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Port Keats Mission

Port Keats Mission was established by the Catholic Church in 1935 at Werntek Nganayi in the Daly River district. It moved to Wadeye in 1938. A Mission school and dormitories were established for Aboriginal boys and girls aged 5 to 17 years. The school closed between 1942 and 1946 due to World War II. In…

Garden Point Mission

The Garden Point Mission was established on Melville Island in 1940 by the Catholic Church to take charge of all Catholic Aboriginal children from The Bungalow, Alice Springs, and Kahlin Compound in Darwin. A residential school operated at the mission for children aged 5 to 17 years. In 1942 many children were evacuated to Carrieton…

Our Lady of the Sacred Heart Primary School

Our Lady of the Sacred Heart Primary School was established by the Daughters of Our Lady of the Sacred Heart in Alice Springs in 1938. From 1940 it provided accommodation and education for children aged 5 to 16. Children under the care of the government may also have been placed at the School. In 1983…

Daly River Mission

The Daly River Mission was established by the Catholic Church on the Daly River in 1955. It operated a Mission School with dormitories for Aboriginal children aged 5 to 17 from 1957. The Daughters of Our Lady of the Sacred Heart were placed in charge of the girls and the Missionaries of the Sacred Heart…

Jibson House

Jibson House in South Hedland was established in 2011 as a government-run residential group home. It was in the same premises as the South Hedland Group Home. Jibson House had closed by 2014 and in that year the premises were being used for the Port Hedland Lifeskills Office of the Department for Child Protection and…

St Andrew’s Hostel, Esperance

St Andrew’s Hostel, Esperance was established in 1968 by the Anglican Diocese of Kalgoorlie to accommodate young people attending high school in Esperance. From 1973 to 1975 it was run by the Anglican Diocese of Perth and then by the Country High School Hostels Authority. It was not uncommon for children who were wards of…

Waif’s Home, Parkerville

The Waif’s Home, Parkerville began in 1903. It was founded by the Sisters of the Church. Sister Kate Clutterbuck has had the strongest association with the Home, which was the pioneer in Western Australia of ‘cottage care’ and keeping children from the same family together. In 1909, the Waif’s Home, Parkerville became a subsidised orphanage…

Perth College

Perth College was established in 1902 by the Sisters of the Church, an Anglican religious order, as a boarding and day school. From 1902 to around 1910, the college also accommodated girls aged 6-10 years who had been brought by the Sisters in 1901 from the Orphanage of Mercy, Kilburn in England. ‘Destitute’ babies were…

Malcolm Street Receiving Home

Malcolm Street Receiving Home was established by the Sisters of the Church in 1907, possibly to accommodate infants who could not be placed at the Waif’s Home, Parkerville. It is likely that the Malcolm Street Receiving Home was open for a short period of time. Whittington (in Sister Kate 1999, p.131) reports that around May…

Girls’ High School, Kalgoorlie

Girls’ High School, Kalgoorlie, was established in 1903 by the Sisters of the Church as a boarding and day school for girls. The first students were nine girls aged 6-10 years who had been brought by the Sisters in 1901 from the Orphanage of Mercy, Kilburn in England. These girls lived at Kalgoorlie for some…