CURTIS, GEORGE SILAS (1845-1922), auctioneer and politician, was born on 19 July 1845 at Tamworth, New South Wales, son of George Curtis, farmer, and his wife Suzanne, née Martin. Educated at Sydney Grammar School and Maitland High School, he went to Rockhampton with an overland party in 1863; he returned there in 1866 to enter Wormald's auctioneering firm, which he acquired in 1872 and developed as G. S. Curtis and Sons. As a prominent auctioneer, landholder and real estate speculator, Curtis became one of the city's most vigorous and influential public figures, first in campaigning through the Chamber of Commerce for railway extensions and a deep-water port, and from 1889 as the leading exponent of territorial separation in central Queensland.

When the Central Queensland Territorial Separation League was formed in 1889 with Curtis as chairman, the movement had entered its third and most active phase. In 1891 he ...

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Source:

Australian Dictionary of Biography