Established in 1891 as the Blackall Range’s first European settlement was taking root, Mapleton Cemetery holds the remains of pioneers, orchardists and generations of mountain families. Now a local descendant is leading a call for long-overdue restoration, and asking the community to join her.
On a quiet stretch of Delicia Road, set back from the road behind a modest timber-rail entry sign, lies one of the historically significant pieces of ground on the Blackall Range. The Mapleton Cemetery, gazetted in 1900 but receiving its first burial in 1901, is the resting place of approximately 180 people: the settlers, farmers, orchardists and community builders who gave Mapleton and Montville their character, and the generations who followed them.
For Mapleton resident Donna Klease, the cemetery is not an abstraction. She is a Smith by birth, a direct descendant of Thomas Smith, one of the two brothers who first selected land at Mapleton in 1889 and, through their orchard success and community spirit, helped transform raw scrub into a thriving hinterland village. “My father Colin Smith’s (pictured) ashes will be arriving from Dallas, Texas, with a family member for his internment in the niche wall,” Donna told the Range Community News. “Once Council finalise his plaque and paperwork, he’ll finally be coming home.”
It should be a moment of closure and of pride. Instead, Donna finds herself anxious, and embarrassed.
“My latest visit to the cemetery was quite upsetting, knowing that my father’s ashes will be interred in the mouldy, dirty niche wall,” she said. “I’m embarrassed that my overseas family, who will travel to attend his memorial, will be distressed and disappointed with his final resting place. That is not how you want to farewell your father.” “Fifteen members of my family are interred there. In the coming months, a sixteenth will join them, his ashes arriving from Dallas, Texas.”
From Scrub to Settlement: The Smith Legacy
To understand why the Mapleton Cemetery carries such weight for families like the Kleases and the Smiths, it helps to understand the role their forebears played in founding the place itself.
In 1889, brothers Thomas and William Smith, then aged twenty and twenty-one respectively, walked west from Nambour through dense vine scrub, carrying swags and searching for land suitable for fruit growing. Thomas selected a 160-acre holding at Mapleton on 15 November 1889. The pair built a slab hut with a shingle roof and flagstone floor, survived a punishing drought, and began planting citrus orchards that would soon make Mapleton a name known across Queensland’s fruit trade.
Originally known simply as ‘Blackall Range’, the district had been briefly renamed ‘Luton Vale, derived from the Luton Vale Orchard property of early settler E. H. Biggs, whose land gave its name to a postal receiving office, opened in January 1893. It was William Smith who gave the town the name it carries today, proposing ‘Mapleton’ at a settlers’ meeting in 1894.
Their father David Smith followed his sons to the range and is buried at the cemetery alongside his his second wife Margaret, who died in October 1920. David himself passed away on 7 February 1921, aged 75. Their ancestral plot, recently restored and refurbished by family members, with a clean rendered surround and protective railings is one of the most prominent memorials in the cemetery.
It was Thomas and William who, before November 1899, convened a public meeting and petitioned the Lands Commissioner for a formal cemetery reserve. The commissioner, having no record of such a reserve, called for a survey. Surveyor E. H. Lack surveyed approximately five acres of land on what was then called Delisser Road (now Delicia Road), and Cemetery Reserve 321 on Reserve 482 was gazetted in 1900. Thomas and William Smith were elected among the first trustees at a public meeting, their appointment eventually confirmed, along with Edgar Harold Jeffs, Joseph Francis Power and Frederick Lounds, as the five official trustees of the Mapleton Cemetery.
The first interment following the gazettal was Hannah Smith, Thomas and William’s grandmother, from Montville, on 17 July 1901.
A History of Patchy Upkeep
The cemetery’s administrative history has not always been smooth. By 1955 the site had fallen into a neglected state, a fierce fire had swept through the grounds, and most of the original trustees had died. Only one, the elderly Frederick Lounds, survived, and he expressed willingness to transfer trusteeship to the Maroochy Shire Council. That transfer was officially completed on 5 April 1961. Since then, the cemetery has been a council responsibility.
Yet for Donna, who has been visiting the site since childhood, the council’s stewardship, while not without effort, has not matched the heritage significance of the place. “From the 1960s, I believe not a great deal has been done,” she says. “My Great Aunt Essie Park, née Smith, visited the cemetery in the 1970s and photographs from that time show how little had changed. Over the years we’ve seen some minor improvements, mainly mowing.”
In 2012, a family member wrote to Council requesting landscaping and seating. In time, a small seated shelter, a modest water tank and a short concrete path were installed. Another community member, a Mrs Cec Stuart, separately lobbied for improved parking, the cemetery has none of its own, leaving visitors to park across Delicia Road at the Linda Garrett National Park, but that request went unanswered.
More recently, a community member proposed a clean-up of the grave sites. The task was eventually taken on by the Blackall Range Lions Club, whose efforts have been warmly appreciated. Council continues to carry out regular mowing. But for Donna, and for many others who hold connections to the site, the cumulative effect of decades of minimal investment is now painfully visible.
“When you visit other cemeteries like Kulangoor at Nambour, you understand that more could be done.”
The Niche Wall: A Centrepiece in Need of Care
The most urgent concern, in Donna’s view, is the cremation niche wall, a substantial brick structure bearing dozens of bronze memorial plaques representing community members across several generations. Positioned towards the rear of the cemetery reserve, the wall is a focal point for families gathering to remember lost loved ones.
Currently, that wall is in a condition that Donna describes plainly as mouldy and dirty. Soil and dust drifting in from an unsealed road and unfenced boundary settle across the plaques and into the brickwork. Without shelter, the wall is exposed to every season the Blackall Range can deliver.
“The niche wall needs a thorough pressure clean,” Donna says. “I would also love to see a gable-roofed structure installed over it, something in keeping with the heritage character of the cemetery. That would not only give families a dignified setting for memorial gatherings, it would protect the wall from the elements and, ultimately, save Council the expense of cleaning it as frequently.”
She also points to the need for landscaping along the fence line, specifically, the planting of flowering shrubs to arrest the flow of dirt from the road onto the graves and memorials. “It would make the whole cemetery feel cared for,” she says. “Colourful flowering plants would honour the people who are resting there and the families who visit them.”
A Council and a Community: Finding Common Ground
The challenges facing Mapleton Cemetery are not unique to this site. Across Queensland, rural cemeteries administered by local councils face a persistent tension between tight maintenance budgets, competing community priorities and the deeply felt expectations of descendants and local residents. Mowing, basic path maintenance and occasional infrastructure works are budgeted; heritage-sensitive restoration and landscaping often are not.
Range Community News put Donna’s concerns directly to Sunshine Coast Council and received a detailed response. A council spokesperson confirmed that Mapleton Cemetery is one of 18 cemeteries managed by Council across the region, with 203 recorded interments, comprising 178 burials and 24 ash placements. Maintenance activities, the spokesperson said, are “aligned to the service levels provided at other rural cemetery sites.”
On mowing, Council said the cemetery is serviced fortnightly during summer months and approximately every three weeks in winter, with road edge vegetation managed as part of those cycles. Schedules may be adjusted in response to extended rainfall to avoid turf damage and ensure safe access.
On the niche wall, the focus of Donna’s most urgent concerns, Council confirmed it was last cleaned approximately 18 months ago and is scheduled for cleaning again within a standard two-year maintenance cycle. The spokesperson drew a distinction between council responsibilities and those of plot holders: Council is responsible for maintaining cemetery infrastructure including niche walls and common areas, while the cleaning and upkeep of individual memorials remains the responsibility of burial rights holders.
Council also acknowledged the site’s environmental challenges directly. “As a rural cemetery set within an established natural landscape, Mapleton is more exposed to elements such as leaf fall, moisture and dust, which can affect how the site presents from time to time,” the spokesperson said, adding that dust movement from nearby unsealed areas can occur periodically and is managed as part of routine maintenance.
On Donna’s request for a roofed shelter over the niche wall, the response was measured but cautious. “While there are no current plans to install a shelter or roof over the niche wall, any future low-cost improvements would be considered as part of a broader, network-wide approach to ensure equity and consistency across all cemeteries,” the spokesperson said. Planned maintenance and future works are guided by the Sunshine Coast Cemetery Plan 2019–2028, which outlines Council’s approach to managing infrastructure across its cemetery network.
The council position, that the site is “currently meeting expected service standards for a rural cemetery”, will provide little comfort to Donna Klease. She is not disputing that Council performs its scheduled duties. Her argument is that the standard itself may need revisiting for a site of this historical significance, and that the approaching interment of her father’s ashes makes the timing urgent rather than merely aspirational.
Allocating restoration funding equitably across a network of 18 cemeteries is a genuine administrative challenge, and it would be unfair to suggest the current state of Mapleton Cemetery reflects indifference on the part of Council. The cemetery’s rural setting, Council notes, makes environmental exposure an inherent rather than a preventable feature of the site.
At the same time, the community’s expectations are reasonable. A cemetery gazetted more than 120 years ago, holding 203 recorded interments and still in active use, surely warrants more than a two-yearly pressure clean and fortnightly mowing. The improvements Donna Klease is seeking, a heritage-appropriate roofed shelter, additional landscaping and flowering shrubs along the fence line, are not extravagant. They are the kind of dignified upkeep that bereaved families have every right to expect, particularly at a site the Sunshine Coast’s own heritage records identify as historically significant.
Donna has written directly to Councillor David Law, in a letter dated 11 February 2026, formally requesting that upgrades be considered in future council budget processes. The letter details the specific improvements sought and draws on the family’s deep personal and historical connection to the site.
How You Can Help
Donna is now asking the broader community to add their voices to her request. A groundswell of letters and emails from local residents, she believes, will carry real weight in the council’s budget deliberations.
“I would hope that the local and surrounding communities of Mapleton support my request to Council,” she said. “These families were instrumental in the early settlement of Mapleton and Montville. The 180 dearly departed members of our community deserve a resting place that honours them.”
Those wishing to support the campaign are asked to send a brief email to Sunshine Coast Council’s cemetery management team at cemeteries@sunshinecoast.qld.gov.au, quoting reference number CST2600028R. A few sentences expressing support for improved maintenance, niche wall cleaning, a heritage-appropriate roofed structure and landscaping will be sufficient.
For Donna, the coming months carry a weight that goes beyond the administrative. Her father, carrying the Smith name that helped build this mountain town, will soon be brought from halfway around the world to rest among his ancestors.
“I just want him to rest somewhere beautiful,” she said. “Somewhere we can be proud of. That’s all any of us want for the people we love.”
Sunshine Coast Cemetery Plan 2019 – 2028
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