{"id":2029,"date":"2017-05-05T12:45:28","date_gmt":"2017-05-05T02:15:28","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.wakefieldpress.com.au\/blog\/?p=2029"},"modified":"2017-04-27T17:59:18","modified_gmt":"2017-04-27T07:29:18","slug":"south-australia-eve-war","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.wakefieldpress.com.au\/blog\/2017\/05\/south-australia-eve-war\/","title":{"rendered":"South Australia on the Eve of War"},"content":{"rendered":"

May marks the annual South Australia’s History Festival.\u00a0<\/em>South Australia on the Eve of War<\/a>\u00a0was launched on Tuesday as part of the festival. \u00a0Here we have an excerpt from book’s introduction, written by Melanie Oppenheimer and Margrette Kleinig.<\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Three individuals \u2013 David Unaipon, Catherine Helen Spence\u00a0and Douglas Mawson \u2013 encapsulate the spirit of South Australia\u00a0in the years between Federation in 1901 and the eve of war. All,\u00a0too, have graced our paper currency at one point or another, an\u00a0indication of their national importance. Catherine Helen Spence,\u00a0who died in Adelaide in 1910, was described as \u2018the leading\u00a0woman in public affairs at the turn of the century in Australia\u2019:\u00a0South Australia\u2019s Chief Justice further described her as \u2018the\u00a0most distinguished woman they had had in Australia\u2019.\u00a0<\/span>At the\u00a0forefront of the first-wave feminist movement, which included\u00a0ensuring South Australia was the first Australian state to secure\u00a0voting rights for women in 1894, Spence became Australia\u2019s first\u00a0female political candidate, standing unsuccessfully for election\u00a0as a delegate to the 1897 Australasian Federal Convention.<\/p>\n

\u2018Preacher, author and inventor\u2019 David Unaipon was once\u00a0described as the \u2018best-known Aborigine in the Commonwealth\u2019\u00a0in the early twentieth century.\u00a0<\/span>Born in 1872 at the Point \u00a0McLeay Mission (now Raukkan) on the edge of the River Murray\u00a0Lower Lakes, Unaipon was, on the eve of war, in his early\u00a0forties. Interested in \u2018philosophy, science and music\u2019 and in\u00a0recording his people\u2019s oral stories and traditions, Unaipon had\u00a0\u2018led a deputation urging government control of Point McLeay\u00a0Mission\u2019 in 1912, and the following year gave evidence to a state\u00a0government Royal Commission into Aboriginal matters.<\/p>\n

In early 1914 Douglas Mawson triumphantly returned from\u00a0the Antarctic, where he had led Australia\u2019s \u2018first scientific\u00a0exploring endeavour beyond the Australian continent\u2019.\u00a0<\/span>Lecturer\u00a0in mineralogy and petrology at the University of Adelaide,\u00a0Mawson was physicist on the Shackleton expedition (1907\u20131909) that aimed to reach the South Geographic Pole. While\u00a0leading the Australasian Antarctic Expedition of 1911\u20131914, he\u00a0made scientific advances in \u2018cartography, geology, meteorology,\u00a0aurora, geomagnetism, biology and marine science\u2019.<\/p>\n

These three remarkable people, who pushed the boundaries\u00a0in their own particular spheres in unexpected and very\u00a0different ways, point to important social, political and cultural\u00a0developments in late nineteenth- and early twentieth-century\u00a0South Australia that had an impact both nationally and\u00a0internationally.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Find out more about<\/em> South Australia on the Eve of War here<\/em><\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

May marks the annual South Australia’s History Festival.\u00a0South Australia on the Eve of War\u00a0was launched on Tuesday as part of the festival. \u00a0Here we have an excerpt from book’s introduction, written by Melanie Oppenheimer and Margrette Kleinig.   Three individuals … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[553,107],"tags":[16,404,703,702],"class_list":["post-2029","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-adelaide","category-extract","tag-history","tag-south-australia","tag-south-australia-on-the-eve-of-war","tag-south-australias-history-festival"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4v1Of-wJ","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wakefieldpress.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2029","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wakefieldpress.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wakefieldpress.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wakefieldpress.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wakefieldpress.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2029"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.wakefieldpress.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2029\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2099,"href":"https:\/\/www.wakefieldpress.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2029\/revisions\/2099"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wakefieldpress.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2029"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wakefieldpress.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2029"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wakefieldpress.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2029"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}