from the National Archives of Australia
National treasures perhaps, but what are the satirists Roy Slaven and H G Nelson doing at the National Archives of Australia?
The Roy and H G connection is one of many pleasant surprises at the Archives new home in the elegant old building that was once the Canberra GPO. The duo was asked to select from thousands of black and white images held by the Archives, and caption photographs for a whimsical look at the Australia they grew up in.
Nearby a flickering screen shows banned excerpts from the famous BBC sci-fi series Dr Who and opposite is a colourful billboard of the south coast ship the Merimbula dating back to 1910.
Also in the Gallery, an engaging display about national service including the barrel and marbles which were used to determine who was conscripted during the Vietnam War. There is material about Federation, personal immigration records and dossiers of soldiers who served in World War I.
The displays and exhibitions provide just a glimpse of the Archives' massive collection of Commonwealth Government records.
In her book Documenting a Nation, about the first 50 years of the Archives, Hilary Golder talks of the national introspection which seems to come with a new century.
'The 1990s like the 1890s have seen a sharpening of the debate on Australian identity and this is a debate in which the Archives must be involved,' she said.
Historians, researchers and the public can turn to the Archives for essential historical material. From Cabinet papers to post office architecture, lighthouse ledgers to migrant files, flag designs to railway records, the collection is impressive.
For those researching their family history, the Archives is a valuable resource with its army service records, ships' passenger lists, migrant files and naturalisation papers.
There are reading rooms and repositories in each State and Territory and access is free. In all, some 300 shelf kilometres of file material - enough to link Parliament House in Canberra to the Opera House in Sydney!
And along with the files there are posters, maps, plans, architectural models, charts, films, musical scores, sound recordings, computer databases and other electronic records.
Amongst the collection, some quirky touches to keep visitors entertained. For example, the menu for the State luncheon for the English aviatrix Amy Johnson, and Douglas Mawson's 1930 Antarctic Proclamation which was retrieved from its copper tube in 1979 and returned to Australia in a Foster's cardboard box!
The National Archives is within the Communications, Information Technology and the Arts portfolio.
Contact
National Archives of Australia 02 6212 3600 or email: archives@naa.gov.au or visit the Archives website at www.naa.gov.au
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