this pub is the soul of this place. This IS the heart. This is it. It’s where you go to get work. It’s where you catch up with your neighbour. It’s where you meet your mates. It’s where you have a fight and where you then buy him a beer. It’s where you grew up and it’s where you keep coming back to. - M.H.

No matter where the winding way of life takes me, Long Pocket is always home. Long Pocket is always where the heart is. It’s where family is, where sisters and brothers are, where mates are, where dreams begin and where my soul longs to be. Across my face comes a shining smile when I’m back in the valley. Driving down Abergowrie Road, admiring the lush green cane growing high, following the tall telegraph poles as they raced ahead endlessly,… letting the country road take me home. - S.A.E.C.

I literally spent every Friday night at the Ashton growing up, playing on the old slide, picking music on the juke box then falling asleep under the table haha - J

Long Pocket State School 1938. Front Row L to R: Remo Romano, Peter Pallanza, Stewart Kehl, Kauko Kaurila, Eric Kauppila, Matti Kauppila, Des Standford. Second Front Row L to R: Billy Scott, Dulcie Scott, ?, ?, ?, Valeria Somogyvari (Romano), Julie Cattoni (Tua), Anneli Polvi, ?, ?, ?. Second Back Row L to R: Aimo Kaurila, Olavi (Ollie) Kaurila,?, Jack Woodall, ? Mendiolea (braces), Louie Croton, Kevin Killoran, Veikko (Vic) Polvi, ?, ?, Louie Cristaudo, ?. Back Row L to R: ?, ?, Bambina Springer (Morelli), ? Jukkola, ?, Peggy Croton, ?, ?, ?, ?, Teacher ?. Photo generously provided by the Kehl family.

The Ashton Hotel

If you go to Long Pocket by car or per boot
Or be borne along on a four-footed brute -
Leave Ingham behind you and call at Trebonne
Where best of good liquour is always laid on.
Better take a few with you - no more can be had
For shanties are few and the water is bad.

Cross over Stone River - go up by Gum Park -
Where tractors are chugging from dawn until dark
You’ll then strike a region of Tories and cranks
Who think that Australia is run by the Yanks.
Don’t linger too long, only just take a spell
And go till you meet with the Ashton Hotel.

You’ll find it a calm and a pleasant retreat
Where sons of all nations in brotherhood meet -
‘Tis never a question how much you have got
‘Tis certain that someone will but you a pot.
Sweet songs you shall hear and good stories as well
In all the tongues spoken since Babylon fell.

You’re sure of a job if you’re looking for toil
But ‘ere you start on it I’ll give you the “oil”
You’ve got to keep moving to earn your pay
Or else you’ll be “feenish” the very first day.
As soon as they find you can do your job
You’re sure to be treated as one of the mob.

Dan Sheahan (early 1950’s)

Dan Sheahan was an Australian rover, farmer, and poet, with an undying deeply held love for the Eire he left behind and the boundless passion and adoration for our great Southern Land he made home. The Ashton pub was his local watering hole which he fondly loved. Dan emigrated from Cork, Ireland along with his younger brother Ben in 1904. A lover of life and family, he experienced the horrors of the Somme and Messine, the hardships of natural disasters, and the inescapable post war socio economic collapses. As atested by his extensive and insightful poetry, he matched adversity time and again with lyrical wryly witt and fortitude.

The Ashton Hotel

If you’re driving to the Pocket and you are feeling like a beer -
Just call in to the Ashton with its friendly atmosphere.
Don’t worry about your mode of dress - No need for coat or tie -
For shorts and thongs are uniform - They are Aussies Dinky-Di.
They will greet you at the Ashton where the beer is always great -
Everyone’s your cobber and they are glad to see you Mate.

A friendly Finn may greet you or a guy who sailed from Rome -
Men from many nations have called the Pocket “Home”.
If your father was a Spaniard or your Mother was a Turk -
You are just as much an Aussie as Blue from back of Bourke.
We will meet you at the Ashton where the beer is always great.
We are a mob of Dinkum Aussies, so come and join us Mate.

When the long hot days are ended and the tractors put away -
The local lads will tell you of the bins they hauled that day.
Now as you walk around the bar - don’t hold your head too high -
For a stick of cane may hit you or trash get in your eye.
The cane grown at the Aston is sweet and tail and green
As the night grows older - it’s the best the world has seen.

You are sure to hear a grumble about hte price of cane and beef.
They’ll tell you of the big ones that they caught out on the Reef.
You could play a gane of Euchre or throw a dart or two -
Whatever takes you fancy - they have got it all for you.
There is a special friendship that is Aussie strong and true,
the Ashton at Long Pocket, where they’ll always welcome you.

Mary Barnes

Mary Barnes is Dan Sheahan’s daughter who has lived her entire life in this beautiful country which she adores. She married and raised 6 children on the emerald green sugar cane farm. Now in her ninties, she is the first to tell you who’s dating who around the area and what’s happening on Facebook!

Where did the old name of Ashton Hotel come from?

We don’t know for sure. There was a property called Ashtone between Ingham and Trebonne. The 1,000 acrea property was established by Henry Stone in 1869.

Who started the hotel?

The hotel was established in 1926. At a licensing meeting on the 12th of October the year prior, three spearate applications were made fora hotel in the tiny townlet of Long Pocket. In an attempt to stop sly grog selling, the decision was made to grant only George Habermann a provisional Hotel license on the 26th May 1926. The applications of John Cassanaros and Abraham W. Jayasuria were rejected. The block of land the hotel sits on was pre-emptively divided on the 30th March 1926 and is described as 200 by 500 chains in the county of Cardwell and the parish of Lannercost.

There used to be an old butchers shop across the road from the Pub and a General Store to the right of it.

Pub with no bar

It’s a lonesome for trees in The ‘Gowrie these days.  For the forest has gone – with its tall Morton Bays. 

Yet while chopping and flopping thick bark in the scrub –  there was sense in one thing, when the folk built a pub.  But now life has turned dreary and dull out this far –  as the pub’s boarded up – and they’ve shut down the bar. 

Yes The Ashton’s front door is banged in with a nail.  There’s a sign out the front that is reading ‘For sale’.  But the paint on it’s cracking – it’s been there so long.  No more the shall the canecutters burst into song.  And The Longpocketeers now don’t know who they are, as they gaze from the street – at a pub with no bar. 

It is Covid, some say, brought the pub to its knees.  Last year it was closed by the pandemic’s breeze.  But while other pubs fired up their pumps and their taps when they got the green light – this pub didn’t do that.  There’s no schooners sat frothing or pints in the jar –  what a terrible place is a pub with no bar. 

They’ve gutted the inside, some locals have said.  There’s dust on the stools and the barmaid has fled.  A faint flame had flickered that all would be good.  But to raffle a pub – well sure, who ever could?  So now I sit cursing the door from afar, as I’m outside alone – at a pub with no bar.

Well the Martins and Sheahans and Kangases too –  the Finnish Kaurilas and Bottos are blue.  For they’ve toiled and then oiled their throats here for four score.  But The Ashton is empty – they’ll drink here no more.  Nor tap to the banjo and roll a cigar –  won’t somebody save us from a pub with no bar. 

The time in our history when it was a sin, to govern a pub and let ‘blackfellas’ in, is banished to memory – Australia’s shame.  The times they were evil and greed was to blame.  Now we’re all united – one people we are –  as we stare from the road at a pub with no bar. 

It is lonesome in ‘Gowrie and Longpocket too, where once at the pub – we could drink the night through.  The dingoes and curlews cry out in the night.  The wise ancient mountains will lightning to strike.  But there’s nothing so striking to rip you a scar –  as to stare from the road – at a pub with no bar.

Jonny Pearce (2020)

Jonny Pearce emigrated from Jersey, Channel Islands to Australia in 2010 and resides in the local area with his wife and two small boys. He is a passionate writer and musician. A selfproclaimed wannabe bush poet, he penned his first bush poem upon moving to the area in 2020, insipired by the breathtaking rift valley, lockdown, and Dan Sheahan’s poetry collection ‘Songs from the Canefields’. Jonny teaches at the local school, St. Teresa’s College, Abergowrie, and is always up for a banter, spontaneously launching into stanza and prose.

Publican Hall of Fame

1926 George Habermann
1927-1930 Victor Fitzroy Franklin
1931-1932 Thomas John Malone
1932-1937 Eino Edvard Erkkila
1937-1938 Margaret Murray Holland
1938 Francis Joseph Holland
1938 Louis William Cross
1938-1939 Queenie Elizabeth Bowthorpe
1939-1941 Giovanni Ottavis

**Fire in May 1941 destroyed the original wooden building. A new brick building was built and opened in 1942. In the interval in between, alcohol was sold in a temporary backyard shed bar from May to November 1941.**

1942-1946 Alma Ghiralaldelli
1947 Humphrey Joseph Dawson
1948-1957 Teresa Rose Killoran (nee Guerra)
1958 Eda Quartero
1959-1970 Raymon Rosendu Ypinazar
1971-1974 George Thomas Allen
1975 Gloria Jean Grigolon
1976-1977 Owne Douglas Inman
1978-1982 Frances Robert Linsley
1983 Donna Wendy Smith
1984 Raymond Ernest Miguel
1985-1987 Douglas McKenzie Thomson
1988-1990 Barry Jones Longworth
1991-1999 John Rohdes Wilson
2000-2005 Beverly Kay Somers
2006-2016 Cathy Spaleder
2016-2022 Douglas Senior
2022 to date Sally Anne Elizabeth Cloake