This book provides a comprehensive environmental history of how Australia's rainforests developed, the influence of Aborigines and pioneers, farmers and loggers, and of efforts to protect rainforests to help us better understand current issues and debates surrounding their conservation and use.

Warwick Frost is Professor of Tourism, Heritage and the Media at La Trobe University, Melbourne, Australia. His research interests include environmental history, comparative economic history and the history of national parks and zoos.

1. Fire and Rain: Rainforests, Settler Societies and Frontiers


2. From Regenwald to Rainforest: Changing Terminology and Meanings


3. Gondwanan, Aboriginal or European Rainforests? The Evolution and Distribution of Rainforests


4. European Settlement of Australia's Wet Frontier, 1788-1914


5. Clearing the Rainforests: Techniques, Origins and Challenges


6. The Environmental Impact of Clearing: Regrowth, Pests and Secondary Clearance


7. Butter (and Sugar): The Search for a Sustainable Staple


8. Chinese and Pacific Islanders: The White Frontier and the Other, 1880-1920


9. 'My Love Is Otherwise': The Fascination with Rainforests, 1820-1914


10. Forest Conservation, Water Supply and Transport: Tensions between Governments and Farmers


11. Rainforest National Parks and Scenic Reserves: Origins, Developments and International Comparisons, 1872-1928


12. The Lamington Plateau: The World's First Large Rainforest National Park


13. Australia Unlimited? Conflicting Visions of Farming, Forestry and Conservation in Uncertain Times, 1918-1939


14. Afterword: 1939 and Beyond

Appendix A: The Making of The Land of the Lyre Bird

Appendix B: Common and Scientific Names of Plants