Meli is an organisation created in April 2023, following a merger of Bethany and Barwon Child Youth & Family (BCYF). Meli’s office in Hamlyn Heights (Geelong) is on the former site of the Geelong Female Refuge, established in 1868, and Bethany Babies’ Home (1928-1977). BCYF’s originated with the Geelong Orphan Asylum (established 1854), later known…
The Canossian Daughters of Charity is a Catholic order founded in Italy in 1808. They first came to Australian in 1949, and arrived in Darwin in 1970 with the purpose of establishing a residential children’s home – Bakhita Village. They ran the children’s home from 1972 until late December 1974, when it was destroyed by…
The Northcote Trust was established in 1936 following a bequest in the will of Lady Alice Northcote, wife of Lord Henry Northcote, third Governor-General of Australia, to assist “poor children of British birth of either sex, and particularly orphans, to migrate from any part of Great Britain…” (Melbourne Leader, 30 March 1935). The bequest was…
Gilead Boys’ Home was established in Narrogin around 1973 to accommodate Aboriginal boys in a family atmosphere. In the mid-1970s Gilead was used as a single-family foster placement by the Department for Community Welfare, accommodating boys and girls. It was run by the Gilead Boys Home (Inc), with house parents living with the children. It…
The Benedictine Missionary Sisters were a group of Catholic religious women who ran what was known as St Joseph’s Native School and Orphanage, New Norcia from 1904 to 1974. The Benedictine Missionary Sisters were encouraged, according to Massam (2008, p.205) to value ‘poverty, hard manual work, separation from family, obedience to a superior, and dedication…
The Children’s Cottage Home was established by Sister Kate Clutterbuck in 1933 in Buckland Hill. In that year it housed ten children from the Moore River Native Settlement (1918 – 1951). By August 1934, a new Children’s Cottage Home was opened at Queen’s Park and within a year the children and staff had moved there….
The Western Australian State Children Department existed between 1 January 1917 and 22 December 1927. The State Children Department was an early preceding agency to the Department for Communities and the Department for Child Protection and Family Support which were established in 2007. The State Records Office website provides an overview of the State Children…
STAY Geraldton began in 1984. STAY means ‘short term accommodation for youth’ and it has provided services for young people aged 13-25 years since that time. STAY is run by a private management committee as a 24-hour service. STAY Geraldton began in 1984 and by 1987 it received funding from the Youth Supported Accommodation Program,…
Wattle Grove Baptist Cottage was run by members of the Wattle Grove Baptist Church during 1958 and 1959. The Child Welfare Department intended to place 12 ‘specially selected’ girls in the Home, and three girls were housed there by March 1959. It is likely that the department did not place any girls there after 1963….
Shiloh, in Broomehill, south of Katanning, was a farm school for up to 16 boys who were wards of the State, referred by the Child Welfare Department. It was run independently by Mr and Mrs Beeck on their farm, ‘Langwell’. Boys went to school on the property. Shiloh’s aim was to reform ‘delinquent’ boys through…
May 3, 2024
Apr 24, 2024
