WA Snapshots

WA SNAPSHOTS

The Historical Encyclopedia of Western Australia project is delighted to announce our exciting partnership arrangement with the West Australian. From 24 April 2004 to 10 December 2005 a weekly column was published in the newspaper's Weekend Extra section on the crossword page. The column was an edited extract or full text copy of an Encyclopedia entry. We are very grateful to West Australian Newspapers for this high-circulation publicity.

Anzac Cottage
Anzac cottage, 38 Kalgoorlie Street, Mount Hawthorn is Western Australia’s oldest First World War memorial, unique because it is a house. Organised by the Mount Hawthorn Progress association, it was erected to commemorate the landing of Australian Forces at Gallipoli on 25 April 1915. Seventy horse-drawn drays formed a half-mile procession in James Street on 5 February 1916 to cart donated materials to the cleared block. On Saturday 12 February, Mount Hawthorn was awoken at 3.30 am to the sounds of a ringing bell and a town crier: ‘Arise, arise! Anzac Cottage is to be built today’. Community spirit rallied over two hundred men to volunteer and dozens of women to serve hot meals as they toiled. Thousands watched the spectacle of a house being built in one day. Private John Porter was chosen as the recipient of the four-room bungalow. A soldier in the 11th Battalion, wounded on 25 April 1915, Porter was in the first contingent of diggers to return to Perth from the ill-fated campaign. Restored in 1995, heritage listed and administered by the Vietnam Veterans’ Association, Anzac Cottage is now a museum. Every year Australia’s last Anzac service of the day is held at the cottage, under a western sunset.
Valerie Everett

Anzac Day
On 1 November 1914, 30,000 men of the Australian and New Zealand Army Corp (ANZACS) sailed from Albany. On the last day of December, a second convoy left Albany with a further 12,000 Anzacs. At dawn on 25 April 1915, most of these men began landing at Gallipoli on the Turkish coast, at a position now named Anzac Cove. In the eight months of the Gallipoli campaign, 25,000 Australians died or suffered wounds and serious illness.

In 1919, the Western Australian Parliament passed the Anzac Day Act, making the state the first to proclaim 25 April as a public holiday of remembrance. Since Second World War, Anzac Day, while retaining the spirit of Gallipoli, honours all Australian men and women who served in the military and associated services in Australia and overseas.

The first official capital city dawn service was at the Sydney Cenotaph in 1927. Perth followed in 1929 with a dawn service at the WA State War Memorial in Kings Park. What is believed to be the first rural dawn service in Australia, was conducted at Albany in 1930 by a former army padre, the Rev. Arthur White.
Neville Green

Australia First Movement
The Australia First Movement, ultra-nationalist, semi-fascist and anti-semitic, grew from resentment of perceived British attitudes toward Australians during the First World War, the Great Depression and even the ‘bodyline’ cricket tour of 1932-33.

Its leaders, the Sydney writer Percy Reginald ‘Inky’ Stephensen and businessman William John Miles, were tolerated by the Right in the 1930s because of their anti-communism; they were, however, increasingly sympathetic toward the totalitarian governments of Germany, Italy and Japan as the Second World War approached.

The movement’s Western Australian branch did not exist until 1942; its membership then consisted of just four people and a Military Intelligence agent provocateur, Frederick James Thomas. Largely on Thomas’s evidence, Laurence Frederick Bullock, a Gallipoli veteran, and Charles Leonard Albert Williams, an insurance agent, were convicted in the WA Supreme Court on 23 June 1942 of conspiring to assist Japanese forces then seemingly poised to invade Australia. Both served gaol terms and were then interned by Commonwealth authorities. Nancy Rachel Krakouer, a postal assistant, and Edward Cunningham Quicke, a dairy farmer, were acquitted by the jury but interned regardless, along with sixteen other movement members from New South Wales and Victoria.
Peter Gifford

The Avon Descent
The Avon Descent is Western Australia’s own unique sporting event that attracts participants and spectators from throughout Australia and increasingly, overseas.  Participants challenge the Avon and Swan Rivers in a variety of paddle and power craft in a two-day time trial over 133 kilometres offering participants conditions ranging from long stretches of flat water through to white water rapids.

This event was first held in 1973 with just forty-nine competitors, no rules, no officials, no checkpoints and very few spectators.  In the thirty-one years hence, over twenty-five thousand people have competed in the Avon Descent, from novices and families, to World and Olympic Champions. 
Preparation, planning and management for the Avon Descent is undertaken throughout the year by members of Northam’s Avon Descent Association.  Over 2000 Western Australian volunteers support the race itself. Communities and community groups benefit directly and indirectly from the Avon Descent and it is estimated that more than $5 million was injected into the local economy in 2001 as a result of the event and the additional visitors attracted to the regions.

The Avon Descent has all of the ingredients for a highly visual, interactive and spectacular event.
Dave Hunt

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Banking
Banking took eight years to gain a foothold in WA. Prior to the establishment of the Bank of Western Australia (BWA) in June 1837, the colony had insufficient capital to support a local bank, while external banks dismissed WA as too small. Among the founders of BWA were leading merchants and landowners. Encouraged by this demonstration of viability, the Bank of Australasia opened a branch in 1841, causing upheaval in BWA and, before long, its closure. Several directors of BWA subsequently formed the Western Australian Bank (WAB), competing so successfully with the interloper that it withdrew within five years.

The WAB survived the colonial government’s short-lived attempt to encourage working class thrift by opening a savings bank in 1855, as well as the establishment of the Post Office Savings Bank in 1863. More formidable opposition arrived in the form of intercolonial banks, beginning with the National Bank in 1866. The Union Bank established a Perth branch during 1878, the Bank of New South Wales (BNSW) arrived in 1883, and the Commercial Bank established a presence in 1888. In 1895 Premier Forrest sought to stimulate agriculture by establishing the Agricultural Bank (ABWA).
Ken Spillman

Bell-ringing
Bell-ringing (change ringing) is a traditional English folk-art that originated in the early seventeenth-century when it was discovered that bells could be rung using a scientific system of mathematical permutations. While the art maintains a socio-cultural association with Anglicanism, it also adopts a broader secular function.

Change ringing was first introduced into Australia in Sydney after the arrival of the first ring of eight bells in 1795. During the nineteenth century the practice spread to other colonies, with installations of bells in Tasmania, Victoria, South Australia and Queensland.

In Western Australia the first change ringing bells were installed in 1903 at St George’s Cathedral, Perth, as a memorial to Queen Victoria. Between 1985 and 1996 change ringing expanded, largely due to the influence of Australia’s Bicentenary and private benefactors. Three new installations of bells occurred at Holy Trinity, York, Christ Church, Claremont, and St Hilda’s Anglican School for Girls, Mosman Park. During the late 1990s, change ringing extended south of Perth, with bells installed at Rockingham Civic Centre and Christ’s Church, Mandurah. Finally, in December 2000, Western Australia’s controversial Millennium Project ‘The Swan Bells’ was officially opened. The eighteen bells include twelve historic bells from the church of St Martin-in-the-Fields, London.
Ron Chapman

Bible Society
The Bible Society in Western Australia is an interdenominational non-profit organisation tracing its roots back to the formation of the British and Foreign Bible Society in London in 1804. The Society translates, publishes and distributes the scriptures to churches, groups, individuals and communities in Western Australia 'free of doctrinal note or comment'. It also cooperates with the national and overseas Bible Societies to 'achieve the widest possible effective distribution of the Christian Scriptures.'

Bicycles
Invention of the Safety Cycle in 1885 and pneumatic tyre in 1888 provided a cheap and convenient mode of transport for the 1890s gold rush in WA.

Versatile on untracked country, the bicycle proved a boon to prospectors, shearers and professionals such as doctors and ministers of religion, while messenger and 'express' delivery services, sometimes involving relays of riders, sped up communication. Having the advantage of not requiring fuel or feed, the bicycle proved invaluable to boundary riders who inspected and repaired the rabbit proof fence, while similar inspection and repair teams covered the Kalgoorlie water pipeline up to 1962. Showing the potential of the bicycle, Arthur Richardson was the first cyclist to cross the Nullarbor in 1896, riding from Coolgardie to Adelaide in thirty-one days. He later answered the 'call' when, along with other WA bushmen cyclists, he joined a cycling brigade in the Boer War, providing valuable communication and combat services.

The largest cycle builder and dealer in the State was Swansea Cycles of Fremantle, who in their heyday produced over 1,500 machines a year. But gone are the days when choice is restricted to a simple steel framed machine: cycles can now cost as much as a new car.
Mel Davies

Blue Funnel Line
The Blue Funnel Line (Ocean Steam Ship Co.) was established by Alfred Holt in 1865 in Liverpool, England. It first appeared in WA waters in 1891 to provide a vital feeder service to the mainline and Britain via the north-west ports and Singapore.

‘Blueys’ nearly always carried Greek names which were often re-used. Two successive Gorgons (1908–28, 1933-–64), two Charons (1903–25, 1936-64) and two Centaurs were specially designed for the WA Service to withstand the extreme tidal conditions in north-west ports and to accommodate the live sheep and cattle trade, transport refrigerated products, general cargo and passengers.

The vessels were also known as the ‘schoolships’. By the mid 1950s up to 250 school children of ex-pat British and Australian families based in Singapore and Malaya were taken home at Christmas time and returned at the beginning of the school year to boarding schools in Australia, principally Perth.

During the Second World War the ships were requisitioned by the Australian Government to transport supplies and troops.

The Service ended in 1982 due to its inability to compete with container shipping.
Juliet Ludbrook

Boer War
The Boer War provided the opportunity to demonstrate that the granting of responsible government in 1890 had been justified and that Western Australia could meet the expectations of a self governing colony. Support for the imperial cause against the two Boer Republics in South Africa was popular. Between November 1899 and May 1902 over 1,200 volunteered to serve in South Africa in contingents raised in Western Australia.

The 1st Contingent under Major HG Moor, left Albany on 7 November 1899, arriving in Cape Town on 27 November. They were accompanied by infantry companies from other Australian colonies. In Cape Town the companies were amalgamated to form the First Australian Regiment, the first time that a unit representing the various Australian colonies had been formed for active service.

The 1st Contingent saw action on 9 February 1900.at Sligersfontein The action and location were given the name of West Australia Hill in honour of the brave defence against superior forces.

The first Victoria Cross awarded to a Western Australian was to Lieutenant Frederick William Bell, West Australian Mounted Infantry for gallantry at Brakpan, Transvaal on 16 May 1901.

The Fallen Soldiers’ Memorial in Kings Park commemorates Boer War service and lists 41 casualties.
Robert Mitchell

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Camels
Camels were initially introduced into Australia to aid in the exploration and development of the arid outback. In the wake of earlier efforts, the first successful large-scale commercial importation of camels from Karachi to South Australia occurred in 1865. Camels were typically accompanied by their Muslim handlers, who became collectively identified as Afghans. Colonel P. E. Warburton’s 1873 expedition from Adelaide to north-western Australia was the first to use only camels as transportation. The first camels seen in Perth were on the Ernest Giles’s 1875 expedition from Port Augusta. By the late nineteenth century camels had become the accepted desert transportation method, particularly in South and Western Australia.

Camels contributed greatly to the economic settlement and growth of the outback. During the 1890s gold boom in WA, camels carted food, water and other supplies from ports to the goldfields. Across Australia, they carted supplies and ore to and from mines. Camels also transported building materials for the construction of telegraph and railway lines. Major stock routes were developed based on surveying and bore-drilling expeditions that used camels. Their use slowly declined after the First World War however, as motor vehicles became more common.
Jane Leong and Bianca Piestrzeniewicz

Circuses
Historically, most circuses seen in WA have come from the east.
The first recorded circus performance in WA was an ‘international circus’ presented by the acrobat Frank Stebbing, advertised in the Perth Enquirer on 25 April 1869, as the first equestrian entertainment in WA. The gold rushes were a magnet for circuses, which sometimes received payment in dust and nuggets. The Hyland family came to WA in 1910 and became our resident circus for some decades. Today with increasing government restriction, fewer circuses can afford to come here, but the Lennon organisation, including Burtons and Stardust, occasionally makes the trip across the Nullarbor. Perth and some regional centres are on the itinerary for international tours, like the Canadian Cirque du Soleil.

The original ‘Wimmin’s Circus’, including West Australians Rose Wise and Sarah McNamara started in Melbourne in the 1980s. Other West Australians, Anni Davey, Mel Fyffe, Matt Wilson and Joel Salom all became pivotal members of Circus Oz. Festival Circus, Bizircus, Suitcase Circus and Flip ‘n’ Flop are among the small groups which have travelled throughout the state combining circus-style performances with training for children. Matt Yates’ Lunar Circus, from Margaret River, is known for its bold energetic performances.
Reginald Bolton

Constitution Centre
The Constitutional Centre of Western Australia was opened by the Premier Richard Court on 29 October 1997. The State Governor at the time was Major General Michael Jeffery and in his Australia Day 2005 address as Governor General, Jeffery described the centre 'as a superb educational model where students and visitors learn how our political system evolved and works now, its relevance to them and the influence on governance they can have’. In response to documented public support, and a specific submission, The Report of the Western Australian Constitutional Committee (1994), chaired by Malcolm McCusker QC, had earlier recommended the establishment of the Centre. The state government of the time, led by Premier Richard Court, keenly endorsed the concept. The former Hale School site, near the Parliament, was redesigned to house the new Centre, with Malcolm McCusker as the inaugural chair of the Advisory Board. As well as providing civic education for ciitizens about the state's constitution and the federal political system in the form of publications, exhibitions, escorted tours (including the associated Electoral Education Centre) and other activities, the Centre provides strategic policy advice in this domain to the Premier.
Harry C. J. Phillips

Coolbaroo League
The Coolbaroo League (1946–64) began operations in Noongar country in Perth, and soon spread to a number of outlying regional towns. Coolbaroo, a word for 'Magpie,' was suggested by returned Yamatji servicemen Jack and Bill Poland and came to represent a message of reconciliation, of black and white coming together.

Originally beginning with the popular weekly community dances that centred around East Perth, the Coolbaroo League grew to become an Aboriginal-controlled community organisation responsible for running the 'Westralian Aborigine' newspaper; lobbying the state government on issues such as the removal of children, citizenship laws, deaths in custody, and repealing of the worst elements of the then 1944 Aboriginal Citizenship Act, the 1936 Native Administration Act; and eventually having an impact on changes to the 1954 Native Welfare Act.

Various community members relate the closure of the league to the creation of the Aboriginal Advancement Council, others suggest that the league continued on with small functions into the mid 1960s. Until the time that the League was absorbed into the Native Welfare Council, a white ameliorative society, it could be considered the most advanced and effective Aboriginal organisation of its kind in WA.
Steve Kinnane

Coolgardie International Exhibition
Coolgardie International Exhibition, held March to July 1899, was in the
tradition of the 1851 Great Exhibition in London’s Crystal Palace. It celebrated the prosperity that gold had brought to the colony. The main building, forming part of a quadrangle, was of stone, and comprised a tower, concert hall, an agricultural exhibits hall, and administration. The remainder of the quadrangle was galvanised metal with lawns and fountains around the buildings to defy the desert. Performances by a Coolgardie choir and orchestra brought forth the talents of the culturally diverse goldfields. There were also swimming carnivals, tug-o-war competitions, spelling bees, eisteddfods, stone throwing, weight lifting and wrestling contests.

Agricultural produce from York and the south-west districts was displayed along with a jarrah exhibit and mining machinery displays. The Mineral Court was impressive and became the core of the WA government’s contribution to exhibitions in Paris in 1900 and Glasgow in 1901.

The Exhibition failed to attract much international or inter-colonial support, as much because of worldwide economic depression as the remoteness of the location. However, additional trains and reduced fares enabled people to come from all over the colony, with a total of 61,000 visitors.
Lynne Eastoe

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Diamonds
Gold prospectors at Nullagine made the first discovery of diamonds in WA in 1895, but the development of this and subsequent small alluvial deposits proved not economically viable. It was not until 1976 that the first significant diamond discovery was made at Ellendale, 140 kilometres east of Derby in the Kimberley, where exploration revealed approximately fifty diamond pipes, but they too were considered to be uneconomic for a mining operation to be established. The delay in diamonds being discovered in WA was due in part to their atypical occurrence within lamproite rock rather than kimberlite geological formations as found elsewhere. The major Argyle discovery was made in 1979, 130 kilometres south-east of Kununurra, with initial production being concentrated on the associated alluvial deposits of Smoke and Limestone Creeks.

Mining of the main Argyle diamond pipe began in 1985 and has proven to be the most prolific source of diamonds in the world, although the majority are of an industrial rather than gem quality grade. A second diamond mining operation was established at Bow River (1988–95), 30 kilometres downstream of the Argyle deposit. Mining of the previously discovered Ellendale deposits began in 2002.
Garrick Moore

Fairbridge
The Fairbridge child migrants farm school near Pinjarra was the first of the seven Fairbridge schools around the world, the only one established and managed personally by Kingsley Fairbridge (1885-1924) and his wife Ruby, and is the only one still surviving largely intact. The site initially chosen proved too small and after several years the school moved to its nearby present location in 1920. Children considered to have poor prospects in England were trained for colonial farm life. With male and female staff and students, abuses associated with some child migration and orphanage schemes were generally avoided.

The property was owned by the London-based Child Migration Society, whose Chairman during the 1920s was Sir Arthur Lawley, formerly Governor of WA. Most buildings are by Perth architects but the chapel (1928-32) is Australia’s only design by leading English architect Sir Herbert Baker who had worked in South Africa and India.

After the Second World War, Fairbridge provided temporary accommodation for migrant families. When demand diminished the property was sold to Alcoa Australia, and after a period of uncertainty was leased in the 1990s to local charitable group Fairbridge WA, which operates educational and community activities focussed on youth, heritage and environment.
David Dolan

Fremantle Doctor
The Fremantle Doctor is the regular sea breeze which blows on summer afternoons across Fremantle and the Perth suburbs. The term ‘doctor’ was first used in South Africa and the West Indies, to describe winds with refreshing or cleansing properties. It had entered the Western Australian lexicon by 1870 at the latest, as the name of a distinctive climatic feature gratefully appreciated not only for lowering the daytime temperature, but also for purging diseases from the atmosphere, promoting health and ‘vigour’ in children and longevity in adults, and making the colony ideally suited to receive convalescents from less salubrious outposts of the British Empire, especially India.

As Perth developed into a suburbanised and widely-affluent city, ‘the doctor’ took on different connotations, delighting wind-surfers but otherwise encouraging an early-afternoon exodus from blustery beaches, and reliably affecting the outcomes of yachting races and cricket matches.

The Fremantle Doctor is a south-westerly wind; its effects are felt on an average of five out every seven summer days, typically reaching the coast by midday and blowing at between ten and twenty knots during the afternoon, before dying out around sunset.
Joseph Christensen

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Greenough
Greenough is a rural farming community located on fertile flats stretching approximately 12-25km south of Geraldton. The name of the flats, town and shire derive from the Greenough River. Captain George Grey named the river after Sir George Greenough, President of the Royal Geographical Society. Colonial settlement in the 1850s led to the indigenous communities being savaged by disease and frontier conflict. The first colonial settlers were pastoralists, followed by farmers and subsidiary commercial interests. A town evolved in the 1860s boasting a vibrant community life. In 1888 a great flood devastated Greenough, costing at least four lives and destroying or severely damaging most homes and businesses. The lack of a town plan meant the town of Greenough did not have the cohesion necessary to withstand natural disasters and economic downturns. In the three decades that followed the flood the town atrophied, but the rural community survived. The historic hamlet at Central Greenough is a reminder of the attempt to rebuild the town after the flood. The emphasis on the establishment and resurrection of religious institutions, post-1888, is symbolic of the belief in restoring a covenant with God, as if the flood had washed away sin. The hamlet has national heritage significance.
Simon Stevens

The Independent
The Independent, WA’s first new newspaper for seventy years, was launched on 27 April 1969. Its owners, mining partners L.G. (Lang) Hancock and E.A. (Peter) Wright, saw it as an effective vehicle for giving them ‘a voice in public affairs.’ In his introductory statement, Wright said he wanted to raise the interest of people ‘by fighting socialism and the woolly thinking that goes with it.’

Launched as a Sunday publication, with the intention it would go daily, The Independent never seriously challenged the market dominance of the long-established  Sunday Times.  Although there was a period during which it claimed sales of 70,000 copies, The Independent was unable to close a 100,000-plus circulation gap. Founding editor, Maxwell Newton, only stayed a year before returning to Canberra.

The Independent became a daily newspaper for four weeks late in 1973, when it was published as The Independent Sun. The return to Sunday-only publication was blamed on lower than expected sales and low advertising volumes.

In December 1984, with losses exceeding  $1 million a year, the paper was acquired by News Corporation, who ran it side-by-side with The Sunday Times. The reprieve only lasted until May 1986 when it was closed because of ‘cost and circulation problems.’
Jack Beverley

Kurirr Kurirr
The Kurirr Kurirr is an Indigenous ceremony of the East Kimberley region of WA, made famous by its connection with the distinctive Warmun Community artwork of the 1980s and beyond. The Kurirr Kurirr is particularly associated with the work of Rover Thomas and Paddy Jaminji.

The Kurirr Kurirr was “found” by Rover Thomas in 1975, coming to him over time in dreams. The revealed narrative tells of the spirit of an old woman returning to her own country from her place of death, along the way visiting many places rich with religious and historical significance to the region’s Indigenous people.

The Kurirr Kurirr was first performed at Warmun in the late 1970s. It was brought to Perth in 1983 in conjunction with the Aboriginal Arts Festival, and later taken to other places.

The Kurirr Kurirr has featured prominently in major exhibitions and collection catalogues. An exclusively focused Kurirr Kurirr exhibition (Dreaming the Dreaming) was mounted for the 2004 Perth International Arts Festival.
Will Christensen

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Mint
The Perth Mint is Australia's specialist precious metals mint, and one of the oldest mints in the world still operating from its original premises. It was established in June 1899 as a branch of Britain's Royal Mint to refine the gold from Western Australia's newly discovered Eastern Goldfields and to turn it into British sovereigns and half sovereigns for the Empire. Between 1899 and 1931, The Perth Mint issued more than 106 million sovereigns and nearly 735,000 half sovereigns. It also produced large volumes of Australia's conventional legal tender coinage over many years.

The Mint continued under British control until 1970, when ownership was transferred to the Western Australian government. In the mid-1980s, following a major redevelopment initiated by the state government, the Perth Mint became the home of the Australian Precious Metals Coin Program. By agreement with the Commonwealth government, the Mint manufactures and markets internationally a range of Australian legal tender gold, silver and platinum proof and bullion coins. It also produces coins on behalf of other countries. The Perth Mint is a major tourist attraction hosting more than 110,000 visitors a year.
Alexandra Lucchesi

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New Age
The New Age movement is a striking contemporary social and spiritual phenomenon. It consists of diverse and eclectic practices with an emphasis on personal transformation and healing, and engages with indigenous cultures, eastern philosophies, bygone periods as well as peace, ecology and the occult. Techniques include meditation, channelling, reiki, astrology, crystal therapy, tarot, yoga and magic. The neoplatonists’ revival of magic during the Renaissance period, the nineteenth-century alternative movements of Spiritualism and Theosophy, and the 1960s counterculture are some of the historical antecedents and sources of inspiration for New Age thinking.

The New Age spread to Western Australia in the 1970s through books and returned travellers with experiences of the counterculture abroad and interstate. In the last two decades New Age shops, groups and magazines have provided information, merchandise and networks. Founded in Perth during 1992 and published monthly, Nova: Australia’s Largest Holistic Magazine advertises courses and workshops on spiritual development and self awareness. Today New Age wares, books and information can be found in bookstores, gift shops, pharmacies and local newspapers, illustrating that the New Age has shifted from the periphery of society to an accepted and visible place in mainstream culture.
Nicole Crawford

Anti-Nuclear Movement in WA
The Campaign Against Nuclear Energy (CANE) was established in WA in 1975. It was a dynamic coalition totally opposed to the mining and export of uranium for other than biomedical purposes. From 1979 it employed a full-time coordinator and served as the Secretariat of the national Uranium Moratorium in 1981.

CANE encouraged the formation of local groups such as Women Against Uranium Mining, Stirling Anti-Nuclear Energy, Fremantle Anti-Nuclear Group and the Wanneroo Anti-Nuclear Alliance. Campaign strategies included marches, meetings, boycotts, educational exhibitions and a Nuclear-Free Zone petition. In November 1977, 9000 people marched against the proposed Yeelirrie uranium mine. In July 1979, following the announcement by Premier Sir Charles Court of a nuclear reactor, Perth Town Hall was packed to capacity supporting ‘No to a Nuclear WA.’

Many activists joined People for Nuclear Disarmament (PND) in 1982 to develop the Palm Sunday march. Plans for a nuclear plant were abandoned in 1983 and CANE was absorbed into PND in May 1985. In 1998, many groups formed the Anti-Uranium Coalition of WA (later the Anti-Nuclear Alliance of WA) in response to PANGEA’s plans to dispose of nuclear waste here.
David Worth

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The Parmelia
The Parmelia, constructed on the St Lawrence River, Quebec, was launched on 31 May 1825. The 443 ton barque, escorted by HMS Sulphur, left Plymouth on 8 February 1829 and entered Table Bay, Cape Town, on 16 April where she remained for thirteen days. The Sulphur, which had become separated from the Parmelia on at least two occasions, arrived ten days later in need of caulking. On 1 May, rather than delay departure, the Parmelia set sail without its escort to complete the final leg of its journey to the Swan River.

The first migrant ship to reach Western Australia, the Parmelia had on board the original Swan River colonists, the Lieutenant-Governor Captain James Stirling, his wife Ellen, their three-year-old son Andrew and a new infant, Frederick, born on route. Listed among civilian officials were Colonial Secretary Peter Brown (Broun), Clerk to the Colonial Secretary William Sheldon, Surveyor-General John Septimus Roe, Assistant-Surveyor Henry Sutherland, Colonial Storekeeper, John Morgan, Surgeon Charles Simmonds, Harbour-Master Captain Mark Currie RN and botanist James Drummond.

Ten years later the Parmelia was destroyed by fire at a dockland on the Cornish side of the Tamar River.
Ruth Marchant James

Poliomyelitis
Poliomyelitis, once known as infantile paralysis, is a virus that attacks the grey matter of the spinal cord, causing paralysis and possible death. Originally an endemic disease, polio began to appear from 1880 in epidemic proportions affecting all ages. The behaviour of the virus challenged current theories of infection and surrounding uncertainty aroused a high level of fear. Epidemics of polio occurred in Australia from 1897 and were most severe between 1937 and 1956, peaking in 1951. Immunisation with Salk vaccine, introduced in 1956, ended polio’s reign. Sabin oral vaccine was introduced in 1966.

In WA in 1938, forty-seven reported cases (one death) signified the first serious outbreak. Epidemics occurred in 1948 (311 cases, 25 deaths), 1954 (434 cases, 4 deaths), and 1956 (401 cases, 10 deaths).

A great challenge was encountered in 1954 when an epidemic broke out prior to the Royal Visit. There were calls to suspend the tour but Dudley Snow, the Government Epidemiologist, had concluded transmission occurred through faecal contamination and believed minimising contact between children would curtail the risk. The Hawke Government, under pressure from Prime Minister Menzies, laid careful plans for the tour, and Snow’s view was validated.
John H. Smith

Polocrosse
Polocrosse is best described as a combination of polo and lacrosse. The game is played on horseback with racquets used to scoop up the ball and score goals.

Polocrosse was first played in Sydney in 1939, and introduced to WA a decade later. The first WA polocrosse club was established at Kojonup by Bob Russell, and the first polocrosse exhibition match in WA was staged there in 1950. The Polocrosse Association of Western Australia (PAWA) was formed the following year. In 1952 WA was divided into three zone associations: the Northern, Great Southern and South West zones. Following the affiliation of PAWA with the Polocrosse Association of Australia in 1956, WA was later divided into five zones: Great Southern, South West, Central, Eastern and Midwest (formerly Northern).

The WA polocrosse season runs from July to December. National championships are conducted every second year around Australia on a rotational basis. The first national championship played in WA was in 1980, hosted by the Chapel polocrosse club. In 1994 the national championships were hosted in WA by the Walkaway club.
Jane Leong

Postage stamps
Postage stamps were first issued in Western Australia on 1 August 1854. Three values; 1d, 4d and 1/-, each depicting a Swan, rather than the customary Queen Victoria, were issued. The 1d value was engraved in London and the 4d and 1/- values were lithographed in the Colony.

A new ‘4d Printing Stone’ was required in 1855 and when making it, the frame of one impression on the ‘Intermediate Stone’ was inadvertently transferred upside down resulting in the so-called ‘4d Inverted Frame’ variety, one of the world’s charismatic stamp rarities. Fifteen of the 388 printed are recorded, all postally used.

Twopenny and sixpenny values were lithographed locally during 1857-59 before engraved 2d, 4d, 6d, and 1/- values were ordered from London in 1860. New surface-printed values; 3d and a _d, were introduced in 1871 and 1885 respectively and, from 1889, all values were surface-printed.

Following Federation new stamps and values were printed in Melbourne and issued from 1902. The late Queen Victoria was belatedly depicted on the 2/- to £1 values! Stamps inscribed Western Australia, although replaced by Commonwealth stamps from 1913, retained their postal validity until decimalisation in 1966.
Brian Pope

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Rugby Union
Rugby Union was first played in WA in 1881 and five clubs were formed the following year. But this early growth of the game did not continue and in 1885 the clubs converted to Australian Rules football. The discovery of gold in the Eastern Goldfields in the early 1890s, resulting in an influx of immigrants from New Zealand, Great Britain and New South Wales, enabled the sport to be reborn. The Western Australian Rugby Union (WARU) was formed on 30 May 1893. The game fell into decline between 1901 and 1905 and ceased to be played. The WARU was reformed in 1928. The first State team to tour was led by Gerry McGann to Adelaide in September 1935. South Australia won the first game 22-14 and WA the second 23-8.

During the Second World War the sport continued to be played in Perth, though at a reduced level than previously. The WARU was revived in 1946. In 1971 the WARU established its first clubhouse with social facilities at the Perry Lakes warm-up ground.
David Marsh

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Silver Chain Nursing Association
The Silver Chain Nursing Association was founded in WA in 1905 from an idea suggested by rabbit proof fence boundary rider Arthur Grundy. Organised and publicised by journalist Muriel Chase, subscriptions were sought from the public, initially from children who became Silver Links. The original focus was to care for sick and neglected children but this soon changed to an emphasis on the needs of the indigent aged.

The first Silver Chain district nurse in Perth began her rounds on a bicycle in 1907. More districts were gradually formed until the whole metropolitan area was served by district nurses. In 1916, the first Silver Chain Cottage Home for old people was opened in Highgate. A Kalgoorlie Branch was formed in 1921 although country work did not expand until the incorporation of the Bush Nursing Trust into Silver Chain in 1944. In addition to the Cottage Homes, since 1945 Silver Chain has opened five more residential facilities. Three are in the country. Government funding was not sought or accepted until 1948.

Today, Silver Chain is a large corporate entity yet it remains a charitable organisation whose primary aim is still to assist people in need to live in the community.
Jean Chetkovich

Anti-Smoking Campaign
The anti smoking campaign was the first attempt by WA health authorities to address a so-called ‘lifestyle disease’. The Australian National Health and Medical Research Council officially accepted the connection between lung cancer and smoking in 1957 though this knowledge was not reflected in legislation and education programmes until the early 1970s.
Metropolitan trains, buses and ferries were declared smoke free in 1974. In 1983 the WA government increased retail tobacco licence fees and allocated $2 million per year for community anti-smoking education, including the Quit campaign. The Tobacco Control Act 1990 included a phased-in ban on tobacco advertising, and increased penalties for the sale of tobacco to those under the age of 18. Healthway, the Western Australian Health Promotion Foundation, was established to fund research and provide grants to sporting and community organisations that promoted healthy lifestyles. The anti-smoking campaign broadened as knowledge of the dangers of passive smoking increased. Through a series of gradual steps from 1 January 2005, all Western Australian hospitality venues will be 100 per cent smoke free from 1 July 2006.

Despite these measures smoking accounts for an average of 1500 WA deaths each year and sales of tobacco products have not declined.
Sue Graham-Taylor

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'Swan River Mania'
'Swan River mania' describes the blaze of publicity that the Swan River colony generated in Britain. It erupted in the spring of 1829 and collapsed spectacularly in 1830.

The April 1829 issue of the influential Quarterly Review contained a glowing but unsigned article about the new colony written by John Barrow, the man responsible for Britain’s decision to colonise Western Australia. At the same time the press learnt of the grant in the colony that had been reserved for Thomas Peel, and some newspapers used it as a means of attacking Robert Peel, then Home Secretary, for alleged favouritism to his relative.

Bad publicity, however, is better than no publicity and the Swan River colony generated a nineteenth century equivalent to a modern media frenzy. Many Britons became convinced that the new colony was the 'land of promise'.

The Swan River bubble was burst in January 1830. The ship bearing the first batch of mail and Stirling’s official despatches from the colony was beaten to England by a ship bearing letters which contained second-hand accounts of rumours of disaster. The letters were leaked to, then inflated by, the London press. A Colonial Office statement refuting the allegations could not undo the damage. The image of failure remained for decades.
Ian Berryman

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Tennis
The rules of modern tennis were initially cast by the cricket establishment in Victorian England to govern the first Wimbledon tournament in 1877.

In Western Australia the game had its beginnings in the family homesteads of ‘well to do’ citizens. Eventually, the Western Australian Lawn Tennis Association (WALTA) was formed in 1903 to organise inter-club, country week and school competitions as well as tournaments. WALTA gained the right to conduct three Australasian Open Men’s Championships in 1909, 1913 and 1922, yet it was not until 1994 that a permanent tennis centre was established at Burswood. In the post World War II era Clive Wilderspin became a household name in Western Australia, as did Margaret Court (Smith) who had moved to the State after the divide between amateur and professional tennis was broken in 1968. From 1988 international tennis (the Hopman Cup), has been annually held in Perth.

While tennis is a world sport that can be played by both men and women of varying physique and standard, the challenge for WALTA (later Tennis West) has been to simultaneously foster the broad base of the game and develop elite players for the ‘circuit’.
Harry C. J. Phillips

Ticket of Leave
A ticket of leave was a license to be at liberty. It was originally offered exclusively to imperial convicts who had not been reconvicted in WA. A convict who was granted a ticket of leave left Fremantle prison with a liberty kit (prison made and/or issued clothes, blankets and rations) and sought private employment. Unemployed ticket of leave holders were returned to one of the many convict hiring depots and there they laboured on public works projects.

All ticket of leave holders were governed by ticket of leave regulations. While these regulations were revised several times, every set of regulations from 1850 to 1904 required that each ticket of leave holder report all changes of address and employment, that all charges against them be heard summarily, that all sentences be served cumulatively, that the governor may revoke any ticket for any kind of immoral conduct. These strict regulations resulted in many ticket of leave holders being returned to Fremantle prison for minor offences. In the hope of correcting this, in 1862 the ticket of leave system was extended to reconvicted convicts. If ticket of leave holders were able to avoid reconviction, unemployment and immorality they were awarded a conditional pardon.
P. R. Millett

Trotting
Harness racing as an organised sport in this State began in 1910. Before then sulky events, some featuring women drivers, were commonly held at country and city races. In 1913 James Brennan, H. A. Hummerston, and J. A. Burkett established the Western Australian Trotting Association using the WA Cricket Association ground for race meetings. Night trotting, claimed as a Western Australian innovation, began in January 1914.

As the popularity of harness racing rose, clubs were formed in many country towns. The Fremantle Trotting Club was established in 1928.

Public enthusiasm for the ‘peoples’ sport’ as well as its potential gambling revenue spurred construction of the Brennan Park trotting ground on 30 acres (12 hectares) of swamp land at East Perth. Completed in 1930, a unique feature was ‘the ribbon of light’ track made of crushed Swan River oyster shell. The ground was renamed in honour of the visiting Duke of Gloucester in 1934.

The sport became a lucrative business and came under investigation several times including Royal Commissions in 1946 and 1983. A decline in attendances since the 1980s caused the closure of many country courses and in 1991, the Fremantle Trotting Club held its last meeting at Richmond Raceway.
Jennie Carter

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Weld Club
Founded in 1871 by former British officers, and named after the then Governor, the Weld Club recruited its foundation members largely from the colony’s official ranks. Over the next twenty years men from pioneer families gradually joined, as did newcomers associated with railway, telegraph and early mining interests. Talbot Hobbs designed the present clubhouse at 3 Barrack Street Perth, which opened in 1892, and for many years the Club was regarded as a second home to Perth’s establishment. The mining men and pastoralists from the North West provided an exuberance which was later eclipsed by a growing quietness, as Perth’s political and social landscape changed. For much of the twentieth century the Weld was run on frugal lines, although the grounds included tennis courts and a bowling green. Among the many changes were the retirement of the last Chinese staff in 1927 (replaced by female domestic staff) and the discontinuation of resident members in 1979. A huge increase in land taxes and rates in the 1980s led to the redevelopment of part of the Club grounds. The result, the Exchange Plaza, enabled the Weld to face the challenges of the twenty-first century with some confidence.
Paul de Serville

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Westerly
Westerly has long been Western Australia’s flagship literary and cultural magazine. Although its contributors and its subject matter have never been exclusively Western Australian, the magazine has been edited from The University of Western Australia since its foundation in 1956. Westerly now covers literature and culture throughout the world but it maintains a special focus on Australia, especially Western Australia, and Asia. Its contents include poetry, fiction, essays and book reviews. The editors, currently Delys Bird and Dennis Haskell, aim for scholarly but readable work, and seek a variety in the contents of each issue. (See http://westerly.uwa.edu.au/)

Westerly began through the efforts and ideals of students in the Arts Faculty at The University of Western Australia. Westerly’s first issue included two articles on Asia, in a period in which Australia’s relations with this part of the world received scant attention. Westerly receives support from the Westerly Centre at UWA and from ArtsWA, and has a strong reputation internationally, being listed in all the world’s major cultural bibliographies and indexes. Published from the edge of a continent at the bottom of the inhabited world, Westerly has always sought to provide a Western Australian-based voice on cultural issues together with lively creative writing.
Dennis Haskell

Women’s Land Army
The Women’s Land Army concept was considered by the Country Women’s Association (CWA) as early as September 1940 based on British war experience. Local CWA branches believed there was a need for women to work on the land and also provide home help to farm families. Faced with a negative response from the Commonwealth, the CWA launched its own scheme with initial training at Fairbridge in late 1941. Almost two hundred women were placed before continuing rural labour shortages led to the establishment of the Australian Women’s Land Army in July 1942 under the Director-General of Manpower. Virtually all of the members of the CWA-sponsored ‘Land Girls’ enrolled in the new service. Despite initial scepticism, the general response from farmers was ‘my land girl is worth two men’.  Regulations formally constituting the service as a fourth uniformed National Women’s Auxiliary were only enacted after the war ended.
The Women’s Land Army only latterly received official recognition for its contribution to the war effort and the vital task of maintaining food and agricultural production.
Robert Mitchell

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Women's refuges
Women's refuges emerged as a part of the women's liberation movement of the early 1970s as a response to domestic violence. The first such refuge was established in Sydney in 1974 with eleven similar feminist services established during the following year in all major cities of Australia, including Nardine Women's Refuge in Perth later in 1974. Three related services predated Nardine in Western Australia: Byanda (1895), Ave Maria (1961) and Warrawee (1971); however, these services only later identified domestic violence as a reason why women sought assistance. Domestic violence was understood as a manifestation of unequal gendered power relations and so while women’s refuges provided accommodation and support, their workers were also concerned with social change and lobbied for improvements to the welfare, legal and criminal justice systems.

In 2002 there were forty refuges and outreach services in WA at an annual cost of $10 million. Refuges are not the only service response to domestic violence. Other initiatives include community education campaigns, Indigenous-specific services, programmes to assist men to change their violent behaviour and a domestic violence court. However, while services have improved since the 1970s, there is no indication that the incidence of domestic violence has decreased.
Suellen Murray

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