History

On 19 August 1891, the Balfour brothers - John, Charles and Robert, took up Colinton run which included the present site of the town of Linville. The Balfours originally intended to build their homestead

Homestead (buildings)

A homestead is either a single building, or collection of buildings grouped together on a large agricultural holding, such as a ranch, station or a large agricultural operation of some other designation.-See also:* Farm house* Homestead Act...

 where Linville now stands but decided to establish it instead about 10 kilometres to the south, near where Emu Creek enters the Brisbane River

Brisbane River

The Brisbane River is the longest river in south east Queensland, Australia, and flows through the city of Brisbane, before emptying into Moreton Bay. John Oxley was the first European to explore the river who named it after the Governor of New South Wales, Thomas Brisbane in 1823...

. At the 2006 census

Census in Australia

The Australian census is administered once every five years by the Australian Bureau of Statistics. The most recent census was conducted on 9 August 2011; the next will be conducted in 2016. Prior to the introduction of regular censuses in 1961, they had also been run in 1901, 1911, 1921, 1933,...

, Linville had a population of 110.

During their occupancy of Colinton the Balfours built stockyards

Feedlot

A feedlot or feedyard is a type of animal feeding operation which is used in factory farming for finishing livestock, notably beef cattle, but also swine, horses, sheep, turkeys, chickens or ducks, prior to slaughter. Large beef feedlots are called Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations . They...

 on the north bank of Greenhide Creek near its junction with the Brisbane River. The yards became known as "Nine Mile Yards". By about 1886 a small private township grew up at the spot and the Nine Mile Receiving Office opened there in 1898. The name was used up till 1901.

Surveyor E.M. Waraker laid out a town at Nine Mile and the plans of sections 2 to 7 of the town, to be known as Linton, were lodged with the Survey office on 6 December 1901. Linton was situated about one kilometre south east of where Linville now stands. Local residents wanted the name Linton, which was formed by dropping the syllable "Co" from "Colinton". The postal authorities did not favour this as there was already a place in Victoria called Linton

Linton, Victoria

Linton is a town in Victoria, Australia off Glenelg Highway. It was first settled about 1840. The town was named after a pioneer family in an area. At the 2006 census, Linton had a population of 355. The Clarkesdale Bird Sanctuary lies to the south-east of the township, near Springdallah Creek.-...

, 30 kilometres west-south-west of Ballarat

Ballarat, Victoria

Ballarat is a city in the state of Victoria, Australia, approximately west-north-west of the state capital Melbourne situated on the lower plains of the Great Dividing Range and the Yarrowee River catchment. It is the largest inland centre and third most populous city in the state and the fifth...

. A compromise was reached and at the request of residents the name of the receiving office was changed to Linville in November 1905; it became a post office in January 1910.

The same year saw the extension of the Brisbane Valley railway line to Linville from Toogoolawah

Toogoolawah, Queensland

Toogoolawah is a small town in South East Queensland, Australia. Toogoolawah is a centre for gliding and parachuting and in the past the centre of a dairying industry. Cressbrook Creek, a tributary of the Brisbane River, passes through the town as does the Brisbane Valley Highway...

. This allowed the timber industry

Logging

Logging is the cutting, skidding, on-site processing, and loading of trees or logs onto trucks.In forestry, the term logging is sometimes used in a narrow sense concerning the logistics of moving wood from the stump to somewhere outside the forest, usually a sawmill or a lumber yard...

 to develop, with a sawmill

Sawmill

A sawmill is a facility where logs are cut into boards.-Sawmill process:A sawmill's basic operation is much like those of hundreds of years ago; a log enters on one end and dimensional lumber exits on the other end....

 opening in 1912 and logging continuing to be an important industry until the 1950s when cattle

Cattle

Cattle are the most common type of large domesticated ungulates. They are a prominent modern member of the subfamily Bovinae, are the most widespread species of the genus Bos, and are most commonly classified collectively as Bos primigenius...

 grazing

Grazing

Grazing generally describes a type of feeding, in which a herbivore feeds on plants , and also on other multicellular autotrophs...

 become the predominant local industry. In 1920 some of the land was allocated to returning soldiers, some of whom setup dairy farms.