From 1884 when Lahey Brothers began their Sawmill in Canungra, they employed Mr Tyson as an ambulance and first aid officer when needed.
Transport to Beaudesert Hospital grew from a hand litter pulled and pushed over hills, through creeks and across flats by four men, to a horse drawn ambulance wagon purchased in 1915.
Matt Braiden was appointed as an official QATB officer (Queensland Ambulance Transport Brigade).
To accommodate his family and the ambulance, a two-story house was built in Appel Street in 1916.
The Lahey family donated the land and the house was constructed by Canungra Lahey’s Sawmill to care for its workers and the locals.
The sawmill donated the timber and townsfolk volunteered their labour. The building included doctor and dentist treatment rooms and a dispensary, and upstairs was for family accommodation.
For years Mr Braiden worked from this building, giving assistance wherever he could – especially during the outbreak of the pneumonic flu in 1919, when he visited the farming families in the valleys.
A nurse, Sister Dennis from Beaudesert, aided by Josephine and Sybil Delpratt, nursed patients in the school and at Leighton House (Leighton House was a guest house built in 1902 to house single gentlemen and distinguished guests).
In 1929, the QATB ambulance service was transferred to Beaudesert and the Canungra QATB closed.
The house was sold to a private purchaser in 1929.
In the following years several doctors took up residence in the house with a small surgery underneath, opening onto a small porch on the western side of the building.
Today the building is still privately owned and is registered as an ‘Historical Building’ with council’s Significant Heritage Buildings in Scenic Rim.
