Quick Summary

1770 - Point Danger and Mt Warning was discovered and named by Captain Cook in 1770.

1842 - The first accurate map of the Gold Coast was produced in 1842 by the English-born surveyor Robert Dixon. At the time of the mapping Queensland was not a state but was still part of New South Wales.

1845 - There were only 1,599 white people in what was to become Queensland.

1859 - The new colony of Queensland was declared.

1861 - Queensland's population had grown to 32,838.

1874 - The Gold Coast region was first put up for sale when it was little more than a picturesque collection of lagoons and mangrove swamps with rivers and creeks meandering their way out to the ocean at Southport.

1884 - The Gold Coast was already becoming a popular holiday destination and Cobb & Co. started running regular coach services from Brisbane to the developing Gold Coast region

1885 - A Governor of Queensland, Governor Musgrave, built a seaside home near Southport in 1885, setting a trend for the Coast becoming a fashionable resort for the wealthy and influential.

1889 - when a rail link between the Gold Coast and Beenleigh was completed. The rail link was removed 65 years later in 1964.

1902 - Southport was established as a town in 1902, boasting a population of 1230, Southport became not only a resort town, but the business centre of the South Coast. Hotels sprang up to accommodate the increasing number of visitors.

1923 - James Cavill was instrumental in the growth of the region when he built the Surfers Paradise Hotel in the early 1920's. He purchased the land in Elston (now known as Surfers Paradise) for a princely sum of £40 (about $200).

1925 - A bridge replaced the old horse ferry crossing of the Nerang River in an effort to attract the more mobile and lucrative holiday market, the town of Elston (previously known as Meyers Ferry) was renamed "Surfers Paradise" in 1933 after the hotel Cavill had built 10 years earlier.

1933 - Jim Cavill and Elston residents successfully lobbied to change the name of Elston to Surfers Paradise and Australia's most famous beach resort was born.

1936 - An emergency airport strip was created at Coolangatta for planes flying between Sydney and Brisbane, in the same location it is now Australia's seventh busiest airport, Gold Coast Airport.

1940 - These seaside towns of the South Coast (now Gold Coast) became well known to the thousands of Australian and US armed servicemen who came for recreational leave during the Second World War.

1940 - In the late 1940s, Brisbane journalists called the coast, south of Brisbane, 'the Gold Coast" - it was the place to buy and sell land in the post war real estate boom.

1950 - Development increased rapidly. Serviced holiday apartments and shopping arcades were built. The canal Estates of Paradise Island, Chevron Island and Isle of Capri were some of the first modern major land developments.

1958 - With a growing tourism industry local businesses began to adopt the term 'Gold Coast' in their names, and on 23 October 1958 the South Coast Town Council was renamed "Gold Coast Town Council". The Queensland State Government proclaimed the Gold Coast a City on May 16th 1959.

1959 - The first high rise on the Gold Coast , Kinkabool, was built in 1959 at Surfers Paradise and still stands today.

1965 - The area was becoming a popular destination and in 1965 the Meter Maid scheme began topping up the empty parking meters of visitors, with Annette Welch being the first bikini-clad meter maid.

1972 - The first theme park opened, Sea World (formerly Ski Gardens based at Carrara). Originally developed by Keith Williams now owned by Warner Brothers and Village Roadshow.

1970 - The hi-rise boom continued in earnest during the 1970s.

1980 - Japanese property investment during the 1980s continued to change the face of the Gold Coast with hi-rise developments and golf resorts.

1981 - Dreamworld, the original creation of John LongHurst, opens at Coomera. Now owned by Macquarie Leisure Trust.

1982 - Coolangatta Airport Terminal opens and runway upgraded for larger aircraft(B737 and A300).

1984 - Cades County Waterpark opens to be later renamed to Wet n Wild.

1991 - Warner Bros. Movie World opens.

1995 - The Gold Coast was amalgamated with the hinterland and northern areas of the Albert Shire Council to form today's City of the Gold Coast and become the seventh largest city, and one of the fastest growing, in Australia.