Rocky outcrops and volcanic remnants along the South-East coast of Queensland played a vital role in the creation of what we now know as Fraser Island.
River in New South Wales carried with them sand and particles from the tablelands. Currents carried them north and a lot this sand was eventually caught by these outcrops. The prevailing South-East winds swept it up into high dunes. After the last ice age, sea levels rose and disconnected Fraser Island from the main land.

It is likely the first aboriginals arrived on Fraser Island about 30.000 years ago. At that stage Fraser Island was still connected to the main land. Not much is known about this ancient past but it seems likely the aboriginals numbered only a couple of hundred at the time and might have visited the area of future Fraser Island only a couple of months a year.
About 5000 years ago, when Fraser Island had become a proper island, permanent settlement on Fraser Island existed. The oldest middens on Fraser Island date back to that time.
When the Europeans arrived, there were around 2000 aboriginals living on Fraser Island.

The first discovery by Europeans dates back to May 1770 when Captain James Cook sailed by. While passing he noticed the aboriginals on a high rock. As the Europeans referred to the native people as “indians” he named the rock “Indian Rock” nowadays a popular tourist destination.

The first “white” people started settling on Fraser Island at around 1860 and began felling trees.

The aboriginals called Fraser Island by the name of K’gari, a beautiful spirit. The Europeans called the island Great Sandy Island. However in 1836, the Stirling Castle stranded North of Fraser Island and the crew and passengers took the lifeboats to try to get back to Brisbane. The wife of Captain James Fraser, Eliza Fraser, was among them. One part of the group continued to Brisbane to gather a search and rescue party for the other group that stayed on Fraser Island, captured or rescued by the aboriginals (which of the two remains unclear till the present day).

The story of hardship that Eliza Fraser told after her rescue, led to the new name of Fraser Island.

The first proper settlement of Fraser Island started around 1860. This was purely focussed on timber logging. Mainly Kauri, which was used in the local timber industry, but after the discovery of gold, most of the timber went to the new mines. As Fraser Island was still an extremely remote area with no commercial value except for the timer and no strategic position, no other settlement took place.

During those early years, the aboriginals were treated badly and there number declined rapidly.

During WWII a commando unit was based on Fraser Island. This unit, known as the Z-Force was based on the West coast of Fraser Island, a bit north of today’s Kingfisher Bay Resort. The wreck of the Maheno was used as practise object.

Logging continued until the 1970s. During the 1970’s sandmining became a second “big business” on Fraser Island. Tourism, which started back in the 1930’s on a very tiny scale, also grew bit by bit and started to really take off in the 1970’s. Several communities began to develop to support these economic activities. However all settlements on Fraser Island remained very small and never consisted of more than a couple of hundred people.

Today Fraser Island is a World heritage Listed site and an internationally famous nature destination.

No logging, sandmining or other commercial activities are taking place on Fraser Island. Except for an intensive tourism industry. Still only a couple of hundred permanent residents live on Fraser Island, although the yearly number of visitors exceeds 300.00.