Dr Jane Davis is the recipient of the State Library’s second Battye Fellowship. Dr Davis’ project will challenge the current widely-held assumptions about settlers and the Australian environment. It will focus on twenty-one colonists who settled in the South West of Western Australia between 1829 and 1907, and the extent to which they developed a sense of home and belonging through their relationships with and perceptions of the landscapes they encountered.
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Past Speakers
November 2011
Mike Lefroy - C.Y. O'Connor - An Inside Story
Mike has a passion for history, in particular the history of Western Australia and his home town of Fremantle.
He is a fifth generation Western Australian. his great-great-grandfather was John Septimus Roe, the State's first Surveyor General. His great grandfather was Charles Yelverton O'Connor, the Chief Engineer of Fremantle Harbour and the Goldfields Pipeline.
Mike's interest in history and education has drawn him to writing and he particularly enjoys the challenge of making the past come alive for children. his publications include picture books, junior novels, non-fiction titles and education kits.
Mike's current project is a children's book with Black Dog Books about one of Australia's most notorious shipwrecks, the 17th century Dutch Spice trader Batavia.
August 2011
Dr Jean Chetkoich
Building the Battye Collection - Show and Tell
Dr Jean Chetkovich will show us some of the new items which have been added to the Battye collection over the last year. She will also speak about the challenge of determining the significance of items which could potentially be added to the collection. She will welcome discussion with the members on this topic. Jean commenced work at the State Library of Western Australia in August 2010. Her role is described as Collection Liaison: manuscripts.
This involves selection of material for inclusion the heritage collection of the library. Knowledge of Western Australian history or heritage was the primary qualification for the role. Prior to taking up her new role, Jean was formerly the Director of the Centre for Western Australian History at the University of Western Australia. Jean did her PhD at UWA on Irish migration to Western Australia post 1945 and has maintained an active interest in Western Australian history. Her historical works include Irish Migration to Australia after 1945, published in 2009 and A century of care: 100 years of the Silver Chain Nursing Association, 1905-2005 by Jean Chetkovich and Deborah Gare, published in 2005.
May 2011
Mr Kim Epton - Research Co-ordinator
WA Explorers' Diaries Project
The story of the Western Australian Explorers' Diaries Project (incorporating the Historical Records of Western Australia) begins with the collection of exploration reports and journals prepared by the founding Surveyor General of the Swan River Colony, John Septimus Roe. During his term in the Survey Office, Roe attempted to transcribe every journal of exploration in Western Australia, from 1827. The heavy, leather-bound volumes in the State Archive bear witness to many hours of work, the handwriting clearly reflecting the energy or lethargy of the writer. After Roe retired in December 1870 the collection of exploration reports was not updated. Although the Survey Office (later the Lands and Surveys Department) continued to hold surveyors’ field books, journals and reports, these documents were not kept in a single form of reference. There was no perceived need for a single, comprehensive and accurate transcript of expeditions of exploration.
However, almost a century after Roe’s retirement, the need for a central record of exploration documents arose as the result of technological change in the methods of surveying.
Kim Epton is the author of Publishing Your Book with Hesperian Press; C.C. Hunt's 1864 Koolyanobbing Expedition; and Rivers of the Kimberley.
Since helping to establish the Project his role has been one of marketing and assisting in financing future volumes, and maintaining the Project's website.
March 2011
Jane Davis - JS Battye Fellow, State Library of WA
NOVEMBER 2010
Jennie and Bevan Carter - Outpost to City Writing the history of the Armadale district
For the past three years, Jennie and Bevan have been working on a commission from the City of Armadale to research and write the history in Kelmscott in 1830 to its present day position as one of Perth’s largest and fastest growing suburbs. Along the way there have been some interesting discoveries made about the history of Armadale, a couple of myths busted, and just a few controversies stirred.
Jennie has an Honours in History from the University of Western Australia, and graduate qualifications in Library and Information studies from Curtin University. She is the author of Bassendean: A social history 1829 to 1979 which was commissioned and published by the Bassendean Town Council. Before retiring from the State Library in 2007, she managed the archival collections of the Battye Library, then spent two years as Director of the Battye Library prior to completing her career as Battye Librarian and manager of the State Library’s Subject Specialists team.
Bevan has degrees in science and education from Sydney University. For many years he has pursued his interest in family history including a stint as President of the Western Australian Genealogical Society. He is the author and publisher of books on conservation, botany, and history, his most recent works being From Norfolk poacher to Northam farmer: the life, times, and descendents of Robert Carter and Phoebe Oxbury and Nyungah Land: Records of invasion and theft of Aboriginal land on the Swan River 1829-1850.
SEPTEMBER 2010
June Caunt - I was not a whinging Pom; Post World War II migration experiences.
June completed a Masters degree at the University of Notre Dame in 2007 with a thesis titled From Dream to Reality: A Story of British Migration to WA in the 1960's. She is now undertaking a PhD with the University of Western's History Department looking into the attitudes of Western Australians towards British immigrants in the 1960's as expressed through newspapers and other documents.
June has given talks to many groups and benefited from the memories they have shared with her.
JULY 2010
Jonathan Schmidt - "Through the eyes of the conservator. Exhibiting the Duracks: the other side of the story".
Jonathan will discuss the process of putting together an exhibition from storage to display. He has been the Paper Conservator at the State Library for seven years and has treated a wide range of collection materials including documents, photographs, maps, ephemera and plans. He trained in conservation of cultural materials at the University of Canberra.
MAY 2010
Professor Bob Reece - Discovering Robert Menli Lyon
Our guest speaker will be Professor Bob Reece who will talk on the life
of that fascinating and enigmatic early setter in Western Australia,
Robert Menli Lyon.
MARCH 2010
Dr Pamela Statham-Drew & Jacqueline O'Brien - Highlights from our Wittenoom book "On We Go The Wittenoom Way - The Legacy of a Colonial Chaplain"
This book traces the fortunes of the chaplain's descendants from the earliest attempts to carve productive farmland out of a strange, topsy-turvy land in the face of poisonous plants and harsh climate, into the heady days of pastoral expansion and gold fever, through the twentieth century's grimmest experiences of depression and war, and on to the turn of a new century.
NOVEMBER 2009
Dr Robyn Taylor - "Which artist is that? A Battye field guide for finding lost and forgotten artists"
SEPTEMBER 2009
Ronda Jamieson - "Writing a biography of Charles Court; why it has not been done before now"
JULY 2009
Gerard Foley - The files of the Colonial Secretary's Office
Steve Howell - Dead Reckoning: How to find your way through the genealogical jungle of Western Australia
MAY 2009
Father Ted Doncaster - "Colonial Clergymen and their Curious Kinds of Conveyances"
MARCH 2009
Dr John Dargavel - "The zealous conservator: a life of Charles Lane Poole".
PLEASE NOTE:
NEXT MEETING
13 March 2012
5.00pm for 5.30pm
Great Southern Room
4th Floor
State Library of WA
The Great Southern Room is often used prior to our meeting, so please check this website or the FOBS Newsletter for the correct starting time of the FOB's meeting.
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