Gippsland and East Gippsland Aboriginal Cooperative Ltd is a community controlled not-for-profit organisation that was established in 1972 to respond to poor health and housing outcomes for Aboriginal people in Gippsland, Victoria. It opened the Meerindoo Hostel for Aboriginal students at Bairnsdale in 1972, and ran it (with support from Aboriginal Hostels Ltd) until 2014,…
Meerindoo Hostel was opened at Bairnsdale in 1972 as a hostel for Aboriginal students from regional communities in Eastern Victoria attending school in Bairnsdale. It had capacity for up to 12 students aged between 12 and 17 years old. At times children who were wards of the state we placed at Meerindoo. Many of the…
Aboriginal Hostels Limited (AHL) was established in June 1973 to provide hostel accommodation and related services to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people across Australia. AHL was established by the Commonwealth Government as a not-for-profit company, with the AHL board reporting to the Minister for Aboriginal Affairs. It ran at least one children’s home/hostel for…
This is a youtube video that contains approximately one minute of footage of Turana from the early 1980s.
Glenn’s story is a short film by Arnold Zable from 1979. It features the story of 15 year old Glenn Broome who was in the maximum security section of Turana. In the film, Glenn also mentions his time in foster care, and the institutions Allambie and Baltara. Some of the scenes were shot at Turana.
This is a photo of the Wirraminna Hostel, run by Aboriginal Hostels Limited, at Essendon, Melbourne. It shows a brick suburban cottage with white bay windows at the front. This image was published in the 1980 Aboriginal Hostels Limited annual report.
Wirraminna Hostel was a family group home for Aboriginal boys opened by Aboriginal Hostels Limited at Essendon in 1973. Wirraminna was run by a married couple who acted as house parents to the boys who lived there. Typically there were five or six boys in residence at Wirraminna, although the hostel was reported to have…
This is a copy of a photograph of boys in a dormitory at Castledare in Western Australia. It was published on a webpage about Castledare Boys’ Home.
Stubbs Terrace Children’s Home at 233 Stubbs Terrace, Shenton Park, was an inpatient unit for children and young people set up under the Mental Health Act. Residents could be aged between 4 and 17. Delphine Jamet writes that young people were admitted to Stubbs Terrace for temporary care, for a wide range of reasons: “Some were…
This is a copy of a photograph of Stubbs Terrace children’s psychiatric hospital, published in an article on the ABC News website in 2025.
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