New England University College: building an academic institution

New England University College matriculation ceremony 1939. Behind the work creating a new university lay the families of the academics. To mark the 80th anniversary of the foundation of the New England University College in 1938, this is the first of a short series telling you a little of the story of the wives and children of the new College

It is eighty years this year since the foundation of the New England University College, Australia’s seventh oldest university institution and the first founded outside a capital city.

On 18 April 1998 at a celebration to mark sixty years since the College’s foundation, some of the siblings, the children of the College’s early academic staff, met for the first time in a number of years. We came to be called the siblings because of the intense shared experiences from that early period.

Ten years later, Jenny Browning (Janet Howie) published a social history, Four Wives. This  focused on the experiences of four of the wives – Ella Howie, Gwenda Davis, Phyllis Voisey and Hilda Crossley – who came to Armidale with their husbands.

Later that year, UNE’s Dixson library mounted a special exhibition, Families of NEUC: A Social History as part of the celebration of the College’s 70th anniversary of the College. This examined the early days of the University through the eyes of the families that accompanied the first academics to their teaching posts in Armidale and the families of the staff that supported the running of the College

With the passage of time, those with living memories of NEUC as staff, students or children of the College have necessarily diminished. The College itself has begun to vanish into the mist of the past, becoming a simple addendum to the early history of the University.

That’s a pity. The early staff were all highly qualified and committed to building a new institution. They had to be, for the obstacles were considerable.

Today, the university takes pride in the fact that it has achieved maximum student satisfaction ratings for thirteen consecutive years, something no other Australian university can match.

It should, but we should not forget that it was the during the sixteen College years that the ethos of the place was created, an ethos that has continued despite sometimes turmoil in the later institution.

Under pressure and with limited resources, the College out-performed the mother university in teaching, research and community outreach. Staff knew that they had to be better just to survive, and in many ways they were.

But in all this, what about the wives? Jenny Browning makes a convincing case that without them, the College would have failed. They had to deal with insecurity, loneliness,. financial pressures, with multiple roles as they supported their husbands and families.

Over the next few columns I want to take you back into that now vanishing past, telling you about the wives and children of the College, of what it was like to be there.

I do not pretend that this will objective history. Rather, I want to capture the feel, the taste, of that time. 

Note to readers: This post appeared as a column in the Armidale Express Extra on 3 October 2018. I am repeating the columns here with a lag because they are not all on line outside subscription. You can see all the Belshaw World and History Revisited/History Matters columns by clicking here for 2009, here for 2010, here for 2011, here for 2012, here for 2013, here for 2014, here for 2015, here for 2016, here  2017, here 2018 .

New England higher education 1 - Seventh Day Adventists and Avondale College 1897

Avondale College, Cooranbong, NSW, 27 August 1908. Photo Ralph Snowball (1849-1925). University of Newcastle Cultural Collections

The genesis of the Seventh Day Adventist Church can be found in the Millerite Movement of the 1840s in upstate New York, a phase of the Second Great Awakening, a Protestant religious revival that began around 1790 and then peaked around 1850. As part of this revival, Baptist preacher William Miller (1782-1849) formed the view based on his bible studies that Jesus Christ would return to earth between the spring of 1843 and that of 1844 for the biblical Day of Atonement. The failure of this prediction (the Great Disappointment) left Miller and his followers confused and disappointed. A search began for new answers, for an explanation.

In the discussions that followed many Millerites came to believe that Miller’s calculations based on Daniel 8:14-16 were correct, but that his interpretation that Christ would come to cleanse the world was flawed. Daniel foretold Christ’s entry into the Most Holy Place of the heavenly sanctuary rather than his Second Coming. This understanding of a sanctuary in heaven developed into the doctrine of the investigative judgment, an eschatological (end of days) process that commenced in 1844 in which every person would be judged to verify their eligibility for salvation and God's justice would be confirmed before the universe.

In parallel, other ideas were being developed or reinforced including the importance  of the Sabbath and the importance of a holistic approach to the person, to diet and lifestyle. I haven’t tried here to discuss Adventist beliefs in detail. At this point, I would simply note that in time they would translate to an emphasis on education, health and food in institution building. In an Australian context, this would include Avondale College and Sanitarium foods.

The Adventist movement had begun as small loosely knit groups from different churches. From 1849, a periodical called The Present Truth now Adventist Review provided a unifying vehicle. It’s editor James White (1821-1881) along with his wife Ellen G White (1827-1915) would now become co-founders of a new church. Ellen White came to occupy a particularly central role; her many visions and spiritual leadership convinced her fellow Adventists (among other things) that she possessed the gift of prophecy. She wrote extensively, providing the new church with an extensive  body of work that remains important today. 

On May 21 1863, a meeting formally established the church with its headquarters in Battle Creek, Michigan and a membership of 3,500. From the 1870 it turned to missionary work and revivals. Membership increased to 16,000 by 1880 and then 75,000 in 1901. By this time the church operated two colleges, a medical school, a dozen academies, 27 hospitals, and 13 publishing houses.

Mission to Australia

On May 10, 1885, a party of eleven Americans including three pastors, a printer and a bookseller as well as two wives and four children set sail from San Francisco on the Australia with hopes to “open up a mission in Australia”.

The party arrived in Sydney on June 6, 1885. Leaving two pastors in Sydney, the others took the three day coastal steamer to Melbourne which had been chosen as initial headquarters. On 10 January 1886, the first Seventh Day Adventist church was formed with 29 members. Now events occurred that were to give Australia and indeed Northern NSW a place in church history.

James White had died on 6 August 1881, leaving wife Ellen and two surviving boys, James Edison and William Clarence, both of whom had been brought up in the church. Ellen, a powerful preacher, had continued their work. In 1891, she and William received a call to Australia, sailing at the end of the year.

William Clarence White , often known as W C or Willie to his friends, was born in Rochester, New York, August 29, 1854. On 11 February 1876 he married Mary Kelsey. Both were active in the church, with William serving in a number of leadership roles. Mary died from tuberculosis in 1890 at the age of 33 She contacted the disease while the couple were working in Switzerland on church business.

From his father’s death, William had worked closely with his mother. They made a considerable team. Now they left for Australia on what would be a nine year posting, initially leaving William’s daughters behind at Battle Creek.

Once in Australia, William divided his time between helping his mother and establishing the work in the new country. In 1894, he was named to lead the Australian Union. He exercised this responsibility until 1897 when he asked to be released from executive responsibilities to better support his mother’s literary work.

While in Australia William met and in married a Tasmanian woman, Ethel May Lacey. They appear to have had five children together.

Establishment of a new College

With Ellen’s guidance, a small bible college was established in Melbourne in 1892. However, she preferred a rural location and in 1893 a search began for suitable land. The problem was to find a block that the still small church could afford. The sources are silent on the matter, but I imagine the economic crash in the early 90s would not have helped.

Eventually the committee searching for the land found a 1,450-acre (5.9 km2) block of land at Cooranbong near Lake Macquarie 50 kilometres south west of Newcastle. The land was low priced, $3 per acre, because it was "poor, sandy and hungry". Asked to inspect the land, Ellen White gave her approval. The block was purchased in the Spring of 1895, with the Avondale School for Christian Workers opening in 1897. As illustrated in the lead photo, the early buildings at Avondale were built in the American New England architectural style rather than the Australian style.

While work continued on the Avondale buildings, construction began on a house for Ellen White. The Sunnyside Historical Home as it’s now known was completed in 1896 and still stands.

Sanitarium Health Food Company

Two major food companies are associated with the Seventh Day Adventist Church, Kellogs and the Australian/New Zealand Sanitarium health food business. Both reflect the early interest in diet in the church.

Upon his arrival in Australia, William White convinced Seventh-day Adventist Edward Halsey, a baker at John Harvey Kellogg's Battle Creek Sanitarium to immigrate to Australia. Arriving in November 1897, Halsey rented a small bakery in Melbourne, and produced granola (made of wheat, oats, maize, and rye) and Granose (the unsweetened forerunner to Weet-Bix). The product was sold door to door as an alternative to fat-laden or poor nutritious foods popular at the time.

In 1899, a bigger factory was opened at Cooranbong next door to the college. With further growth, a major new and rather striking factory was built in 1937. The world changes. In 2015 Sanitarium, while still owned by the church, announced that it was closing the plant over three years because the maintenance costs had become just too high!

The Whites return to the US

In September 1900, Ellen, William and his family returned to the United States after their nine years in Australia, terminating the direct connection. 

Evolution of Avondale College

In 1911 its name was changed to Australasian Missionary College, making it’s still limited purpose clear. Courses covered teaching, business, and biblical and mission studies. By the early 1950s students could study, B.Sc through the external program of the University of London, a BA through Pacific Union College, California and an MA through Andrews University Michigan. The 1960s were a time of expansion. In 1964 the institution was renamed Avondale College, while the men’s residence and first year’s women’s residence were completed.

In 1974, Avondale received Government accreditation to offer and its own bachelor degrees. From the 1990s it was allowed to offer its own master’s degrees with doctoral degrees offered from 2006. In 2010,  Council changed the name to Avondale College of Higher Education. as an interim step to achieving full university status. In December 2014, Avondale was granted self-accrediting status by the Australian Tertiary Education Quality & Standards Agency.

The past decade has seen significant development in staff qualifications and research output. Four research centres and an academic press have been established. There has been increasing interaction, including collaborative research with Australian universities, industry, and the professions. Scholarly activity has been facilitated by policies providing generously for staff research and professional development.

Avondale remains a small college by Australian tertiary standards, but not one without ambition.

Note on sources

As textual analysis would make clear!, this piece is drawn especially from assorted wikipedia entries, edited and consolidated.   

1949 flood left Kempsey devastated

Raging waters: The dramatic Kempsey flood of 1949 rushes past a house.

On Wednesday 31 August 1949, the Mayor of Armidale, L E Dawson,. launched a special appeal for the victims of the disastrous Kempsey floods.

“The citizens of Kempsey have indeed suffered a major catastrophe, and our hearts go out to them in their distress”, the Mayor said. “ Armidale citizens will, I know, do all that is expected of them.”

The previous Friday, 26 August, Arthur Lindeman had come on duty at Kempsey Aeradio at midnight.

Located at Kempsey airport, Kempsey Aeradio was one of twelve original stations built by AWA in 1938 to try to make the skies safer following several crashes.

Manned by five staff, the station provided 24 hour communication with aircraft overflying Kempsey on the Brisbane and Sydney route using a point-to-point Morse channel. The station also had one of the prime navigational aids used by aircraft at the time, a 33Mc Radio Range, along with an NDB (non directional beacon) and a rotating light.

The equipment was not always reliable, with equipment failures contributing to the fatal crash of the ANA passenger plane Lutana on the Crawney Range the year before.

Find out more about the fate of the Lutana:  

The fatal flight: Lost lives of the Lutana  

History Podcast: Lost lives of the Lutana

 It had begun raining very heavily. By 2 am the rain was torrential. Lindeman explained the situation to the Flight Checking Officer at Sydney and requested permission to close the station. A regular freighter was due out of Brisbane about this time and permission was refused.

Torrential rain continued.

“At about 3.30 am the wife of a local farmer and her young son arrived and asked if I had been outside lately”, Lindeman later recalled. “The water was lapping the top steps, a depth of about four feet. Equipment which could be moved was placed as high as possible after advising Sydney and Brisbane that the station was closing.”

With dawn breaking, the party headed across the airport for higher ground. .As they passed through the airport gate, they eyed the snakes that coiled themselves round the fencing wires and gate posts. There were snakes everywhere

Kempsey Aeradio station under water 1949 flood.

Rain continued, with another eight inches (203mm) falling on the Saturday. The effects were devastating. It was pitiful”, Lindeman said, “to witness houses, outhouses and belongings being washed down the river.”

 Railway Bridge, Kempsey 1949 flood suggests the power of the water.

Six people died in the flood, including a 13-year-old boy at Smithtown who drowned after he went out by horseback to get some cattle in for his dad. Rescue efforts were hampered by the collapse of the telephone system and the flooding of the local radio station.

Armidale citizens responded generously to the Mayor’s Appeal, including a £25 donation from Armidale Rotary to the Kempsey Club. 

Note to readers: This post appeared as a column in the Armidale Express Extra on 26 September 2018. I am repeating the columns here with a lag because they are not all on line outside subscription. You can see all the Belshaw World and History Revisited/History Matters columns by clicking here for 2009, here for 2010, here for 2011, here for 2012, here for 2013, here for 2014, here for 2015, here for 2016, here  2017, here 2018 .

Judith Wallace's childhood reflections

Replacement labour: Some 18,000 Italian POWs were sent to Australia during World War II. 10,000 became farm workers some on IlParran. This, the eleventh in a series on growing up on the Northern or New England Tablelands, continues the story of writer Judith Wallace. 

For many of us, childhood memories are especially intense. Time seems to stretch, to last for ever.

Then as we grow older, as more events and responsibilities crowd into our lives, things begin to blur. We have to put aside memories as our brains become more crowded. Yet childhood memories remain because they have a continuing and indeed increasing emotional intensity.

This was true of writer Judith Wallace. Some of the most intense and lyrical pieces in her memoir Memories of a Country Child-hood relate to her early childhood growing up on Ilparran, a large station to the west of Glen Innes. .

Ilparran is only 18 miles (29k) from Glen Innes. Today one would pop into the car without thinking. But even in the 1930s when Judith was a child, visits to town were rare.

The old stations were self-contained worlds, villages. There was the inside (life in the big house or homestead) and then the outside (life on the property outside the big house). Beyond that was the rest of the world.

Up to the Second World War, most stations retained domestic staff - cooks, maids, nannies - who looked after the inside. This was a more formal world with marked class distinctions.

The first part of Judith’s book records this life from the viewpoint of the child. Initially the focus is on life in the house and immediate surrounds, but progressively widens as the growing child is able to explore the property around the house.

A turning point comes when she and her sister are given ponies. Now they can explore still more widely.

The Second World War brings major changes as staff are drawn away by the War. Outside staff are partially replaced by Italian POWs, inside staff by the family.

Judith’s English mother takes over the cooking, using skills originally learned at Finishing School. Meals acquire a distinct French flavour as plain mutton and vegetables are replaced by food encrusted in rich cream based sauces.

The young Judith takes responsibility for the necessary milking, rising at 5.30 to tramp across the sometimes black-frost ground to gather the Jersey cows.

The girl enjoyed it, resting her head against the warm side of the patient cows for protection from the cold. Then, milking done, she carries the pails back to the warm kitchen where bacon is cooking.

Comment 

While I knew that Italian POWs had worked on the farms, I did not know that they were in New England until researching this column, nor did I know the numbers involved. Something else I have to investigate! 

Note to readers: This post appeared as a column in the Armidale Express Extra on 19 September 2018. I am repeating the columns here with a lag because they are not all on line outside subscription. You can see all the Belshaw World and History Revisited/History Matters columns by clicking here for 2009, here for 2010, here for 2011, here for 2012, here for 2013, here for 2014, here for 2015, here for 2016, here  2017, here 2018 .

The demons of a historic New England figure

Edvard Munch, The Scream 1893: Driven by his own demons, William Ogilvie, Edward's eldest son, took his own life in 1920.This, the tenth in a series on growing up on the Northern or New England Tablelands, continues the story of writer Judith Wallace

Life can sometimes become too much. On 18 November 1920, William Ogilvie was found lying on his bed at Sydney’s Usher’s Hotel with a bullet wound in his temple, a revolver clasped in his right hand. He was only 58.

Near his body were found a letter to his solicitor plus telegrams to his wife and children.

“Good-bye, my darling wife, one telegram read, “I shall never see you alive again. I have written you to Ilparran today, explaining everything. Fondest love, my dearest dear.”

I do not know what drove him to suicide, can only imagine the distress it caused his family.

Edward, the eldest boy and Judith Wallace’s father, was in England. After beginning his education at TAS (The Armidale School), he had gone to England to study at Oxford, his father’s old university. He was, the TAS magazine observed, one of the few Armidalians who had studied at Oxford.

Edward underwent officer training and in 1914 became a second lieutenant in the 17th Lancers. At the time of his father’s death in 1920, he was still in England as a lieutenant with the Life Guards.

Now as his father had wished, Edward returned home to help his mother and manage Ilparran as well as the family’s other interests.

Four years after his return, he married the English born Dorothy Gytha Micklem in Brisbane at what appears to have been a considerable social wedding.

"It is indeed a haunting, sad, but magical book..."

The Micklems owned property in North Queensland, so the papers presented it as a union of two major pastoral families with the Governor of Queensland present as one of the guests.

To house his new wife, Edward built a new house on the property. That house and the surrounding property form the centre piece of Judith Wallace’s memoir on he childhood.

Writing in 1996, David McCooey (Artful Histories: Modern Australian Autobiography) features Judith’s book as one example in his study of Australian autobiography. He capturing the key elements of the book to place them in a broader context; ideas of place and time; the elegiac nature of accounts of place; the way time weaves itself through the narrative.

It is indeed a haunting, sad, but magical book, one that shows life at a particular time in a particular place. Australia is not and never has been a uniform whole, but a place of many and varied stories.

Next week I will look at key features in Judith’s story.

Postscript

I used the famous Munch image to illustrate this column because it captured that sense of personal despair  Over on ART and ARCHITECTURE, mainly, Hel's Edvard Munch, Norwegian meteorology and mental ill health provides some fascinating background to Munch painting.

Other Reader Feedback

Ed wrote (21/11/2018) in an email:
Greetings Jim,

You local history articles are greatly appreciated and on some topics you have a unique perspective: an insider looking out.  This message is specifically prompted by your sequence on William Ogilvie -- of particular interest to me because I actually visited Yulgilbar Castle circa 1952.  It was a mess, of course, and ascending the stairs was not prudent; my main memories are of lucerne hay bales stored where there was still some roof and of the lions couchant at the entrance, maybe they are still there.  My companions on the day informed that a nearby creek called “OBX Creek” was so named because the landholders along it were Ogilvie, Boyd and a completely illiterate chap who only signed documents with an ‘X’.  I took that with a grain of salt but it’s a lovely story and it would be nice if it were true.  Can you shed any light on this this pressing matter?

I fear that I can't provide light on QBX Creek. Perhaps a reader can? I did love the description of Yugilbar. I understand - I have still to visit - that the upstairs is gone. Too difficult to repair.   

Note to readers: This post appeared as a column in the Armidale Express Extra on 5 September 2018. I am repeating the columns here with a lag because they are not all on line outside subscription. You can see all the Belshaw World and History Revisited/History Matters columns by clicking here for 2009, here for 2010, here for 2011, here for 2012, here for 2013, here for 2014, here for 2015, here for 2016, here  2017, here 2018 .

The Ogilvies - a dynasty under strain

Unlikely friendship: The English poet Robert Browning was a friend of the Clarence River squatter Edward Ogilvie and his daughters, his beloved Octet. This, the nineth in a series on growing up on the Northern or New England Tablelands, continues the story of writer Judith Wallace.    

London, May 1888. “My dear Eight”, the English poet Robert Browning wrote to the Ogilvie girls: “what a peculiar as well as pleasant privilege it is, to love each one of you as if there were eight of you to love and the whole eight as if they were one and indivisible”.

Browning was then 76 and would die the following year. His friendship with the Clarence River squatter Edward Ogilvie and his family was an unlikely one. I think Browning liked their freshness and lack of cant.

The family was breaking up, although that was not immediately clear. Edward was lonely following the death of his wife and had become demanding. He also felt that his sons were growing away from him, becoming absorbed into English life.

The girls would soon escape into marriage. For the boys’ part, Edward considered that it was time that eldest William took over his dynastic responsibilities.

Edward recognised that William would need to learn the ropes after such a long time in England. He was therefore sent home to Yulgilbar to be mentored under manager William Penrose.

Soon after arriving in Australia, William married Ethel Mylne, Graham Mylne’s daughter from nearby Eatonswill. The two families had always been close, connected by proximity, shared experience and marriage. 

Tensions soon arose between William Penrose and William Ogilvie.

Father Edward was showing no signs of returning and had rented a house in his beloved Florence. Penrose continued living in the big house and would cede little responsibility to William Ogilvie, treating Yulgilbar as his own.

William also felt that Penrose was using Yulgilbar to build his own stock at Yulgibar’s expense. Finally, a frustrated William wrote to his father to deliver an ultimatum.

“I will give up my claim to Yulgilbar”, he told his father, “if you will lend me £2,000 to buy a place of my own.” Far away in Europe, Edward agreed.

It would be a permanent break. When Edward finally came to make dynastic choices, Yulgilbar would go to daughter Mabel. It was made clear to her husband, Charles Lillingston, that he must throw himself into the place, but that it could never be his.

Lillingston, a successful man in his own right, was reluctant but finally agreed. The resulting discussions created significant tensions within the family, making the break with William permanent.

For his part, William had already purchased Ilparran, a property west of Glen Innes. It was this property that William’s granddaughter Judith Wallace would immortalise in Memories of a Country Childhood.

Note to readers: This post appeared as a column in the Armidale Express Extra on 22 August 2018. I am repeating the columns here with a lag because they are not all on line outside subscription. You can see all the Belshaw World and History Revisited/History Matters columns by clicking here for 2009, here for 2010, here for 2011, here for 2012, here for 2013, here for 2014, here for 2015, here for 2016, here  2017, here 2018 .

In pursuit of a dynasty

Great success: Tom Robert's painting of squatter Edward Ogilvie. Ogilvie staked out land on both sides of the Clarence River seeking to build a dynasty.This, the eighth in a series on growing up on the Northern or New England Tablelands, introduces the story of Judith Wallace.   

Academic and writer Judith Wallace’s great great grandfather, Edward Ogilvie, was an ambitious man. He wished to found a dynasty. He was to achieve great success, but his own personality brought a key plank undone.

Edward’s remarkable story was told by George Farwell in Squatter's Castle: The saga of a pastoral dynasty (1983). Here I can do no more than sketch a few details to set the scene for later events.

Edward was born at Tottenham, Middlesex, on 25 July 1814, the son of naval officer William and his wife Mary.

In 1824, William and Mary decided to emigrate to NSW, arriving in January 1825. William was given a land grant of 2,000 acres in the Upper Hunter which he named Merton after the English village they had been home.

The Ogilvies were undercapitalised and initially struggled. The children were home schooled by Mary and actively involved from an early age in farm work.

In 1846 Edward and brother Frederick along with an Aboriginal companion went north looking for new land.

Escaped convict Richard Craig had discovered a large river, the Clarence, while living with the Aborigines. Now he was leading a large party from Falconer’s Plains near Guyra down to the Clarence. 

The Ogilvies asked to join the party. Denied, they pushed on as fast as possible and reached the Clarence at Tabulum ahead of Craig. Downstream Edward took up fifty-six miles (90 km) on both sides of the river and later named the runs Yulgilbar. By 1850 Yulgilbar was about 300 sq. miles (777 km²) and included Fairfield, a 100,000-acre (40,469 ha) cattle station in the mountains.

With the family fortunes now established, Edward sailed for Europe in August 1854, traveling widely across the continent. Florence became his favourite city, a love that would stay with him.

While in Europe Edward met and in 1858 married Theodosia de Burgh. Returning to Australia in 1859, he built a palatial home for his new wife that would become known as Yulgilbah castle. In 1862 a first son, William Frederick, was born.

At twelve, William was sent to school in the United Kingdom and seems to have stayed there until finishing at Balliol College Oxford.

In late 1884, Edward returned to England with his wife and daughters for another extended visit, joining his two sons. It was the last time the whole family would be together.

Edward had always been a dominant personality. Now he was becoming irascible and over-controlling. The scene was set for events that would throw his dynastic plans into chaos. 

Note to readers: This post appeared as a column in the Armidale Express Extra on 15 August 2018. I am repeating the columns here with a lag because they are not all on line outside subscription. You can see all the Belshaw World and History Revisited/History Matters columns by clicking here for 2009, here for 2010, here for 2011, here for 2012, here for 2013, here for 2014, here for 2015, here for 2016, here  2017, here 2018 .

The rhythms of our lives - influence of church on young lives

Tennis party: Armidale social life in the 1930s. Photo is from the Drummond family collection.This is the seventh in a series on growing up on the Northern or New England Tablelands.

The rhythms of our lives proceed in stages linked to age: childhood, school, beginning work, family formation. While these rhythms are linked to age, their exact pattern varies over time and space and is affected by individual circumstance.

"The nineteenth and first part of the twentieth century, the church you attended or were affiliated with had a major influence on childhood and young adult life."

 Australian society today has become increasingly secular. By contrast, over the nineteenth and first part of the twentieth century, the church you attended or were affiliated to had a major influence on childhood and young adult life.

The big sectarian divide was between Catholic and Protestant, although there were divides among the Protestant churches too. 

At St Ursula’s in Armidale, the nuns wanted their girls to marry good Catholic boys and bring up good Catholic children. Mixing with other boys was discouraged.

In similar vein, Judith Wright noted somewhat acerbically that some parents sent their girls to the New England Girls School in the belief that they might find a suitable husband from among the boys at The Armidale School. It was a marriage market. Mixing with Catholic boys was not encouraged.

While important, the religious divide was not universal. Cooperation did occur and indeed was necessary in small communities. There is very little evidence of religious divides in Maslyn Williams’ descriptions of community life in Tenterfield.

However, one thing that stands out from Judith’s writing is just how little contact she had with people outside her family and immediate circle. The girls at NEGS came from the same group.

When cousin Tina introduced her into social life, it involved the social round of the Bachelors and Spinsters, Matrons, Races and TAS/NEGS old boys/old girls balls. There are no references to people or life beyond this other than some people on or linked to the property or rare visits to Armidale for particular purposes.

This contrasts with Binks Turnbull Dowling’ memories. She, too, was sent to boarding school, in this case the Hilton House School. Today we know the school as PLC Armidale, but it was then owned by its principle, Miss Alethea Tendall.

There are similarities in the description of school life at the two institutions, something that is a story in its own right, but Hilton was in town and less cloistered than the more remote NEGS.

Binks had relatives and friends in Armidale and we get descriptions of a social life that contained some similar elements to that of Judith but which was more town centered and far more varied. Indeed, any older Armidale resident who reads Binks’ book will instantly recognise names and places.

Next week I will introduce our fourth character, the writer Judith Wallace, a member of another pastoral dynasty, the Ogilvie family. Her story provides a counterpoint to that of Judith Wright. 

Note to readers: This post appeared as a column in the Armidale Express Extra on 8 August 2018. I am repeating the columns here with a lag because they are not all on line outside subscription. You can see all the Belshaw World and History Revisited/History Matters columns by clicking here for 2009, here for 2010, here for 2011, here for 2012, here for 2013, here for 2014, here for 2015, here for 2016, here  2017, here 2018 .

Life and times of Binks Turnbull Dowling

Water houses, Papua. Binks Dowling's father became a popular Australian writer on Papua New Guinea in the 1920s and early 1930s. This is the sixth in a series on growing up on the Northern or New England Tablelands.

Today’s column introduces a third character, Binks Turnbull Dowling, into our continuing story of coming of age on the New England. Each character is different, their lives take us in sometimes unexpected directions, but between them they reveal something of the depth and complexity of our shared history.

Binks Turnbull Dowling was born in Papua in 1923, the daughter of English born Gilbert Munro Turnbull and Jean Doris Winn. Jean was part of a totally different extended Turnbull family headquartered at Kotupna, a large station in the Fall country to the east of Armidale.

Gilbert trained as an architect and in 1920 became Government Architect in Papua. He was an adventurous man and a considerable writer.

Often writing under the pseudonym Tauwarra (Motu for fighting-man), Gilbert published numerous short pieces and articles, at least 90 short stories and four novels.

The couple met when Gilbert was visiting Australia and married in the Presbyterian Manse in Armidale on 31 August 1921. Initially the marriage seems to have been happy enough, although they were very different characters.

In 1928’ the couple decided to send Binks to stay with the Turnbulls on Kotupna. Later, mother Jean decided to return to Kotupna, leaving Gilbert in Papua. While the couple remained married, they never reunited. Gilbert retired to Urunga in 1934 and died four years later at just 48.

In 1997, Binks’ children persuaded her to write and publish an autobiographical memoir, For crying out loud. It’s a good if sometimes confusing read.

The book is broken into overlapping chronological segments. These explore and describe Binks’ life up to her marriage.

The book is also an examination of her parents, their personalities and the complexities of relationship, seeking to understand. It is dedicated to the father that she greatly loved, a father she rarely saw after she was sent to Kotupna, a father who died when she was fifteen.

It is not a sad book, but there are sad elements that made me uncomfortable, a reminder of the uncertainties and complexities of life. Apart from the story of her parents, I wondered about the inarticulate nature of the Turnbull men, about the break-ups and relationship failures. Sometimes, it seemed to me that Kotupna had become a devouring beast.

I know that members of the Turnbull family would probably not share that perception.

When Binks asked her mother years later why she stayed at Kotupna, Jean looked at her strangely and said simply “But I was happy”. The love they all had for Kotupna, Binks is no exception, shines through.

Next week, I will look at some of the elements in Binks’ life comparing them to other characters in our story

Note to readers: This post appeared as a column in the Armidale Express Extra on 1 August 2018. I am repeating the columns here with a lag because they are not all on line outside subscription. You can see all the Belshaw World and History Revisited/History Matters columns by clicking here for 2009, here for 2010, here for 2011, here for 2012, here for 2013, here for 2014, here for 2015, here for 2016, here  2017, here 2018 .

The poetry and the passion: Judith Wright's Moving Images

Cresting the Moonbi range in 1942, Judith Wright's love of the New England, "my country", suddenly crystallised. The 1946 result was The Moving Image, her first book of poems.This, the fifth in a series on growing up on the Northern or New England Tablelands, is the second on poet and writer Judith Wright

In 1946, the 31 year old Judith Wright published her first book of poetry, The Moving Image. Dedicated to the father she loved and who loved her, the book is one of the masterpieces of New England literature.

The poems cover many of the themes for which she would later become well known including love of the environment and awareness of Aboriginal dispossession, but most are local poems that will be instantly familiar to anybody who knows the New England Tablelands. They reflect a love of country, a sense of passionate identify.

This long felt love had suddenly crystalised in 1942.

Judith had been working in Sydney. Most men were now away at the war, while her father was leading civil defence planning to evacuate people and livestock from the coast in the event of Japanese invasion.

After pressure from Judith, her father agreed that she should come home to help on the property. Topping the Moonbi Range, Judith was suddenly aware, struck, that she had entered her country.

She had long known that she would be a poet.

After her mother’s death in 1927, the twelve year old Judith had tried to adopt the role of Norah from the Billabong series, books that she loved. She became fiercely protective of her brothers and tried to look after her father. She was also struggling with the stresses of early puberty.

When he father  remarried, Judith and her new step mother clashed. It was decided that Judith and her cousin Tina should go to NEGS, the New England Girls' School, as boarders.

Unlike the slim Tina, the bespectacled Judith was bookish, spotty, bulgy and uncertain. She was not sure what to expect, but knew that she would always second. She consoled herself with the love of poetry and the knowledge that she would become a poet.

At NEGS, Judith decided that she would like to go to the University of Sydney, but her plans were thrown awry by the second of two serious accidents.

In the first, she was thrown from a horse and broke her arm. It was set wrongly and had to be broken and reset.

The second accident was far worse. Her horse fell, leading to very serious injuries. She was carried by stretched to the homestead, driven to Armidale and then sent to Sydney by train for surgery and rehabilitation.

It had been an agonising experience, one that had also put paid to any idea of matriculation. But not all was lost.

I will continue my story next week, also introducing our third character in our growing up on the New England series.

 Note to readers: This post appeared as a column in the Armidale Express Extra on 25 July 2018. I am repeating the columns here with a lag because they are not all on line outside subscription. You can see all the Belshaw World and History Revisited/History Matters columns by clicking here for 2009, here for 2010, here for 2011, here for 2012, here for 2013, here for 2014, here for 2015, here for 2016, here  2017, here 2018