner of the Queensland outback remember the goats of their childhood with undying love. Through their goats they are in fact telling us the social history of our pioneers. Nowadays goat breeders proudly display their pedigree taanen, angora and kashmiri champions every year at the Ekka.

I learned a lot from this book, which is a research project of the Queensland Museum. For example, I learned that although Rockhampton never quite succeeded in its alarming bid to become the capital of Queensland, it did become the undisputed goat-cart racing capital of the world in the 1920s and 1930s. Most of all, this goat-book takes us back to the era of our pioneers before the advent of industrialisation, rapid transport and mass distribution of commercial goods. This was the age of ‘making do’ for the pioneers of the outback and the milk and cheese of the Nanny and the working ability of the Billy were vital to this era.

This substantial text is broken up into bite-size pieces which allow readers to dip in here and there, especially to sections dealing with their own special region in Queensland. It is amazing just how many different regions feature in these stories: they range from Brisbane in the 1890s, Rockhampton, Townsville, Charters Towers, Cairns, Toowoomba, Charleville, St George and Quilpie to Longreach, Winton, Mt Isa, Cloncurry and Hughenden, to name just a few places.

In all of these places the ubiquitous, indispensable goat flourished and provided a service without which the far-flung frontlines of pioneering settlement of the outback could never have been achieved. This book is a rattling good read and has a unique perspective on our heritage.

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