Australian National University Archives in Acton | Education

Australian National University Archives

Locality: Acton

Address: Ground floor Menzies Library, Fellows Road 2601 Acton, ACT, Australia

Website: http://www.archives.anu.edu.au

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24.01.2022 Trigger Warning: Some of the following photographs depict the impact of bushfire. You may find this content disturbing. On 18th January 2003, fires that had been burning in the Brindabella and Namadgi National Parks for more than a week, reached the south-west suburbs of Canberra, devastating the area. Four people were killed and over 500 homes were destroyed. One of the first areas impacted by the fires was the Mount Stromlo area, home to the ANU’s Mount Stromlo Observato...ry. The observatory was decimated. The fires destroyed the workshops, administration building, eight staff homes and seven telescopes, including the Oddie Refractor which was established at the observatory in 1911 and was the first Commonwealth building in Canberra. The only telescope that was not destroyed was the Farnham Telescope, built in 1886 and installed at the observatory in 1928. Parts of the observatory have been rebuilt, with Mount Stromlo remaining the headquarters of the ANU Research School of Astronomy & Astrophysics and welcoming visitors, however all of the ANU's large research telescopes now operate out of the ANU’s Siding Spring Observatory near Coonabarabran in northern NSW. Our archives hold a variety of material relating to the observatory and those who lived and worked there including the first Director Walter Duffield and his family, and engineer and mechanical designer Kurt Gottlieb. Here we are sharing some photos of the observatory taken between its inception in the 1920s and 2003, some of which show the impact of the bushfires on the observatory and surrounding areas 18 years ago.

23.01.2022 A rainy Monday morning is a great time for a trip through some Tooth & Company Northern Beaches hotels. The Northern Beaches stretches over approx. 250 square kms along Sydney's northern coast from Manly in the south up to Palm Beach and inland to Pittwater. We hold records for around a dozen Tooth & Company hotels that have operated on the Northern Beaches since the 1850s. ... One of the most well-known hotels on the Northern Beaches is Manly’s Hotel Steyne. The original hotel was one of Manly’s oldest buildings, having been built in 1859 by English merchant and parliamentarian Henry Gilbert Smith. He saw great potential in Manly as a seaside resort town and constructed a number of buildings including the Hotel Steyne, a school and St Matthew’s Anglican Church. The first Hotel Steyne was destroyed by a fire which broke out just after 2am on 22 June 1863. An inquest concluded the fire originated in the cellar but the cause was not determined. Smith engaged prominent architect Edmund Blacket to design a new hotel, which opened in January 1864. In the 1920s the hotel was purchased by Resch’s Ltd, and their interest in the hotel passed to Tooth & Company in 1929. In 1935 Tooth sought to modernise, demolishing the building and erecting a new hotel at a cost of approx. 20,000 Pounds. In 1936 they introduced the new concept of a beer garden in the form of an annex to the hotel, as well as a wintergarden and spacious dancefloor with a glass ceiling and orchestra space. A number of other significant refurbishments were undertaken in the 1960s to modernise the hotel. Further up the Northern Beaches, is another well-known establishment, The Newport Hotel (also known as The Newport Arms Hotel). Again, this hotel has a long history, having originally been built in 1880 by Charles Jeannerett and George Pile, who also built the wharf and acquired the mail contract for the area, which had recently become known as Newport. The hotel quickly became a popular venue for refreshments, attracting visitors who arrived by both coach and steamer. Tooth acquired the hotel in July 1929 and undertook renovations in 1938. The new hotel was designed by the architectural firm Copeman, Lemont & Keesing, who completed many hotel designs for Tooth. The building work was completed by the firm Paynter and Dixon. The renovations cost 3,990 Pounds and the new hotel opened on 5 Dec 1938. Tooth undertook further improvements throughout the 1950s, including adding a new drive-in bottle department in 1958. Some of our newly-digitised Tooth & Company hotel albums include some wonderful interior photos of both of the above hotels. You can see more of our newly-digitised hotel photos on our Open Research website here - https://openresearch-repository.anu.edu.au/handle/1885/2. Just use the search box to search by hotel name or location.

20.01.2022 Commiserations to Raiders and Rabbitohs fans on their losses over the weekend. We were personally hoping to see our Raiders make back-to-back grand final appearances, but it clearly wasn’t meant to be. If you’re a Rabbitohs fan, you may have gone and drowned your sorrows in one of the pubs around the spiritual home of the club, Redfern. Redfern was traditionally occupied by the Carrahdigang people, with the names Redfern originating from a land grant in the area in 1817 to Wi...Continue reading

19.01.2022 March is Women's History Month and we'll be celebrating by highlighting some of the records we have in our collection relating to remarkable women. The Australian Women's Conference for Victory in War and Victory in Peace was held in November 1943, organised around the theme 'A War to Win, a World to Gain'. At the time, it was the largest women’s conference ever held in Australia. The conference brought together 91 women’s organisations from across Australia, including rep...resentatives of trade unions, religious groups, political parties and a variety of special interest groups. Their aim was to discuss post-war reconstruction, and specifically the issues that faced women and children in this era. The conference was organised by the President of the United Associations of Women, Jessie Street. Street was a prominent feminist and was strongly involved with a number of organisations, campaigning for equality for women, including equal pay and an end to wider discrimination against women in the workplace. An important outcome of the conference was the development of a charter of rights for women in the post-war world, known as The Australian Women's Charter. The Charter was a program of reforms put forward by women relating to planning of post-war reconstruction. It covered a wide range of issues and objectives including women's right to paid work, the need for adequate child care and the needs of rural and Aboriginal women. After the conference, The Australian Women's Charter Movement was established to action the resolutions outlined in the Charter. This included holding subsequent conferences and lobbying members of the federal parliament to enact positive changes for women and children. Image: Australian Woman's Charter Committee members presenting deputation to Prime Minister John Curtin, 1943. Pictured from L to R - Eileen Furley, Della Nicholas (later Elliott), Mrs Green, Mrs Quinane, Mrs Carter, Hattie Cameron, Jessie Street, Mona Ravenscroft, Eve Higson, Mabel Warhurst, Anne Outlaw, Ruby Rich and Margaret Jennings.

19.01.2022 We were thrilled to be able to assist with providing some archival material for the new documentary film Brazen Hussies. Brazen Hussies shows us how a daring and diverse group of Australian women joined forces to defy the status quo, demand equality and create profound social change - contributing to one of the greatest social movements of the 20th Century. The film interweaves freshly uncovered archival footage, personal photographs, memorabilia and lively accounts from th...e bold women who reignited the feminist movement in Australia, at times at great personal cost. If you're in Canberra, Sydney or Brisbane you can catch sessions of this fantastic documentary at Palace Cinemas and Dendy Cinemas this week.

18.01.2022 It’s that time of year when we get football finals fever, with both the AFL and NRL grand finals being played this weekend. The first recorded games of Australian Rules Football were a series of matches between the Melbourne schools Scotch College and Melbourne Grammar held in 1858. This was the start of what became regular games around Melbourne. Within a decade, crowds of up to 10,000 were crowding into the Melbourne Cricket Ground to watch regular games between clubs for...med around the suburbs of Melbourne. Schools, churches, trade unions and businesses formed their own clubs and competitions. The oldest Victorian clubs, Melbourne and Geelong, were formed around the same time, in 1858 and 1859, and are among the oldest continuous sporting clubs in the world. Other Australian states didn’t take too long to follow, with clubs formed in South Australia in 1860 and QLD in 1866. Both Victoria and South Australia had their own leagues operating by 1877. Leagues followed in Tasmania (1879), QLD (1879), NSW (1881) and WA (1885), with the first national carnival held in 1908. The game has grown to be extraordinarily popular throughout the country, with the AFL now consisting of 18 teams that generally play a 22 season competition. The early days of the National Rugby League (NRL) date back to Sydney in 1907 and a disgruntled group of rugby union players who sought to establish a new game with paid players that adopted the rules of the game played by the Northern Union of England. This was a break away from Rugby Union, which had been the dominant game played in NSW and QLD from the 1890s. The first season of rugby league was played in NSW in 1908 with nine clubs Glebe, Newtown, Western Suburbs, South Sydney, North Sydney, Balmain, Eastern Suburbs, Newcastle and Cumberland. Within only a year, Australia had a national team, the Australian Rugby League Kangaroos, who embarked on a tour of England. The team played 45 matches around England, and although the tour was less than successful, both in terms of results and revenue, the game started to gain popularity in Australia, with clubs being established around Sydney and an association starting in QLD in 1909. The game spread to schools from 1913 and began to be broadcast on the radio from 1924. Matches were shown on television from the 1960s and the popular State of Origin series of interstate matches between NSW and QLD was introduced in 1980. Today the game is one of the best attended sporting events in Australia, with 16 clubs participating from NSW, QLD and Victoria. To celebrate grand final weekend, we’re sharing some of our favourite football photos from our archives.

18.01.2022 This week we're headed over the bridge for our look into the Tooth & Company archives, to North Sydney and neighbouring McMahons Point. Originally we had intended to include a number of Lower North Shore suburbs in this week's tour but we soon discovered that the suburbs of North Sydney and McMahons Point were quite a hub for hotels and had plenty to offer on their own. We will be looking at some other North Shore suburbs in the coming weeks. The North Sydney area is the tr...Continue reading

18.01.2022 Just a reminder that Monday 8th March is the Canberra Day public holiday in the ACT, so our reading room will be closed on Monday while we enjoy a long weekend. Our reading room will re-open on Tuesday 9th March at 9am. Image: Aerial view of Canberra's Civic Centre, circa 1960s. Photographer: ANU Photographic Services.

17.01.2022 Did you know that it was during this week 64 years ago, that the opening ceremony for the Summer Olympic Games was held in Melbourne? Running from 22 November to 8 December, the Melbourne Games were not only the first Olympic Games to be held in Australia, but also the first Olympic Games to be held in the Southern Hemisphere. Did you also know that not all events were held in Melbourne? Due to Australia's very strict quarantine rules, the equestrian events could not be held... here and were instead held in Stockholm, Sweden, in June 1956. The Games were opened by H.R.H. The Duke of Edinburgh, and were a great success, despite the decision by a small number of countries to boycott over the Suez Crisis and the Soviet invasion of Hungary. Australia had great success both on the track and in the pool, with gold medals won by Shirley Strickland, Betty Cuthbert, Murray Rose and Dawn Fraser. We came across these images in the extensive slide collection of linguist Helen Groger-Wurm. Helen and her husband, linguist and anthropologist Stephen Groger-Wurm, travelled extensively, both for field work and family holidays. During their trip to the Melbourne Olympics, Helen took a number of photographs capturing the Olympic village and events, as well as the Melbourne CBD decorated to celebrate the occasion and welcome visitors to Melbourne. You can see more of Helen's extensive collection of images on the ANU Open Research website - https://openresearch-repository.anu.edu.au/hand/1885/173718

17.01.2022 We know it seems like we can’t get away from election talk at the moment, particularly with the US Election fast approaching. However, we are taking our civic duties seriously and reminding our Canberra friends that tomorrow, Saturday 17 October, is Election Day in the ACT. The 2020 Elections are unlike those in previous years - is anything in 2020 the same as previous years? The ABC reports that approximately 55% of voters in the ACT have already voted. Likewise, our friends... up north are casting a record number of pre-poll votes before the Queensland Election on 31 October. The first general election in Australia was held on 29 and 30 March 1901, with the Parliament first meeting on 9 May 1901. Our first parliament had 75 seats in the House of Representatives (although 6 of these were uncontested in the first election) and 36 seats in the Senate. The election saw Edmund Barton’s Protectionist Party up against the Free Trade Party, which was unofficially led by NSW Premier George Reid. Although the majority of states ran Labor candidates, there was not an official federal Labor Party until May 1901. Barton’s Protectionists won the election on votes and seats, however they failed to secure a majority. They were able to form a government with the support of the 14 Labor Party members. Only in South Australia and Western Australia were women permitted to vote. Although Aboriginal and some ‘non-white’ people were technically permitted to vote in NSW, Victoria, SA and Tasmania, in reality, many of these voters faced voter suppression and intimidation. NSW, Victoria, SA and WA operated a ‘first past the post’ system of voting, whereas QLD used a contingent voting system and Tasmania used the Hare-Clark system, which was also later used in the ACT. We hold a large variety of election paraphernalia within the Noel Butlin Archives, including election pamphlets and flyers from a variety of political parties, particularly the Australian Labor Party and the Communist Party of Australia from the 1920s to 1980s.

15.01.2022 We are often asked to post photographs of Melbourne hotels, but unfortunately we very rarely come across any in our archives, largely because Tooth & Company were very much focused on the NSW and ACT hotel markets. So we were very excited to come across an envelope of photographs of Melbourne hotels while we were processing a Tooth & Company collection recently. The photographs feature hotels that were part of the Courage Australia portfolio and have come to be part of our To...oth collections through Tooth’s acquisition of Courage in 1978. Courage Beer launched in Victoria in 1968 as a competitor to Carlton & United, who enjoyed a dominance in the beer trade in the state. Despite its best attempts, and the backing of Tooth from the late 1970s, Courage never managed to make a strong impression. Largely the failure can be attributed to the tied system that brewers had with hotels. The situation in Victoria was very similar to that in NSW. In Victoria many hotels were tied to Carlton & United, meaning they controlled much of the beer distribution to the majority of Victorian hotels. In NSW Tooth & Company enjoyed a similar monopoly. Additionally, beer drinkers tended to be quite brand loyal and certain brands were (and to some extent still are) strongly associated with different states. Most of us are familiar with the strong association of XXXX with Queensland for example. In NSW the majority of beer drinkers were loyal to Tooth’s, Resch’s (owned by Tooth & Company) or Tooheys. In Victoria Carlton & United’s beers were usually the drink of choice, with pubs tending to offer Victoria Bitter (VB), Carlton Draught and Fosters. These photographs are undated but are accompanied by correspondence dated December 1978 so we assume the photographs were taken around this time. Many of the photographs include vehicles, so we are hoping our car enthusiasts may be able to help with dating them. All the photos are captioned with addresses, which we have included, although we suspect some of the hotels are no longer trading. Locals may be able to help by letting us know which pubs are still with us. We believe that the Footscray's Plough Hotel was established in 1868 and is still trading, as are Camberwell's Palace Hotel, Cheltenham's Tudor Inn and Hawthorn's Glenferrie Hotel. Mornington's Tanti Hotel now trades as the Mornington Hotel and Brighton's Hotel Central now trades as the Half Moon Hotel. Sandringham's Red Bluff Hotel was destroyed by fire in 2005 @ploughfootscray @palacehotel.camberwell @TudorInnVIC @TheGlenferrieHotel @morningtonhotelontanti

14.01.2022 We’re still hard at work processing a recent donation to our archives of Ancient Order of Foresters records. You might recall that we shared some photos last week of the untamed state of the boxes. We’ve now processed over 40 boxes and have come across some fantastic finds. We thought you might enjoy seeing some of them. These items all relate to the Victorian branches of the Ancient Order of Foresters, one of a number of Friendly Societies established in Australia from t...he 1840s onwards. The first branch of the AOF, known as a Court, was established in Victoria in 1849, although the society dates back to 1834 in Leeds, England. Friendly Societies had a primary goal of mutual self-help. Members made a small contribution each week to a common fund which paid benefits to those in the group who became ill, lost work, or suffered hardship. Friendly Societies later branched out into hospital and medical insurance, household insurance, personal and housing loans, life insurance and general financial services. We hold a large number of Friendly Society records relating to the Grand United Order of Oddfellows, Manchester Unity Independent Order of Oddfellows, United Ancient Order of Druids, and Ancient Order of Foresters for an extensive number of lodges across Victoria and NSW. These records date back to the mid-1800s and include minutes, reports, conference papers, membership registers, correspondence, financial records, rules and regulations, cash books, visitors books, newspaper cuttings, anniversary and souvenir records, membership registration books, records of sickness, certificates, printed material, photographs and some amazing objects.

13.01.2022 This week's excursion through the Tooth & Company hotel archives takes us away from sunny Sydney and on a road trip to the NSW Riverina. Tooth & Company generally classified their hotel records into two groups - Sydney & suburban hotels with records organised A to Z by hotel name, and country hotels with records organised A to Z by location. Essentially everywhere outside of Sydney was classified by Tooth as being "country". However, there were a couple of exceptions to this... system, with Tooth having separate categories for Far West hotels and Riverina hotels. The Riverina hotel records are organised A to Z by location and cover larger cities and towns such as Albury, Corowa and Deniliquin, as well as many smaller centres. Our trip to the Riverina region is inspired by a researcher request about the Rules Point Hotel. Unfortunately our emails to this particular researcher keep bouncing back to us, so we hope he is able to see this post. The Rules Point Hotel operated in Yarrangobilly, around 2.5 hours southwest of Canberra. According to the Kosciuszko Huts Association, the Rules Point Hotel was "the centre of social life in the high country area for many years". It was originally built in 1910 and licensed in 1915, with the first licensees being Mr and Mrs Harris and Mrs Cooke. Our Tooth records tell us that the hotel closed on 11 November 1936, with the license transferred to Yarrangobilly Caves House. It was run as a guest house, popular with those visiting the area for fishing and skiing, until the weatherboard building was demolished in the 1960s. We have records for six different hotels named the Riverina Hotel in our Tooth & Company archives. One of these is the Riverina Hotel in Wagga Wagga, which originally opened in 1851 as the Hope Inn. The hotel became known as the Bridge Hotel in 1865, renamed to reflect its close proximity to the bridge that joined the north and south of Wagga Wagga. Tooth & Company bought the hotel in 1925 and rebuilt it from a single storey building to a two storey hotel complete with balcony in January 1925. Tooth owned the hotel until 1977. The Riverina Hotel still trades today and is the oldest building in Wagga Wagga that is still being used for the purpose for which it was originally built. You can see more photographs of Riverina hotels in our Tooth & Company online exhibition, using the interactive map to search by location or hotel name - http://library-admin.anu.edu.au/toothhotels/. We also hold many property and office records for these hotels, generally dating from the 1920s to 1970s. If you would like to access these please feel free to contact us at [email protected]

13.01.2022 WARNING: Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people should be aware that this post includes images and names of deceased persons. This week is National NAIDOC Week, which celebrates the history, culture and achievements of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people. We have been working hard on a number of projects relating to some of our Aboriginal records. One of the projects we are very excited to have just completed is an index of information relating to the Aborigin...al people of Borroloola, a remote community approximately 7 hours southeast of Katherine in the Northern Territory. Borroloola has historically been home to a number of different Aboriginal cultures, including the Yanyuwa, Mara, Karawa and Kurdanji people. The Yanyuwa and Mara are referred to as 'saltwater people' and are associated with the Sir Edward Pellew Islands and the lower reaches of the McArthur and Wearyan Rivers. The Kurdanji and Karawa people are classed as 'mainland people' and are associated with land to the south and east of the present Borroloola township. In the late 1950s and early 1960s, anthropologist Marie Reay undertook extensive fieldwork in Aboriginal communities in western NSW and the Northern Territory, including at Borroloola. Through the course of her fieldwork Marie created many records, including field notebooks, photographs, and extensive notes on residents. One of the records she created was a set of detailed index cards for Aboriginal members of the Borroloola community. These cards give us incredible insight into the Aboriginal people living in the area at the time and record names, ages, birthplaces, totems, kinship groups and details of relatives. We have just completed work on a searchable index of these cards and this will be available on your website shortly. We hold a large variety of records relating to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people. This includes records relating to Aboriginal people working on pastoral stations; records within our trade union collections relating to Aboriginal rights campaigns; and records of individuals, such as Marie Reay, who conducted research relating to Aboriginal people. If you would like to see if we hold any records that may help with your research, please feel free to email us at [email protected]

11.01.2022 One of the main types of records we collect in the Noel Butlin Archives Centre (NBAC) are the records of Australian companies. In fact the first collection received by the NBAC, which was known as the ANU Archives of Business and Labour, was a large collection of records of Australia’s oldest agricultural company, the Australian Agricultural Company. Highlights of our business collections include prominent companies such as Dalgety Ltd, Burns Philp & Co Ltd, CSR Limited, Too...th & Co Ltd, Goldsbrough Mort, Elder Smith & Co Ltd, as well as many pastoral stations. Their records occupy hundreds of shelf metres and cover the period from the 1820s to the 2000s. We also hold the records of many smaller Australian businesses that operated at both a national and regional level. One of these companies, which you may not have previously heard of, is the Melbourne-based shoe manufacturers Bedggood and Company. Bedggood and Company was founded in 1854 by Englishman Daniel Bedggood. On arrival from England he established a business making work boots in the Melbourne suburb of Richmond. As the business grew, he also imported English footwear. The company opened branches throughout Australia. Bedggood brought his three sons, Thomas, Edward and John, into the business in 1864 and constructed a new factory on Judd Street in 1873. Son John worked as a travelling salesman, doing good business on the Victorian Goldfields. With Daniel’s retirement, Edward’s death and Thomas leaving the business, John ran the company from the 1870s until 1911, with his son Daniel joining him as a director in 1893. Business was tough in the late 1800s, and the Company blamed protective duties for increasing local competition. To stay competitive, Bedggood explored markets far and wide, with regular trips to regional Victoria, Tasmania, NSW and South Australia, as well as New Zealand. In the 1890s the Company purchased new equipment and honed their manufacturing methods. They greatly benefited from receiving a contract to supply boots to Boer War troops. The Company had a warehouse in Flinders Lane as well as a new factory in Jolimont. The Company continued to operate throughout the early 1900s, with large demand for Australian-made shoes during the war periods and contracts to supply the military, including manufacturing flying boots for the RAAF. The Company also received contracts to manufacture cricket boots for both Australian and English teams. Changes to the market, including technical changes and the availability of imports, made business increasingly difficult for local shoe manufacturers from the 1960s onward, and Bedggood was no exception. The company was deregistered on 21 July 1965. Within our archives we hold records of the company dating from 1895 to 1959 including meeting minutes, financial records, wage books, apprentice registers, advertising materials, and photographs.

09.01.2022 Keeping it real today with a peak inside one of our processing areas in our repository and a large collection we’ve just started working on. Sometimes we receive donations of neatly boxed material that don’t require too much processing work on our part, and other times we receive donations that are in more of a, shall we say, untamed state. It’s a reminder that working as an archivist is very rewarding most days, but some days really requires you to roll up your sleeves and... get your hands dirty. The reality is that most collections we receive require a fair amount of work to get them to a stage where they are accessible to researchers and can be preserved for use for many years to come. This work generally requires sorting through original boxes and rehousing material into more appropriate acid-free boxes and containers. If a collection includes photographs, maps and certificates, these may also need to be carefully flattened or have some conservation work done before rehousing in high-quality polypropylene or mylar sleeves. Importantly, we also need to prepare detailed and searchable lists of the material for our website so that they are discoverable for researchers. There are some real treasures in this collection, dating back to the mid-1800s, and we look forward to sharing the after photos with you in the coming months.

06.01.2022 Happy International Women's Day! We are very fortunate to be caretakers of the records of so many remarkable women. We are particularly grateful to have many records of Australian trade unions dating back to the mid-1800s, including unions with large female representation and those that represented traditional female trades and professions including teachers, hairdressers, air hostesses, tailoresses, actors and administrative workers. ... We also have many trade union records relating to women from unions that are not necessarily thought of in relation to female representation and activism on women’s issues. This includes the Waterside Workers’ Federation, Seamen’s Union of Australia and Australian Coal and Shale Employees’ Federation. Each of these unions, although dominated by male members, had very active female participation in the form of Women’s Committees and Women’s Auxiliaries, and their efforts in campaigning for women’s issues including the right to paid work, equal pay, maternity leave and access to childcare was highly significant. In 1969, it was actually the Australasian Meat Industry Employees’ Union, which represented a large male workforce, that was responsible for spearheading the equal pay debate at the time by bringing an equal pay case against the Meat and Allied Trades Federation of Australia & Others before the Australian Conciliation and Arbitration Commission. Prior to this time, women’s wages were generally substantially lower than men’s, even when a female employee was performing the same work as her male colleague. The meat industry union’s challenge in 1969 essentially argued for the concept of equal pay for equal work. On 19th June 1969 the Commission ruled in favour of the union, stating that in cases where women performed equal work alongside men then they should receive equal pay to their male colleagues. Although of course we know that the fight continues, with the full-time gender pay gap in Australia still sitting at 13.4%, with women earning on average $242 less per week than men. You can explore our trade union records, including many that relate to the continuing campaign for equal pay, on our website - http://archives.anu.edu.au/

05.01.2022 This week’s Tooth & Co tour takes us to the inner-city Sydney suburb of Surry Hills. In our archives we hold records for around 50 different Surry Hills hotels. With this in mind, we will be covering the hotels of the area in a three-part post. So if your favourite Surry Hills watering hole isn’t covered this week, keep an eye on our page over the next couple of weeks. The original Aboriginal inhabitants of the Surry Hills area were the Gadigal people. The earliest European s...Continue reading

04.01.2022 Are you an honours (or equivalent) student researching business or labour history? If so, you should visit us at the Noel Butlin Archives Centre. You should also consider applying for the Eric Fry Labour History Research Grant. The Canberra Region Branch of the Australian Society for the Study of Labour History (ASSLH) and the Australian Studies Institute at the ANU invite students doing honours or the equivalent to apply for this $1,000 grant to conduct research with us at ...the Noel Butlin Archives Centre in Canberra. The Eric Fry Labour History Research Grant is awarded to honour the work of Dr Eric Fry. Eric was born in 1921 and completed a Bachelor of Economics at the University of Sydney before completing an Honours Degree in Arts (1950); Diploma of Education (1951); and a PhD from the ANU. He lectured in history at UWA and UNE before relocating to Canberra, where he was a senior lecturer at CUC and the ANU (1960- 67); reader in history (1967-86) and dean of the ANU Faculty of Arts (1973-75). Eric was a founding member, along with Robin (Bob) Gollan, of the Australian Society for the Study of Labour History, as well as the Society's first secretary and later President (1984-86). Eric died on 3 October 2007. Applications for this grant close on 31 March each year, with the research grant awarded in April. More information is available on our website - http://archives.anu.edu.au//eric-fry-labour-history-resear Image: Dr Eric Fry, 1976. Photographer: Daniel Featherstone.

04.01.2022 By request, this week's tour of Sydney's Tooth & Company hotels takes us back to the Inner West, specifically to the neighbourhoods of Leichhardt, Annandale and Petersham. The area is home to some long-established hotels, including Leichhardt’s Bald Faced Stag, which opened in the 1830s as a Tooheys hotel and was apparently frequented by the Tooheys family. Petersham’s White Cockatoo Hotel opened in 1886 as the Lord Carrington Hotel and was then known as the Carrington Hotel...Continue reading

03.01.2022 Who's been binge-watching the Netflix series The Crown? We'll admit it's been the guilty pleasure this week for a certain few members of our Archives team. It got us thinking about royal visits to Australia, and particularly to Canberra. There have been over 50 visits of members of the British Royal Family to Australia. H.R.H. Queen Elizabeth II, H.R.H. The Duke of Edinburgh, H.R.H. The Prince of Wales and H.R.H. The Princess Royal, amongst many other royals, have made a num...ber of trips to Australia, including to Canberra and the ANU. The first permanent building on the ANU Acton Campus, University House, was officially opened by H.R.H. The Duke of Edinburgh on 16 February 1954. H.R.H. Queen Elizabeth II officially opened the R.G. Menzies Library (accompanied by H.R.H. The Duke of Edinburgh) on 13 March 1963. H.R.H. Queen Elizabeth II was the first reigning monarch of Australia to set foot on Australian soil, when she arrived in Sydney on 3 February 1954. Accompanied by H.R.H. The Duke of Edinburgh, she visited the Australian Capital Territory, New South Wales, Tasmania, Victoria, Queensland, South Australia and Western Australia. As part of our Goldsbrough Mort archives, we hold photos of their visit to Adelaide. Here we are sharing a selection of royal visit photos from our archives.

01.01.2022 Today marks the 100th anniversary of the formation of the Communist Party of Australia (CPA). From a membership of just 26, the CPA grew to be a significant influence in Australian society and politics, with a particularly large representation in the trade union movement. The formation of the Party was spurred on by the growing Labor Movement in Australia and the 1917 Bolshevik Revolution in Russia, with the Party heavily influenced by the Communist Party of the Soviet Union...Continue reading

01.01.2022 Time for our first trip through our Tooth & Company archives for 2021, and this time we're heading to a great little pocket of Sydney's Inner West and the suburbs of Marrickville, Dulwich Hill, Stanmore and Enmore. Some of Tooth & Company's earliest enterprises in the area were Marrickville's Livingstone Hotel (1892) and Victoria Hotel (1897, later known as Hotel Marrickville) and Dulwich Hill's Gladstone Hotel (1897). The Marrickville area is the traditional land of the Cadi...Continue reading