"I have another duty, equally sacred, a duty to myself " Dora: A Doll's House, Henrik Ibsen,1879
1. Welcome to Our Foremothers - "Here is one story ..."
2. First Owners
On this page:
KOORIE STORY: Pre 1863.
SOCIAL STORY: Melbourne 1863.
3. Sara and Sheyda Rimmer
On this page:
OUR STORY: Sarah Curry
KOORIE STORY: 1864 Corandarrk - Diaspora, the Start;
SOCIAL STORY: The Immigrants Home, 'The Fortunes of Mary Fortune'.
4. Smythesdale Goldfields
On this page:
SOCIAL STORY: Women on the goldfields - 'What a Woman on Ballaraat Can Do'; The Sandhurst Impersonator; the Sinking Cathedral.
5. The Egalitarian Idea
On this page:
KOORIE STORY: Resisting Oppression - Louisa Briggs;
SOCIAL STORY:
Enlightenment Thinking; Education; the Education Act. 1872.0's-80's - Free, Compulsary and Secular Education; Not Equal if you are Aboriginal
6. A Fair Go
On this Page:
OUR STORY: Sarah's 'Fair Go'.
KOORIE STORY: Struggles; Coranderrk Petition.
SOCIAL STORY: A Fair Go, the 1882 Tailoresses Strike, the Woman's Suffrage Society; the 'Mother of Womanhood Suffrage' - Louisa Lawson; Orphans & Institutions.
7. Going Backwards
On this Page:
KOORIE STORY:
the Half Caste Amendment Act oy Murphy; Coranderrk.
SOCIAL STORY - Reaction; 1890’s Economic Depression; Women's Paid Work.
8. Running Free
On this page:
OUR STORY: "NO DAUGHTER OF MINE ..."; Hard Yakka.
KOORIE STORY: Indigenous Exclusion.
9. Women Were Not Quiet
On this Page:
Social Story: The Hospital Run By Women For Women;The Victorian Lady Teachers' Association; The 1891 'Monster' Suffrage Petition - Vida Goldstein.
10. Building Peace at Home WW1
On this page:
OUR STORY
KOORIE STORY - Coranderrk Closure
SOCIAL STORY - Conscription; White Feathers; The Zurich Women's Peace Conference; Free Trade
11. A World Not Fit For Heroes
On this page:
OUR STORY
KOORIE STORY: Australian Aborigines League; Cummeraaginja; 26th January, Day of Mourning - Beryl Booth, Margaret Tucker.
SOCIAL STORY: Economic Depression; Making Do - Yvonne Smith.
12. Another War - WW2
On this page:
OUR STORY Our Family
KOORIE STORY: There's Work When We Need You - Nora Murray.
SOCIAL STORY: Pulling Together - Edith Morgan; After the War - Things Weren't All Rosy - Joyce Stevens.
13. Howard's Way - the 1950's
On this page:
OUR STORY
KOORIE STORY: Maralinga - Joan Wingfield, Gwen Rathman; More Protest - Warburton Ranges; Lake Tyers; More Protest;
SOCIAL STORY: Camp Pell; Conformity & Hidden Poverty; The Communist Party Dissolution Bill..
14. A Life Well Spent
On this page:
OUR STORY - Sad times
SOCIAL STORY: Hypocrisy; Hope
Our Foremothers is published by
Women's Web Inc.
Telephone: 03 9486 1808
www.womensweb.com.au
womensweb@iprimus.com.au
© Geraldine Robertson except for study, social justice and feminist sharing.
Our Foremothers |
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11. A WORLD NOT FIT FOR HEROES
On this page:
SOCIAL STORY
OUR STORY
KOORIE STORY: Australian Aborigines League; Cummeraaginja; 26th January, Day of Mourning - Beryl Booth, Margaret Tucker.
SOCIAL STORY: Economic Depression - Making Do; , Yvonne Smith.
The First World War, the so-called “war to end all wars”, did not bring the “peace fit for heroes” as had been promised, and as was anticipated.
Many of the returning soldiers, even those who were not clearly physically or psychologically (or both) damaged by their war experiences, found unemployment.
When I married I found out that my husband's father had been a foundation member of the communist party down at the wharves. He came back from the First World War with bad trench feet, faced unemployment and went through the lottery system to try to get a day's work. These injustices inspired him to get involved. Yvonne Smith www.womensweb.com.au
In 1928 it was already unacceptably high and Australians were already suffering badly when the Wall Street, USA stock exchange collapsed - officially bringing in world economic depression.
Unemployment became as bad as it was during the 1890’s economic depression.
In Australia we were affected earlier and harder than anyone else but people in Germany, where war reparations as well as war itself had ruined the economy.
The 1930’s economic depression wasn’t hard on everyone; some made money – especially those who employed a lot of labour. But it was hard for most people.
Returned soldier and family evicted SLV
That Papa was in the meat industry didn’t help them now. In hard times meat is one of the first things people cut down. Papa was manager of a section of Watkins Meats and it had to be closed down. He was out of work.
Fortunately Nana was a nurse and her work paid the rent. This was supplemented with a generous allowance from her parents.
The first thing Papa did when he stopped work was to sell the car. They only used the car to visit relatives and go for a drive on Sundays, so that wasn’t too hard.
The next thing he did was to buy her a washing machine. He hadn’t known before how hard she worked and he was shocked. Very few people had had washing machines then.
Nana said she would never use the machine.
She thought it was unhygienic, but she gave in – first with the clothes, then with the linen unless someone was sick, and then with all the linen. The washing machine became a fixture.
I understand Papa owned another house, which he rented out and I also understand he didn’t evict the tenants when they couldn’t pay the rent. He didn’t evict them until he couldn’t pay the rates and lost the house.
Watkins couldn’t pay Papa but they donated a large parcel of meat every week – 2 roasts, chops and steaks, stewing meat, mince or sausages and offal.
Nana kept a large vegetable garden and fruit trees. She was concerned for the men who came to her door asking to do ‘odd jobs’ for a pittance. She had no jobs, as she couldn’t pay them, but feed them she did!
It seemed in no time at all she was virtually running a soup kitchen. Hungry men seemed to come from nowhere. Someone had drawn a cross in chalk on her gatepost – a sign between desperate men that you would not be turned away with empty hands from that house.
It was hard. Her first 3 children had to leaave school at 14, although they had some training after that.
They kept their lives going as best they could.
Papa had his community work such as with the Australian Natives Association – he was Chief President – as well as his family and friends. When finally things picked up Watkins took him back as manager, as before.
Papa Ritchie 5th from the left at ANA function
Nana had her family, her work, her friends, her involvement in the Methodist church and her community work such as the Afghan rugs she made for Aboriginal children.
KOORIE STORY - Australian Aborigines League
The 1928 Aborigines Act defined the Protection Board's area of responsibility as those deemed to be Aborigine - this excluded all Aborigines of mixed descent (except by special license) to reside at station.
In the 20s the women wrote letters to the Aborigines' Board pleading to be allowed to stay at Lake Condah (western district), which had been broken up for soldier settlement. Grannie Carter, Grannie Lovett, and Grannie King decided to buy their own land when they were forced to leave Lake Condah.
They bought six acres for twenty pounds, and their families grew up there. Mrs Maude Pepper (1930's land rights struggles as told by Pauline Pickford)) has told of how hard the young girls had to work to get food, hunting rabbits and working for a pittance on other farms.
... The women in Melbourne were very active in the Australian Aboriginal League when it formed and Mrs Brown and others who came from the western district centred their activities around the League, and the collection of signatures on a petition (1814 signatures) presented to Prime Minister Lyons in 1937 seeking direct representation in Australia's parliament.
1938 January 26, was the first Aboriginal Day of Mourning. A conference of Australian Aboriginal organisations passed resolutions condemning inaction, demanding citizenship rights etc.
Yvonne Smith, Taking Time - A Women's Historical Data Kit Union of Australian Women
At this time Aboriginal activists such as Margaret Tucker were also campaigning for Aboriginal rights. Mrs Tucker was co-founder of the Australian Aborigines League in 1932.
Beryl Booth recalls that, after her family came to Fitzroy in 1928, "my grandfather (L.Booth) was a political man who established the first Aborigines League at 240 Victoria Parade, Fitzroy. He was a communist".
http://www.yarracity.vic.gov.au/Services/Aboriginal
Later a joint statement prepared by the League and the Aborigines Progressive Association declared, in part, that:
The 26th January ... is not a day of rejoicing for Australia's Aborigines, it is a day of mourning.
The festival of 150 years of so-called "progress" in Australia commemorates also 150 years of misery and degradation imposed upon the original inhabitants by the white invaders of this country.
http://www.yarracity.vic.gov.au/Services/Aboriginal
Returned Aboriginal servicemen who had fought for our country in WW1 came home to see, for example, that Coranderrk Aboriginal Mission was closed down and everyone evicted to provide land for returned servicemen - but not Aboriginal returned servicemen!
Dr Joy Murphy talks of her father returning from WW1. He had three medals, making him a returned soldier hero, yet he had to get permission from the police to visit his mother at Coranderrk. He was only allowed a half an hour with her before he was sent off to Lake Tyers in Gippsland. http://www.abc.net.au/missionvoices/coranderrk/voices_of_coranderrk/default.htm
1939 - The protest and strike at Cummeraagunja although not successful drew many people into the struggle. Women and children were camped on the Murray in Victoria living in deplorable conditions.
Mrs Tucker became a byword, speaking wherever she could: in private homes, to unionists and at the Yarra Bank, the open-air forum for poliatical and social causes...
TAKING TIME Yvonne Smith, Union of Australian Women
SOCIAL STORY
Coranderrk was closed to provide land for a Soldier Settlement scheme for non-Aboriginal returned soldiers. It failed.
It caused soil erosion. The blocks were too small, clearing them was backbreaking and many went broke.
The erosion caused dust storms, as far away as Melbourne.
Hearts, minds families and bodies that survived the war and survived war service were broken. Land that had been taken from Aboriginal control was now worthless.
In 1928 politicians had promised the Depression would be over by the end of the year. Now it seemed it would last forever.
Yvonne Smith – from www.womensweb.com.au
It was right in the middle of the 1930’s depression, I was a young child and my mother was ill. Together with my sister I went to stay with my mother’s sister in Prahran, Victoria.
I distinctly remember the poor children at school and the poverty around Greville Street where the shops were. There were many dusty second hand shops, many empty shops and a shoddiness in the whole area.
Looking back, I realize that some of the children were pretty shabby although people tried to keep up appearances. Another aunt lived there too and I remember going down to the shops with her. She went into a second hand shop, saying ‘see if there is anyone around, dear’, she was so embarrassed.
They were working class people and they had their pride. That was my first contact with poverty.
Making Do
As in the last Depression, people made things themselves when they couldn't afford to buy them. For example, they grew vegetables and preserved food.