Traces

Here we are, bringing you Volume 4! This time last year, my team and I were busy mapping out the first ever edition of Traces. There were countless discussions about the various features, how the pages should look, what the cover style would be, and

Qantas Founders Museum restores historic Super Constellation plane Qantas Founders Museum completed an external restoration of the Super Constellation aircraft in July this year. The model is now in pristine condition thanks to a team of Qantas engin

October 1922: Finke River, Central Australia. Fifty-year-old Carl Strehlow, a pastor at Hermannsburg Mission, is ill. Prayer won’t help, nor will calls to Adelaide. It soon becomes apparent to the local Arrernte (or Aranda) people, Carl’s wife, Fried

It sounds more like Victorian juvenile fiction than history, but as the true story of the Bells of Sunday Island shows, the thrilling South Sea adventures penned by some of the 19th century’s bestselling novelists – Robert Louis Stevenson, R. M. Ball

The photo opposite was taken in 1940, and shows Arthur Circus in Battery Point, Hobart. Seven children, probably residents of the modest cottages lining the circus, are gathered for games featuring an old tyre, a log, a doll in a pram and a broom. Ba

The offensive against the emus became the only military operation of its kind to take place on Australian soil. Astoundingly, the Australian Government was forced to concede defeat when the avian adversary outplayed, outwitted and outlasted troops in

Standing on one of Sydney’s ferries, it’s hard not to be jolted by the sights and sounds of the harbour. The throb of engines, the noise of crowds, and the whooshes of trains and traffic as the boat pulls out of Circular Quay can be overwhelming. The

In three world-changing voyages between 1768 and 1780, people from Europe and the Pacific met, often for the first time. Neither group was ever the same again. Captain James Cook and his crew travelled ‘farther than any other man’. Cook became famous

Established in the 1870s as a farming town, Farina grew into a lively township when the Great Central Railway – or the Old Ghan, as it is sometimes known – was extended from Adelaide to Marree in 1884, and then from Marree to Alice Springs not long a

Constructed by convicts in the 1850s, Fremantle Prison was Western Australia’s principal convict establishment. Handed over to the local colonial government in 1886, the end of Fremantle Prison as a convict site marked the end of the convict era in A

Whether it’s smuggling moonshine, revolting against authorities in the Eureka Rebellion or bushranging in armour fashioned from buckets, criminal activity has left an indelible impression on Australia’s identity. While many crimes committed on Austra

The year was 1928. Crouched low in an alleyway, looking out at Terry Street in Sydney’s Surry Hills, policewoman Lillian Armfield was ready to bring down notorious Sydney cocaine dealer May ‘Botany May’ Smith, who was stashing cocaine in her terrace.

Traces spoke with Caroline about the process of piecing together the lives of the sisters’ female ancestors, whose stories had been lost in time. What did you discover about the process of researching female ancestors? Even in our preliminary discuss

My grandfather, Thomas, whom I know as Tommy, was born in 1930 in the village of Lisburn, Northern Ireland. Now in the clutches of dementia, Tommy has little to say, but before his memory and words deserted him, he was full of tales of his homeland;

Vivid Recollection began when graphic designer James Walters digitised and restored a shoebox full of his family’s old photos and slides from South Australia. Nine years and hundreds of projects later, Vivid Recollection is a fully fledged imaging st

During both world wars, Australia was confronted with a most challenging problem on its home front; what should be done with the thousands of ‘enemy aliens’ living in Australia? That is, the people who had migrated to Australia from the nations with

Shepherd, convicted sheep stealer, death-row convict, ticket-of-leave man, cattleman, station owner, eager husband, friend of bushrangers, victim of crime, loving father, generous donor, gentleman, occupier of an unmarked grave – I can’t work out for

Ernest Scott, a professor of history at The University of Melbourne from 1914–1936, emigrated to Melbourne in 1892. Scott’s collection of books and clippings, which were acquired by the university after his death, provide a fascinating insight into A

Acclaimed historian and bestselling author of Beneath Hill 60 and Somme Mud Will Davies retells the story of the last 100 days of World War I, and the crucial contribution of Australian soldiers to final allied victory in November 1918. Davies brings

In February 1886, widow Jessie Thorburn moved into a picturesque home named Meroogal, located in Nowra, New South Wales, with three of her four unmarried daughters, Belle, Kate and Georgie. Her youngest daughter, Kennina Fanny, who was known as Tot o

Causes of deterioration There are many causes of disintegration in books, some of which are part of the book’s make-up, and some of which can be avoided. If the paper used within the books, or the adhesive used to bind them, is highly acidic, then th

In the 1840s, a new dance was demonstrated for the first time in Paris. Described as having the ‘intimacy of the waltz, with the vivacity of the Irish jig’, the polka quickly became a favourite among young, fashionable people, and soon spread across