Anthony Jenkins From his home in Fitzroy, Melbourne, the archaeologist John Lockyer O’Brien captured evidence of the inner-city’s evolving urban and social landscape, documenting a transitional stage between the overcrowded “slums” which attracted condemnation, and the construction of the Housing Commission Towers which sprung up from the razed grounds of urban renewal.1 Hidden within the collection of his photographs are vestiges of entire neighbourhoods condemned as “slums” by the Slum Abolition Board (precursor to the Victorian Housing Commission) that were consequently razed. The picture b ..read more

Alexia Rutkowski Figure 1: The Three Cooks, undated, University of Melbourne Archives, Records of Stadiums Pty Ltd, 1987.0094.00132. In the digitised images of the Stadiums Pty Ltd archive collection, Australian boxer, George Cook caught my attention as several photographs included portraits with his wife and daughter, Julie, therefore, relating to his personal life as well as his boxing career. Intrigued to learn more about George, I questioned how a man from Cobbora, Dubbo, New South Wales could have a successful international boxing career during the 1920s and 1930s. Matthew Taylor explores ..read more

William Hoff Figure 1: Crowd at boxing match, University of Melbourne Archives, Records of Stadiums Pty Ltd, 1987.0094.00062. The subjects of this photograph are attending a boxing match at West Melbourne Stadium, but their identities are anonymous. In the metadata, there are no known details for the unseen athletes, nor any definitive transcription of the handwriting on the back of the object. Taken from the Records of Stadiums Pty Ltd collection, held in the University of Melbourne (UoM) Archives, this photograph is logged in the catalogue as being taken in 1950—with a broad estimate between ..read more

Shannon Peters On the evening of Sunday July 25th, 1954, an enthusiastic crowd of around a thousand people gathered at Sydney’s Mascot Airport, eager to catch a glimpse of celebrated jazz singer Ella Fitzgerald. Fitzgerald’s arrival in Australia had been delayed by a few days due to her mistreatment by prejudiced Pan American airlines’ staff, who had refused to validate her first-class ticket.1 Despite this controversy, Sydney’s Daily Telegraph reported that she ‘waved happily to the crowd and signed autographs for her fans’ before departing on a transfer flight to Melbourne.2 Although th ..read more

Ronak Alburz John Lockyer O’Brien (1905–1965), a distinguished historian at the University of Melbourne, curated a remarkable collection of photographs, capturing the late 1950s and early 1960s. During a sabbatical in 1959, O’Brien’s historical curiosity led him to explore bluestone buildings, a subject that plausibly resonated deeply with his expertise. Most of these images were likely taken during this year, as he traversed inner suburban landscapes to document these structures. These photographs offer a unique glimpse into the architectural and urban evolution of inner-city Melbourne during ..read more

Joshua Strong My father Michael, a 76 year-old Melbournian, remembers what it was like being sent to the grocer’s shop as a kid in the 1950s. “The basic staples were sold by weight”, he recalls. “You’d order half a pound of flour, and the attendant would measure it out on a scale and seal it up in a brown paper bag.” Even the biscuits were sold loose out of a large tin, and Michael knew how to double his yield: “The broken ones from the bottom of the tin were half-price, and the grocer would always have some set aside.” This recollection of a lost time comes to life through the images of groce ..read more

As archivists we “discover” many unexpected things in the collections we process. It is rare to unexpectedly discover ourselves, though. In 2021-2022 as the Miegunyah Archivist working on the papers of prominent University of Melbourne figures, I did just that: records revealing my own brief acquaintance with University of Melbourne historian Margaret Kiddle. Margaret Kiddle (1914-1958) was an historian and one of the early female academics at the University of Melbourne. In 1946 Kiddle became a tutor (later senior tutor) in the Department of History. She stayed there for the rest of her life ..read more

Madeline Roycroft is working as a Research Assistant in the Louise Hanson-Dyer collection, which sits within our Rare Music collection. Madeline is also currently a Grainger Teaching Fellow, coordinates Context, a music research journal at the Melbourne Conservatorium of Music and has just submitted her PhD thesis on the reception of the Soviet composer Dmitri Shostakovich in twentieth-century France. Recently, I sat down with Madeline to learn more about her work in Archives and Special Collections. What is the project you are currently working on in the Rare Music collection?  I’m using ..read more

Problem solving was an incidental and unexpected benefit of using our new Wolfvision visualiser last week. Known affectionately as “Wolfie”, it allows objects from Archives and Special Collections to be viewed by students learning wholly online, or through blended learning. It also has great potential in assisting overseas or interstate researchers to view items in our collection on request, assisted by a staff member. Rosa Pinkerton and ? A recent class on researching music in Australia using archival resources from the Rare Music collection included a mystery: an undated photograph of two y ..read more

Image: Melbourne University Intervarsity Hockey Team, Hobart, August 1929, University of Melbourne Archives, 1983.0005.00017. For many students, participation in sport is an important part of their University of Melbourne education. As social engagement and as a way of supporting their physical and mental health, sport adds an extra dimension to academic life. Interfaculty and inter university competitions in sports like tennis, cricket, lacrosse and athletics continue to add richness to campus life. Records of this aspect of university life are held at UMA and encompass a range of formats, i ..read more