Coote, William

COOTE, William jnr (1823-1898) was born in Bethnall Green, London, the son of a shopkeeper “gentleman” of the same name, and Sarah Frances Hanran. He trained under the architect CR Cockerell (1788–1863), and as an articled pupil of the London engineer CB Vignoles (1793–1875). Under Vignoles Coote gained some experience in railway engineering and was probably introduced to Utilitarian ideas which informed his later radicalism. In July 1849 he married Louisa Duesbury Ford in London. By 1852 Coote was in Van Diemen’s Land, where in 1854 he was declared bankrupt and imprisoned. By 1856 he had recovered and entered partnership in Hobart as Coote & EB Andrews, architects and engineers, undertaking alterations to the Royal Victoria Theatre including a new façade and internal alterations including a gallery. In 1857 the practice relocated to Ballarat where he surveyed the route for a tramway from Ballarat to Maryborough. He first came to Queensland in July 1860 ostensibly to give lectures on the Victorian gold discoveries and their contribution to colonial prosperity. Based on his Ballarat experience, Coote was invited to carry out surveys for the Moreton Bay Tramway Co. which was attempting to establish a railway from Brisbane to the Darling Downs. By 1861 Coote was the company’s general manager for which he received the handsome salary of £750. He spent six months surveying the proposed terminus at South Ipswich. Tenders were called for construction of the first 22 miles of the railway before the company failed in September 1862. Coote then fought a long and unsuccessful battle to secure fair compensation from the Government for the company’s surveys and plans, which were later used when the Government constructed its own railway.

He stayed in Queensland, in November 1862 setting up his practice as an architect and civil engineer in the former offices of the Tramway Co. Coote soon presented himself as a learned and progressive member of his profession by giving a series of lectures at the South Brisbane Mechanic’s Institute, of which he was a founder in 1860 and vice-president in 1862. He also lectured to the Brisbane School of Arts, and the Queensland Philosophical (later Royal) Society. Coote, a fluent speaker and “a perfect polyglot of learning”, covered such topics as sewerage and sanitation, railways, and domestic architecture for the tropics – or, as he titled a lecture in 1860, “New homes for a new country”. Alderman George Edmondstone invited Coote to prepare plans for a Town Hall for Brisbane, but other members of the Municipal Council protested that the building should have been thrown open to competition. Accordingly, a competition was held, and in October 1863 James COWLISHAW and Thomas TAYLOR were announced winners, but their design was overlooked in favour of Coote’s. The Town Hall was to end his professional career. It was anticipated as an imposing addition to Queen Street, but its merits of its design were questioned, and the project was ill-fated from the start. The original contract cost of £19,329 had to be raised by loan and posed a considerable burden on a small community. As soon as construction began there were allegations of shoddy workmanship and misuse of public money. In July 1864 Coote and the building’s contractor, John Bourne, threatened legal action against the Guardian newspaper for libel.

Newspaper reports portrayed Coote as a temperamental “genius” who was incapable of adequately supervising construction. In July 1865 there were such alarming defects apparent in the roof and walls that the Municipal Council sought the professional advice of RG SUTER and George McLAGAN on the building’s stability. In September they reported that the roof had already sunk considerably longitudinally, and that the upper walls of the large room had been thrust outwards. The principle of construction used by Coote was found to be defective for a roof with the span of the large room. Suter recommended a practical solution for the roof to be ‘patched’ rather than entirely rebuilt, by the addition of iron tie-rods, which were added in October 1865. By March 1866 the contractor was claiming payment from the Municipal Council for additional expenses due to the departures from Coote’s original design. The dispute went to arbitration in December 1866 and the contractor’s claim was upheld. Completion of the building lagged on, with further mismanagement on Coote’s part. There was a long delay in the supply of material to ornament the ceiling of the large room. When 28 cases of carton-pierre mouldings finally arrived from England upon the architect’s order, at a huge cost of £1000, they were found to be unusable. In January 1868, to dispel continued fears about the stability of the large room, the council invited 80 firemen to march in time around the room, which drew attention to another shortcoming in Coote’s design – the lack of ventilation. Benjamin BACKHOUSE, as a member of the council’s Improvement Committee, then did plans for more windows which were added in February 1868. By 1869 the building had cost more than £24,000, far in excess of the original contract. In 1870 repairs were carried out on the roof of the exchange hall, under the supervision of John HALL, to prevent further damage from leakage. Public debate about the Town Hall’s stability continued into the 1880s.

Other interests soon claimed Coote’s energy. He seems to have given up architecture by 1874 and his practice was taken over by his former assistant, GW CAMPBELL-WILSON. In October 1865 Coote became proprietor of Brisbane’s Victoria Hotel and Theatre, taking over its heavy losses when the former owner became insolvent. Under Coote’s direction the theatre lowered its prices and offered a varied theatrical and musical season but was making a loss by February 1866 when the actors offered him a benefit performance. Declared bankrupt in March 1866, Coote was later imprisoned temporarily when creditors alleged that he was hiding assets and planning to leave the colony. The hearing into his bankruptcy disclosed that his architectural practice had been confused with his other business undertakings, and that he had not kept proper financial records. Enormous debts of £2090 were proved, including a large account with Flavelle’s for personal jewellery and household silver. Clearly, he was guilty of what his creditors deemed “rash and hazardous speculations and unjustifiable extravagance in living”. Coote became increasingly preoccupied with politics and writing. He sought election to the Legislative Assembly and the Municipal Council, but after repeated defeats and even public ridicule worked more as an organiser and propagandist. A prolific and versatile correspondent of the Queensland press, Coote expressed his opposition to the Government in the Brisbane Water Works agitation of 1864 and the financial crisis of 1866. His activities displeased the Government which inquired into his Tasmanian past. He began writing his History of the Colony of Queensland and in 1868 became proprietor and editor of Our Paper, continuing to voice his independent Liberal views.

In 1870 Coote moved to his farm Salisbury, at Rocky Waterholes (now Rocklea), on the outskirts of Brisbane. On 10 October that year his wife died, but despite this loss he was busy on a new venture. Encouraged by the Native Industries and the Manufacturing Industries Acts, his silk production was so successful that Parliamentary select committees recommended a special grant for development of his farm. He produced pamphlets on sericulture and won a medal for the best exhibit of colonial silk at the London International Exhibition of 1873. When a new strain of silkworms imported from Italy proved to be diseased and decimated his stock by 1876, he had to abandon his venture. In 1876 he published the first volume of his History in The Week, and part of the second volume which was never completed. In 1882 the first volume appeared in book form, the first history of Queensland to be published. He was promoting “Atmospheric Self-Acting Gas” in 1878. In 1881 he became editor of the Observer, but soon after the paper changed hands and he lost his post. Coote, frustrated by Brisbane, accepted an invitation to take up journalism in Townsville where Separatist agitation was gaining strength. In 1885 he became organising secretary to the Northern Separation League and won such wide support that the Queensland Figaro of 13 November 1886 suggested that the proposed new northern colony be called “Cooteland”. By the time he died at Townsville on 1 October 1898 his former architectural career had been forgotten.