News from Access Services at Public Record Office Victoria
October 2008 - Number 31

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. Reading Room Closures Over Christmas-New Year Period
2. Upcoming Changes to PROV Publications
3. Local History Grants Program
4. New Probate and Shipping Indexes Available December 2008
5. New PROV Wikis
6. Exhibitions and Public Programs News
7. PROV Seminar and Archival Support Programs
8. Five New PODs Appointed
9. Making Public Histories - Seminar Series
10. Provenance - Issue 7 Now Online - Call for Articles for 2009
11. PROVguide News
12. New Series Available on the PROV Online Catalogue
13. Staff Speaking Engagements
14. Feedback
15. About this Publication

1. Reading Room Closures Over Christmas-New Year Period
The Victorian Archives Centre and Ballarat Archives Centre reading rooms will be closed over the Christmas New Year period.

Victorian Archives Centre will be closed from close of business Wednesday 24 December 2008 and will reopen on Monday 5 January 2009.

Ballarat Archives Centre will be closed from close of business Tuesday 23 December and will reopen on Monday 5 January 2009.

2. Upcoming Changes to PROV Publications
From the start of 2009, a number of changes will take place to the suite of publications produced by Public Record Office Victoria. Among these changes, PROV will cease publishing its print magazine PROactive. The last (farewell) issue of PROactive will be published in December 2008. rEsearch will continue in its present format until February 2009, after which time it will continue to be published in a redesigned online format.

3. Local History Grants Program
Community groups across Victoria are invited to apply for a share of $350,000 funding to tell their stories. Grants of up to $12,000 are now available for not-for-profit community groups across the state to invest in individual projects as part of the latest round of the Local History Grants Program.

The Local History Grants Program assists communities to tell their stories in a variety of ways old and new, by writing histories, preserving documents, making use of new technologies, or passing on the skills needed to commemorate and share the past.

Applications opened on Friday 12 September and close on Monday 24 November.

For details, visit <http://www.prov.vic.gov.au/lhgp> or phone the grants administration officer at Public Record Office Victoria on (03) 9348 5600.

4. New Probate and Shipping Indexes Available December 2008
PROV's volunteers have been busy again this year preparing the next instalment of the outwards immigration index, which will cover the period 1887-1896. Volunteers from the Genealogical Society of Utah and the Victorian Association of Family History Organisations will shortly complete the first stage of an index to probates in Victoria. The index's first stage, covering the period 1841-1925, will allow researchers to search for probates by family name, place, occupation and date. The new instalment of the immigration index and the new probate index will be launched on 16 December 2008 from and will be accessible online as PROVguide 23 at:
<http://www.access.prov.vic.gov.au/public/PROVguides/PROVguide023/PROVguide023.jsp>.

5. New PROV Wikis
PROV is trialling a wiki-type website that will enable researchers to provide comments, extra information and their own linkages about and around records held by PROV. Like Wikipedia, the PROV wiki is on a website anybody can log into, contribute toward and edit.

To kick the wiki off, we will be putting up information contributed by women all over Victoria responding to the centenary of women's suffrage celebrations. We will also be inviting researchers to help us improve the quality of descriptions of photographs in our collection, such as those from our 1956 Melbourne Olympic Games collection. The PROV wiki can be accessed at <http://wiki.prov.vic.gov.au> from Friday 31 October 2008.

We hope that researchers will find the opportunity to contribute their own information, tips and discoveries in the records to help make visits to the PROV website more meaningful and fulfilling.

6. Exhibitions and Public Programs News
Current PROV exhibition - Currach Folk
CURRACH FOLK, an exhibition of stunning photographs of traditional communities of the Irish west coast by Bill Doyle - the exhibition will be on view at the VAC until 8 November 2008. The exhibition features bi-lingual text panels (Gaelic and English).

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/>.

Max Dupain on Assignment - upcoming PROV exhibition

Opening at the Victorian Archives Centre (VAC) in mid-January 2009 is another stunning exhibition of photography to follow on from the mesmerising Currach Folk. The National Archives of Australia's (NAA) Max Dupain on Assignment features works from the collections of the NAA and the Noel Butlin Archives Centre at the Australian National University. Max Dupain is one of Australia's best-known and greatest photographers. The exhibition traces his commercial career from the 1940s to the 1970s and features work created 'on assignment' for the Australian Government and for one of his earliest clients the Colonial Sugar Refining Company Limited - now known as CSR. Open 8 am - 6 pm, Monday - Friday.

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 of colourful memorabilia will be on view in the VAC Reading Room until the end of October.

Art Deco - a new PROV display
A new Art Deco display has been installed in the level 1 corridor gallery at the Victorian Archives Centre (VAC). Further images are displayed 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>

Parliament Open Day - 23 November 2008, 11 am - 4 pm
As part of the Parliament Open Day events, panels from the PROV exhibition suffrage, marking the centenary of women's suffrage in Victoria will be on display. The Women's Suffrage Petition, one of the iconic treasures from the PROV collection, can be viewed in Queen's Hall at Parliament House.

7. PROV Seminar and Archival Support Programs
The June to December 2008 Seminar Series program brochure is 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 October - December public programs highlights include:
Wednesday 29 October 2008 11.00 am to 1.00 pm - Walking Tour: the Irish of Hotham Hill (departing from Victorian Archives Centre) - cost $10 per person

Saturday 8 November 2008 9.00 am to 4.00 pm - Preservation and Conservation: Paper Records, Victorian Archives Centre - cost $25.00 (including morning tea, lunch and GST)

Wednesday 12 November 2008 1.30 to 3.30 pm - Back to School: Education Records at PROV, Central Highlands Regional Library Corporation, Ballarat Branch Library, 178 Doveton Street North.

8. Five New PODs Appointed
PROV's Places of Deposit Program continues to grow with the appointment of five new PODs on 1 September by Minister for the Arts, Lynne Kosky.

The appointed PODs are:
Buninyong and District Historical Society - Court House, Learmonth St, Buninyong, 3357
East Gippsland Family History Group - 21 Morgan St, Bairnsdale, 3875
Lakes Entrance Family History Resource Centre Inc - 2 Marine Parade, Lakes Entrance, 3909
Omeo Historical Society Inc - Historical Park, Day Avenue, Omeo, 3898
Orbost and District Historical Society Inc - East Gippsland Council Admin & Library Building, Ruskin St, Orbost, 3888
There are now a total of 122 community facilities appointed as Places of Deposit across Victoria.

9. Making Public Histories - Seminar Series
A new free seminar series exploring issues and approaches to 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:
20 November 2008 - Linda Young, Graeme Davison, Deborah Tout-Smith, and Richard Ferguson, 'Exhibiting Melbourne: The city in the museum'

Further details are at <http://arts.monash.edu.au/public-history-institute/public-lectures/index.php>

10. Provenance - Issue 7 Now Online - Call for Articles for 2009
Provenance Issue No 7, September 2008 <http://www.prov.vic.gov.au/provenance>

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

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.

Subscribe to Provenance or make an enquiry about contributing to the journal, by contacting the Editor, Dr Sebastian Gurciullo by phone on (03) 9348 5600; or email:
<provenance@prov.vic.gov.au>.

You can search the current and back issues for subjects, names and places of interest at:
<http://www.prov.vic.gov.au/provenance/search.asp>

This year's issue of Provenance, contains a diverse range of contributions from across the researcher community accessing records at Public Record Office Victoria.

Articles
Anna Davine, 'Italian Speakers on the Walhalla Goldfield: A study of a small place and ordinary lives', examines the lives of Italians on the Walhalla goldfields through goldmining, Crown lands, and probate files regarding Vittorio Campagnolo as a case study challenging prior analyses of migration patterns in Australia.
Belinda Robson, 'From mental hygiene to community mental health: psychiatrists and Victorian public administration from the 1940s to 1990s', looks at government records about official policy on mental health and developments in this field during the later twentieth century.
Robyn Ballinger, 'Landscapes of abundance and scarcity on the northern plains of Victoria', employs a range of records relating to land use in the semi-arid northern plains of Victoria to argue that settlement visions in the period 1836-1930 were shaped not only by political and economic imperatives but also by the climatic changes of a semi-arid country.
Victoria Haskins, '"Give to us the People we would Love to be amongst us": The Aboriginal Campaign against Caroline Bulmer's eviction from Lake Tyers Aboriginal Station, 1913-14', revisits the political campaign of residents at Lake Tyers Aboriginal Station who between 1913 and 1914 petitioned the Victorian Government to allow Caroline Bulmer, the widow of their late missionary, to remain on the station with them.
Lyn Payne, 'The Curious Case of the Wollaston Affair', presents a portrait of school teacher Edward George Wollaston and his protracted battle with the Victorian education authorities.

Forum
Brienne Callahan, 'The "Monster" Petition and the Women of Davis Street', takes us back to a street in North Carlton and the working-class women who signed the women's suffrage petition 100 years ago.
Peter Davies, '"A lonely, narrow valley": Teaching at an Otways outpost', presents the story of an isolated milling community through records about its public school, one of many such remote schools that opened following the Victorian government's introduction of free, secular and compulsory education in 1872.
Jenny Carter, 'Wanted! Honourable Gentlemen: Select applicants for the positions of Deputy Registrar for Collingwood in 1864', explores the wealth of detail revealed through the Victorian Chief Secretary's Correspondence relating to applicants for a routine job vacancy.
Dawn Peel, 'Colac 1857: snapshot of a colonial settlement', presents us with a glimpse of Colac in 1856-57 as revealed through a range of government records.
Ruth Dwyer, 'A Jewellery Manufactory in Melbourne: Rosenthal, Aronson & Company', looks at records from both Public Record Office Victoria and the National Archives of Australia to create a detailed account of a Melbourne jewellery firm in the later half of the nineteenth century.
Karin Derkley, '"The present depression has brought me down to zero": Northcote High School during the 1930s', focuses on the struggles of parents to keep their children in education during the difficult years of the Great Depression.

You can still read issue no. 6 (September 2007) and ALL previous issues of the journal (free of charge) at the following web address:
<http://www.prov.vic.gov.au/provenance/pastissues.asp>

11. PROVguide News
PROVguide 65 has been revised and renamed Aboriginal Records at PROV and is available on PROV's website through the Research Tools menu, and in PROV reading rooms.

The guide now combines the best of PROVguide 65 Koorie Family History Research at PROV and PROVguide 67 Aboriginal Records at PROV and replaces both of them. PROVguide 65 Aboriginal Records at PROV is 4 pages in length and features: images of records including a petition from Lake Tyers 1931 and a Public Works Department plan of the Framlingham mission church 1920, Koorie Records Unit section and KRU projects, and a section on publications and online resources.

A new PROVguide 67 will be made available in the near future and will feature information about the new Koorie Index of Names (KIN) database.

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 1449-0323 Copyright © 2008 Public Record Office Victoria

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