Capital history in the news
Preserving our film heritage
The last Tasmanian Tiger | The National Film and Sound Archive have released for the first time a digitally preserved travelogue from 1935 which includes the last-known surviving moving images of the extinct thylacine (Tasmanian Tiger).
Keeping Australia's film legacy alive | Ron Cerabona explains how the National Film and Sound Archive finds, preserves and restores Australian films so that our film heritage is maintained and kept accessible. Covers the challenges that have been involved with finding and preserving some of Australia’s most important films.
Gallery & Library news
National Portrait Gallery's Love Stories has its ups and downs through coronavirus | Love Stories the winter blockbuster for the National Portrait Gallery has been postponed indefinitely due to COVID-19. Instead the Gallery will host an online interactive exhibition Australian Love Stories in the coming months finding the move to more on-line content has had some benefits.
Preserving a pandemic the national library is collecting tomorrows history | The National Library of Australia are inviting the public to collect COVID-19 items for the Library’s collection. They are looking for any material that is a snapshot of the pandemic like posters, signs or stay-at-home notices and are interested in items that indicate the diverse experiences of Australians. Learn more about this here.
Museum news
Live at the Museum | National Museum of Australia is live on YouTube, Thursdays, 2pm. At these sessions you can explore the Museum’s collections and building and ask the curators and staff questions. This Thursday (21 May) the subject will be the Museum two stromatolites —billions of years old they provide some of the earliest evidence of life on earth. See here for more details.
Curly conversations haircuts at old parliament-house | Rose Mackie from Museum of Australian Democracy at Old Parliament House (MOAD) writes about the history of the Parliament House barber shop and hairdressing salon, highlighting that they are all part of the story of how Parliament functioned not only as a workplace, but was also a home away from home. Other MOAD stories can be read here.
Les Carlyon literary prize | The Australian War Memorial has announced the establishment of the Les Carlyon Literary Prize. The winning work will receive $10,000 and it will be awarded for an author’s first major publication relating to Australian military history, social military history, or war history. Entries opened on 25 April and will close 30 June 2020.
Local mysteries & newspapers
On the hunt for suburban oddities | During the COVID-19 restrictions Tim the Yowie Man has been surveying some of Canberra’s suburban oddities and is asking Canberrans if they know of any ghost signs in the city. Georgia Curry explains that these signs are fading hand painted signs that are more than 50 years old and advertise a product that is now obsolete.
Manuka Pool's deepest mystery | Frances McGee writes about Manuka Pool’s lost Champions’ Honour Board and how it is more than a list of names because for each name there is a story and collectively they provide a link to the very early days of Canberra. She stresses that with the Manuka Pool turning 90 in January 2020 finding the lost Honour Board would be a fitting birthday gift.
Sun sets on the Golden Age of local newspapers | Nichole Overall surveys the long and distinguished 160 year old history of the “Queanbeyan Age” given there are concerns it may join other regional and rural newspapers that will not survive the COVID-19 restrictions.
Vale Jack Mundey 1929 – 2020
Our cities owe much of their surviving heritage to Jack Mundey | Dr James Lesh of the University of Melbourne writes about Jack Mundey’s legacy, including his pioneering role in the Australian heritage movement which saw him reconceive Australians’ relationship to their cities and heritage places.
Acknowledgement: The image above is inspired by the NFSA’s release of new footage showing the last-known surviving moving images of the Tasmanian Tiger. It is Anon, 1900. Tas. Marsupial Wolf [Tasmanian Tiger][picture] from the State Library of Victoria. Full details here.
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