Jeffrey Smart, Margaret Olley in the Louvre Museum.
1994–95 Tuscany, Italy. Oil on canvas 67 x 110 cm
Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney. Bequest of Ian Whalland 1997. 85.1997
Jeffrey Smart is admired for his carefully structured paintings of Tuscany and Rome. This National Gallery of Australia’s centenary celebration of his birth takes the viewer back to Adelaide.
Stuart Macintyre was the prime target of the conservatives in the history wars. Our greatest historian of politics and society since the late 19th century, he was assiduous, dedicated and prolific.
Panorama of the gold mining town, Graytown, Victoria, approx. 1861.
National Library of Australia
Bert Newton, a stalwart of Australian radio and television his whole life, has died aged 83.
Frederic Eggleston presented his credentials to Chinese President Lin Sen (林森) at an official reception in Chungking on 28 October 1941.
Sydney Morning Herald, November 12 1941
Under the shadow of World War II, Australia began to form its own foreign policy, separate from the British Empire. A legation in China was Australia’s third foreign outpost.
Education Minister Alan Tudge has rejected the draft history curriculum. He wants students to learn that ‘we live in the greatest country on Earth’. That’s not history. It’s jingoistic nationalism.
Author Hannah Kent’s new novel is a beautifully crafted look at the 19th century Old Lutherans who migrated from Prussia to the colony of South Australia.
Most of our knowledge on songlines comes from central and northern Australia. Now, a songline from north Victoria, reaching up the NSW coast is being reawakened.
A commemorative plaque for Tom Wills, in his hometown of Moyston.
Barry Judd
Discovery of AFL founder Tom Wills’ involvement in the mass murder of Aboriginal people has made it clear truth telling about Australia’s history is needed before any reconciliation can happen.
Missionary Annie Lock with Enbarda (Betsy) left, and Dolly Cumming, both children from the Alice Springs area in Central Australia. Photo taken in Darwin.
National Archives of Australia
I thought I had uncovered a feminist heroine, but for all her intrepid and gutsy behaviour, Lock held intensely socially conservative views in line with her religious conviction.
Portrait of Sir James Stirling, ca. 1833.
Mitchell Library, State Library of New South Wales ML 15 Ref: 897230’
James Stirling was WA’s first governor from 1829-39. He condoned numerous acts of murder by white settlers.
Aboriginal elder Joy Murphy attending the unveiling of a mural painted by Indigenous people in prison, aiming to communicate a message of unity.
JULIAN SMITH/AAP Image
Opportunities to give voice to Aboriginal people in prison have the potential to address the growing impacts of racism in the justice system in Australia.
A slide by Gordon H. Woodhouse to accompany a 1901 lecture by his father Clarence entitled ‘exploration and development of Australia’.
State Library of Victoria
Exclusion has been central to utopian ideas of Australia since before Federation. It still lingers. To progress in this climate-challenged century, Australia’s foundational wrongs must be righted.
S. T. Gill, 34. Iron Bark Eagle Hawk, in Original Sketches, 1844-1866.
Mitchell Library, State Library of New South Wales
Mould, dodging mine shafts, sleeping in beds of dried leaves: Mary Anne Allen’s diary offers a fascinating glimpse of family life on the goldfields in 1852.
Lieutenant John Bowen and party arriving at Risdon, by Thomas Gregson (c.1860).
Courtesy of the WL Crowther Library
Outnumbered 200 to one and using traditional weapons, Tongerlongeter and his warriors drove the colony to desperate measures. In other wars his self-sacrifice would have earned him a medal.
History isn’t just learning facts. Students learn about the past by researching information and synthesising it to form an evidence-based argument. This skill is useful for a range of careers.
Along with firearms and disease, the horse was a key element in occupying Aboriginal land during the colonial period and controlling the largely convict workforce on the frontier.
St Kitts-born Archibald Burt pictured beside sugar cane growing in his Perth garden in 1862. Burt, a former slave owner, became chief justice of Western Australia.
State Library of Western Australia 6923B/182
When Britain legislated to abolish slavery in 1833, some former slave owners moved to the Australasian colonies. New research traces this movement of people, money and ideologies.