You might have noticed we haven’t been as active recently on our blog – it has been a busy month for the team. We have been out and about gaining and sharing knowledge and raising the profile of the Find & Connect web resource.
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The first children’s Home in the Colony of New South Wales (and, by extension, the first in mainland Australia) was the Norfolk Island Orphan School (1795-1814). This home for orphaned girls, or those ‘deserted’ by their parents was opened in 1795 by the Lieutenant-Governor of Norfolk Island, Philip Gidley King. The history of the Norfolk Island Home is the starting point for the history of children’s institutions in Australia.
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Once My Mother is a film by Sophia Turkiewicz from 2014. In the film, Sophia explores her troubled relationship with her mother, Helen. Sophia spent ‘two bewildering years’ at an orphanage in Adelaide until Helen was able to bring Sophie to a new home, with her new husband. In this film, Sophia looks back on her childhood and tries to learn more about Helen’s life, while her mother battles dementia.
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A memorial dedicated to children who were in institutional ‘care’ has recently been installed on the Geelong foreshore in Victoria. The hand-carved limestone couch (by local artist Jacinta Leitch) was officially launched in July 2015.
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Yesterday we became aware of an issue with the Search facility on our website. Search is not working if you use older versions of the Internet Explorer (IE) browser (versions 9.0 and earlier).
We are working to rectify this issue and apologise for any inconvenience caused.
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In April 2015, there was a change in policy on public access to the Commonwealth electoral roll. The final report on the 2013 Federal Election by the Joint Standing Committee on Electoral Matters stated that ‘public access to the electoral roll should be unfettered’.
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Earlier this month, the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada (TRC) delivered its final report, including 94 ‘calls to action’. Two of these refer to Aboriginal peoples’ ‘inalienable right to know the truth about what happened and why, with regard to human rights violations committed against them in the residential schools’. What is this right to know the truth?
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Our readers might be interested in a book by Tanya Evans – Fractured Families: life on the margins in colonial New South Wales (2015, UNSW Press). Launched last week at the State Library of New South Wales, the book draws on the archives of The Benevolent Society (founded in 1813) to tell the stories of the ‘ordinary as well as the extraordinary’ people who lived and worked in colonial Sydney.
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Photographs play an important role in everyone’s life – they connect us to our past, they remind us of people, places, feelings, and stories. They can help us to know who we are. For people who grew up in children’s institutions, photographs are especially important – sadly, this is because for so many people, the photographs most of us take for granted, don’t exist.
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A project based at Macquarie University is seeking former residents willing to share their recollections of life at Weroona Home.
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Dec 18, 2024
Nov 15, 2024
