The suburb of Bulimba was largely a rural and agricultural area for most of the nineteenth century. A boat building industry also began in the 1860s and in 1880 another industrial complex, the Apollo Candle works was established, and a tin smelting works shortly afterwards. By 1894, when Isaac Walter Jenner painted Bulimba Reach, the industrial activity of the suburb had progressed even further as attested by his inclusion of several smokestacks in the painting. The steam and sail boats on the river further the impression of a busy port.