News from Access Services at Public Record Office Victoria
June 2008 – Number 29

rEsearch is a bi-monthly update on public access news at Public Record Office Victoria (PROV). Current and past editions of rEsearch are available online here and are also emailed to subscribers. Email a request to ask.prov@prov.vic.gov.au if you want to be included on our subscriber list.

1. New PROV Seminar Program June - December 2008
2. New Online Records
3. Education Section
4. Colin Ross Reprieve!
5. Hamer Awards Ceremony - And the Winners Are...
6. Volunteers at PROV
7. Exhibitions & Public Programs News
8. News from Regional Archives
9. Making Public Histories - Seminar Series
10. New PROV publication Footprints now available for purchase
11. Provenance - Call for articles
12. New series available on the PROV online catalogue
13. Staff speaking engagements
14. Feedback
15. About this publication

1. New PROV Seminar Program June - December 2008
Watch out for the June to December 2008 Seminar Series program brochure in issue 43 of PROactive, which will be arriving soon in your letterbox if you are a subscriber. It is also available from PROV reading rooms and the 'Events and Programs' pages of the PROV website <http://www.prov.vic.gov.au/events/>. The program features a range of seminars and events for anyone who wants to know more about archives and the type of research subjects that can be undertaken at PROV.

Our July and August public programs highlights include::
Saturday 12 July 2008, at the Geelong Heritage Centre, Archival Support Program: Preservation and Conservation focusing on photographs and photographic media
Tuesday 22 July 2008, at VAC, Melbourne research centres, featuring guest speakers from AIGS, GSV, RHSV and the North Melbourne Library
Wednesday 30 July and Saturday 30 August, at VAC Walking Tour: the Irish of Hotham Hill
Saturday 16 August 2008 at VAC, Ancestors in the Archives – a joint PROV and National Archives of Australia introduction to research at VAC
Saturday 30 August 2008: Irish day at VAC: a day of seminars, tours, walks, information, music and film to compliment the exhibition, Currach Folk – Photographs by Bill Doyle

2. New Online Records
Early Victorian records relating to Aboriginal people – all records in two PROV series relating to the early days of colonial administration in Port Phillip will be available for viewing online through the PROV catalogue shortly. These records are described to item level so you can either perform a search within a series to locate a keyword, or simply browse the contents of each series on the catalogue and select what you want to view:
• VPRS 10 Inward Registered Correspondence to the Superintendent of Port Phillip District
• VPRS 11 Unregistered Inward Correspondence to the Chief Protector of Aborigines - Reports and Returns

VPRS 515/P0 Central Register of Male Prisoners – more volumes from the Central Register of Male Prisoners have now been made available on the website. Entries in volumes 6, 9, 20, 48, 51, 55, 57, 61, 69 and 74 can now be searched by prisoner name and viewed online. The digitised records are available through a search page on the website.

3. Education Section
New NED ONLINE education notes now available for teachers
The education section of the PROV website is undergoing continuous development and improvements. For the latest updates see <http://www.prov.vic.gov.au/education/>. New education notes have just been added for one of PROV's long-standing online exhibitions Ned Online, which features records relating to the crimes, capture and trial of Ned Kelly. The education notes can be accessed at <http://www.prov.vic.gov.au/education/KellyEducation.asp>.

4. Colin Ross Reprieve!
Following the announcement by the Victorian Government of the posthumous pardon of Colin Ross for the murder of Alma Tirtschke, Public Record Office Victoria is displaying some original documents from Ross's trial in the VAC exhibition space (until 30 June). You can download a copy of Ross's prison register page at <http://www.prov.vic.gov.au/main/cross.asp>.

5. Hamer Awards Ceremony - And the Winners Are...
As part of the Information Awareness Month program of events, the Sir Rupert Hamer Records Management Awards 2007 were announced on 15 May, in a ceremony held at Queen’s Hall, Parliament House. Presented annually by the Public Records Advisory Council, the Hamer Awards acknowledge excellence and innovation in records management in the Victorian public sector. The major sponsor of the Awards is the Records Managemen tAssociation of Australasia, the professional body representing the records management industry in Australia; sponsorship is also provided by the Australian Society of Archivists.
In the past, only government agencies have been eligible to nominate for the Hamer Awards, but in 2007 four new award categories were introduced, in recognition of the invaluable contribution made by Places of Deposit (PODs) to the preservation of local history in their communities. Twenty-five nominations were received in these new categories.
A full list of winners in all categories can be viewed at <http://www.prov.vic.gov.au/events/hamerwinners.asp>.

6. Volunteers at PROV
Continuing to index the Outward Passenger Lists, the PROV volunteers are working through the early 1890s. Amongst the many famous or infamous people visiting the colony of Victoria were Mme Bernhardt - actress - and her theatrical troupe of thirty five people travelling to Adelaide. All the troupe were named including wives and managers and the seventeen single male actors.

However none of the '18 members of the Blind Asylum Band' recorded on the January 1893 passenger list of the Flinders were named. This was the sixth voyage the Flinders made from Victoria that January.

The many tens of thousands passenger names indexed this year will be published on the PROV website in December.

Knowledgeable and friendly PROV volunteers also conduct free ‘Behind the Scenes’ tours of the Victorian Archives Centre repository on Fridays at 10.00am, 12.00pm and 2.00pm and on every second and last Saturday of the month at 10.00am. Bookings are essential. Please contact reception on (03) 9348 5600 to secure a place.

If you are interested in joining PROV’s volunteers in deciphering names and unlocking Victoria’s history, please contact Susie Leehane, susie.leehane@prov.vic.gov.au.

7. Exhibitions & Public Programs News
4 July – Making a show of it – Indigenous entertainers and entrepreneurs of 1950s Melbourne opening at the City Gallery, Melbourne Town Hall.

An exhibition featuring PROV records and photographs relating to the landmark Aboriginal stage production An Aboriginal Moomba: 'Out of the Dark' will be on display at Melbourne City Gallery, 4 July – 20 August 2008. Please note that news of this exhibition has appeared in previous issues of rEsearch and in the Summer issue of PROactive under the title 'An Aboriginal Moomba: out of the dark', the 1951 play re-visited.

17 July – exhibition launch of Currach Folk
CURRACH FOLK, an exhibition of photographs of traditional communities of the Irish west coast by Bill Doyle – the exhibition will be on view at the VAC from 17 July to 8 November 2008.
From early July, PROV will be hosting an exhibition from the Australian Maritime Museum. Currach Folk is a hauntingly beautiful exhibition of black and white photography depicting traditional farming and fishing communities of the Aran Islands and Dingle Peninsula, Ireland. Irish photographer Bill Doyle visited the region in the 1960s when access to some of the islands was by ferry and currach – a traditional local rowing boat made of wooden slats and hide. Doyle’s extraordinary images are a record of a now vanished world. The exhibition at the Victorian Archives Centre is supported by some wonderful stories of Irish immigrants to Victoria taken from the original records at PROV.
The Victorian Archives Centre in Melbourne is the only venue other than the Australian Maritime Museum to show this beautiful exhibition. This is an opportunity not to be missed. For viewing times please visit <http://www.prov.vic.gov.au/>.

On Saturday 30 August, PROV will be presenting an all-day program of talks and other activities in celebration of the Irish experience in Victoria. For bookings, contact PROV Public Programs on (03) 9348 5600 or <ask.prov@prov.vic.gov.au>.

25 August – Great White Fleet display in reading room
A display marking the centenary of the Great White Fleet's week-long stay in Melbourne. Sixteen white-hulled battleships carrying fourteen thousand naval personnel visited the city and regions to a huge civic fanfare of receptions and events. The display will be on view in the VAC reading room from the week beginning 25 August and will be on display for a month.

Late August – Art Deco – a new PROV display
A new Art Deco display will soon be installed in the level 1 corridor gallery at the Victorian Archives Centre (VAC). Further images will also be on display within the PROV repository – these can be viewed by booking into a tour of the VAC building (further details on VAC tours can be found at: <http://www.prov.vic.gov.au/events/vactours.asp>). These will be on display for a limited time early between late August – early September 2008.

New display on landmark events in Victorian Aboriginal history now on view in the corridor gallery level 1 Victorian Archives Centre
PROV holds an amazing range of records about Aboriginal people and has a team of dedicated staff in the Koorie Records Unit whose work it is to make these records more accessible and known. To highlight the value of these documentary resources, a new display featuring records and events that were landmarks in Victorian Aboriginal history is now on view in the level 1 corridor gallery opposite the lift and stair well. There are panels on the work of Pastor Sir Douglas Nicholls, Elder activist William Cooper, and rights activist William Barak. The display also includes a timeline of landmark government decisions in relation to Indigenous people in Victoria.

UNESCO recognition for Women's Suffrage Petition
The Women’s Suffrage Petition of 1891 – currently on display as the centrepiece of the exhibition Centenary of Women’s Suffrage: Signature Stories has now received national recognition, having recently been included on the UNESCO-sponsored Australian Memory of the World Register.
In taking its place on the Register, the ‘Monster Petition’ – as the Women’s Suffrage Petition is affectionately known on account of its massive scale – joins a very select group of historical records, judged to be of exceptional documentary significance to Australia.
Centenary of Women’s Suffrage: Signature Stories is on view at the VAC until 14 June. Admission is free. A computer terminal in the exhibition space gives visitors access to a database of the names of the thirty thousand Victorians whose signatures appear on the Women’s Suffrage Petition (for online access to this database, visit <http://www.parliament.vic.gov.au/WomensPetition>).

8. News from Regional Archives
New display at Ballarat Archives Centre
Public Record Office Victoria (PROV) holds a rich and diverse range of records for researching places and properties such as houses, schools, churches, hotels, factories and businesses. A new display, Property Research at the Ballarat Archives Centre (BAC) showcases some of the records and resources available at BAC and can be viewed there until August.

9. Making Public Histories - Seminar Series
A new free seminar series exploring issues and approaches in making public histories is being offered jointly by the Monash University Institute for Public History, History Council of Victoria and the State Library of Victoria.

The seminars aim to be engaging and audio-visual, with expert presentations and lively participation from historians working in museums, heritage, professional history, the media, universities, archives and libraries, community history – and anyone interested in historical representation in contemporary society.
When: Bi-monthly, Thursdays, 5.30pm -7.00pm
Where: State Library of Victoria, seminar room 1.
Come to Entry 3, La Trobe St at 5.25pm.
Coming up:

24 July 2008 – Michelle Rayner, 'The Tail Wagging the Dog?'
4 September 2008 – Shane Carmody, 'Unlocking the Medieval Imagination: Living history and public culture'
Further details are at <http://arts.monash.edu.au/public-history-institute/public-lectures/index.php>

10. New PROV publication Footprints now available for purchase
On 13 May the Hon. Richard Wynne, Minister for Aboriginal Affairs, visited the Victorian Archives Centre (VAC) to launch Footprints: The Journey of Lucy and Percy Pepper, a much-anticipated book published by PROV in partnership with the National Archives of Australia.

Footprints tells the story of Lucy and Percy Pepper, a couple living in Gippsland in the early years of the twentieth century who were profoundly affected by laws and government policies underpinned by ill-informed bureaucratic definitions of who was ‘Aboriginal’ and who was not. Drawing on correspondence between the Peppers and government officials, the book is more than a record of one couple’s battles with bureaucracy – it is also a narrative of their inspiring struggle to survive ill health and poverty and to keep their extended family together.

Footprints: The Journey of Lucy and Percy Pepper is available for purchase at PROV’s Reception Desk, at a cost of $10.00, or online via our website, at a cost of $10.00 plus postage and handling (order forms can be downloaded at <http://www.prov.vic.gov.au/publications/publns/Footprints_OrderForm.pdf>).

11. Provenance - Call for articles
Are you researching PROV records and interested in writing an article about what you have discovered? Then consider submitting an article to Provenance. We are now calling for articles for the 2009 issue of Provenance. The submission deadline for the upcoming issue is 31 March 2009.

Provenance is the free online scholarly journal of Public Record Office Victoria (PROV), the Victorian state archives. Provenance features peer-reviewed articles, and other contributions, that present research drawing upon records in PROV custody.

Issue no 7 is now in production and will be printed in September this year – stay tuned for further news! For the time being, you can read articles from issue no. 6, published late September 2007, at: <http://www.prov.vic.gov.au/provenance/>.

Provenance no. 8, which promises to be another bumper issue, will be published in September 2008. If you would like to receive an email reminder when the issue is published online, please contact the Editor, Dr Sebastian Gurciullo by phone on (03) 9348 5600; or email <provenance@prov.vic.gov.au>.

12. New series available on the PROV online catalogue
Visit <http://www.prov.vic.gov.au/main/newrecords.asp> to view new series that have been added to the online catalogue 'Access the Collection'. The list is updated every two months to coincide with the publication of rEsearch.

13. Staff speaking engagements
Visit our events calendar at <http://www.prov.vic.gov.au/events/calendar/default.asp> for a list of upcoming PROV speaking engagements. Book now!

14. Feedback
If you would like to send feedback and suggestions on the content of this newsletter or if you know someone who would be interested in receiving rEsearch, please email <ask.prov@prov.vic.gov.au>

15. About this Publication
We have included you on our mailing list because you have indicated interest in receiving PROV information. However, if you do not wish to receive this newsletter, please email <ask.prov@prov.vic.gov.au> or phone PROV Reception (03) 9348 5600 and we will remove you from our list.

You can access the web page version of this newsletter at <http://www.prov.vic.gov.au/publications>. Back issues are also available on the website.

ISSN 1449-0331 Copyright © 2008 Public Record Office Victoria

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