One hundred years ago this week the not-very-well-travelled folk of Queanbeyan, most of them doomed by cost and by the tyranny of distance to never see foreign lands, were given a treat. The Queanbeyan Age reported "A LECTURE ON AFRICA" using no less than 70 of those new-fangled lantern slides.
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"It is interesting to meet and speak with a man who has penetrated to the very heart of Africa, who has covered territory over which the great Livingstone went, and who has been where no white man before or since has ventured to go.
"Mr. Browne Smith by virtue of what he has accomplished as a missionary and explorer is one of the most notable men who has visited Australia. He has been around the Great Bend of the Niger River, has spent the best part of his life in the interior of Africa and was for three years in Madagascar, during which time he crossed the island a certain high official he, the official, wouldn't dare cross with a regiment of soldiers.
"Mr. Smith has a fascinating story to tell ... Here you have tales of the jungle, and of the wild savage life that infests it. Here are cannibals, pygmies and zulus, stories enough to fill a large book. After a lantern lecture given at Christ Church on Monday night we left the church with a better knowledge of what has been so long known as the Dark Continent and with a new and abiding interest in missionary work."
