HistoryPin

Cunnamulla is a town full of history. As such it was easy to inspire library staff to appreciate the scope of what the UK based HistoryPin can do. With the core concept being as simple as loading photos (historic and contemporary) and "pinning" the geographic location, it really is pretty easy to use. Colleagues had posted some historic images from our SLQ collections. We then tried to match contemporary views of the same historic point of interest in Cunnamulla - and if the site was no longer recognisable added contemporary images of other points of interest instead. The old to new idea is fun and actually allows for a "fade in" overlay mechanism so that the years disappear before your eyes. Pretty neat really. We went on an afternoon excursion, everyone walking around town with their iPads at the ready to take photos and "pin" away. Much to the amusement of local townspeople. Even some of the local kids stopped to see what we were doing....the sight of the "oldies" using iPads was too good to pass up...."what you doing with iPads Miss?" So, tally for the afternoon was to capture contemporary views of the ambulance building, the Invincible Theatre and the Cunnamulla fountain as overlays of historic images. In addition we pinned the Paroo Shire Council building (funnily enough this appears on the main Cunnamulla post card), the now derelict Trappers Inn which is an historic hotel and the old RSL Cub. Currently for sale if anyone has disposable funds and wants to look at redeveloping the site. A solid brick building on a corner site it could again become a key destination in the community.