Mackay, Queensland

Uncommon card · No. 181232

Mackay ( mə-KYE) is a city in the Mackay Region on the eastern or Coral Sea coast of Queensland, Australia. It is located about 803 kilometres (499 mi) north of Brisbane, on the Pioneer River. Mackay is described as being in either Central Queensland or North Queensland, as these regions are not precisely defined. More generally, the area is known as the Mackay–Whitsunday Region. Nicknames of Mackay include the Sugar capital, Alexandra and Macktown. Founded in 1862 on land traditionally owned by the Yuwibara (Yuibera) Indigenous people, the settlement was originally known as Alexandra, in honour of Princess Alexandra of Denmark, and was later renamed Mackay after John Mackay. Sugar became the economic foundation of the city, with plantations using indentured or enslaved South Sea Islanders. From about 1891, Mediterranean migrants from Italy and Malta began to work the sugarcane plantations, and by the 1930s one third of Australia's Italian migrants lived in North Queensland. The city was...

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