School of Historical and Philosophical Studies - Theses

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    E.H. Lascelles and the Victorian Mallee: a survey of settlement 1850-1905
    Wessels, Sheila Frances ( 1966)
    This survey deals with a portion of the Victorian Mal1ee, in the North-West of the state, stretching from Lake Corrong across to Lake Tyrrell. From 1883 to 1890 the area under wheat in Victoria remained stagnant at about 1,100,000 acres as the process of settling farmers on pastoral lands slowed down. The one area in Victoria where the wheatlands increased in the 1890's and 1900's was the Mallee. E. H. Lascelles was largely responsible for the rapid extension of wheat growing in the area during the 1890's. Geographical considerations play a large part in the Mallee story. The area is isolated, the Mallee growth distinctive and the rainfall light and unpredictable. This survey is an attempt to trace the interaction of man and this environment, with the necessary changes and adaptations which took place as the squatters gave way before the selectors. However because the Mallee covers such a large area - virtually all of the North-West corner of the state - it was impossible to survey the whole in such a short study. So E. H. Lascelles and the belt of country in which he was primarily interested formed a suitable and contained segment of the area, with concentration upon the sub-division schemes at Hopetoun and Tyrrell Downs.
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    The early history of the Diamond Valley, 1836-1854
    Wilkinson, David J. ( 1969)
    “History,” said Francis Bacon, “maketh men wise.”, and whether the historian’s matter be a wide-ranging study of civilizations or a local history on the smallest scale, I believe this is the primary aim he must keep clearly before him. History is a purposeful discipline, motivated and directed by this objective. From an examination of the past the historian seeks wisdom for the present; this is the ultimate criterion of all historical writing and all historiographic values and judgements are tributary to it. The study and writing of history is both a science and an art. As a scientist the historian seeks out and balances his source materials, evaluates their validity, and analyses them to determine the facts of the past. But the history he writes must go further than a bare recital of facts which is a dull product, sterile of wisdom. My experience in this work is that the study of history becomes ultimately an act of understanding by a creative imagination and a disciplined mind, steeped in the facts of the past, and keenly aware of the present, and this has been my objective. History is no less scientific or “true” because it is an imaginative re-creation: contemporary writers on the method of the physical sciences make a very similar claim for their disciplines. History is about the men of the past whose thoughts and ideas rough-hewed our destiny, and our minds can be schooled to reach back to their times just as their best minds stretch forward towards us. Like a physical science, history is always a transitional understanding. The disciplined and creative historian with the hindsight of a century may perceive within the ideas and actions of the past significant developments germane to his purpose that were indiscernible to all but the acutest minds of the period he is studying. These may be nowhere explicitly recorded in the documents, for the men of the past were no more able than we ourselves to foresee what meaning future generations might be seeking from the records of their times. Documentary sources may provide specific statements of men’s conscious objectives and motives in the past, but each historian’s research, directed by his quest for wisdom in his own day, sets them in a new context, ae meaning which a later age reads from the record of men’s attested deeds and stated policies may be very different from that which their authors attributed to them. Thus there can be no comprehensive final understanding of the past. In every age men will re-write their history to answer the questions of their time, seeking wisdom from the past to bring order into the confusion of the present, by adding to it a perspective, a proportion, a direction, and a rationale. To attain an insight into our past is to illuminate our present and give us the priceless wisdom to know ourselves and shape our destiny. The writing of history is an art. The historian who seeks to convey to other men what he has found in his studies will require all the artistry he can command to tell his story well within the discipline which historiography prescribes. He must communicate to the minds of his readers a re-creation of the past that gives meaning to the present. He must be aware that his selection and marshalling of facts and his allocation of emphases are swayed by subjective considerations and by the questions of his own time which he is seeking to answer, and that these inevitably bias the history he writes. Finally, since a historian’s primary obligation is to be correct about what happened in the past, he must take care that his bias does not falsify the accuracy of the whole. His task becomes a delicate gauging and balancing of priorities. He cannot tell the whole truth, but he is required to tell nothing but the truth and not to distort the remainder. (From Introduction)
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    William Thomas and the Port Phillip Protectorate, 1838-1849
    Crawford, Ian Maxwell ( 1966)
    Between 1839 and 1849 the total number of Aborigines living in the area between Melbourne and Western Port declined by 50 per cent, despite the impact of the most intensive attempt to civilize Aborigines ever made in Australia. Those Aborigines who did survive showed no signs whatsoever of adopting the white man’s culture. The elaborate scheme known as the Protectorate had failed. Various reasons have been put forward for this failure. Some colonials maintained that the “sneaking murdering black cannibals” were incapable of improvement and even many Christians concluded that the Aborigines were suffering under the judgement of God and therefore could not be helped much by human agencies. The Protectors accused the Government of deliberately hindering their activities and of doing nothing beneficial for the Aborigines. The Government — or at least La Trobe, who was “practically the Government” — maintained that conflict between settlers and Aborigines was an inevitable stage in the spread of civilization, that the Protectors were incompetent and that the Protectorate was an unnecessary encumbrance on the Government. And the Aborigines for their part, said that “all White Men Bungalarly”, thereby signifying their contempt for anything white. Was there any truth in all of these mutual recriminations? The truth — in my opinion — lies in the conflict of ideas. The settlers wanted land and were prepared to sacrifice the rights of the few natives to the God of profit. The Government, while pressed by its English overlords to look after the rights of the Aborigines, lent heavily towards the views expounded by the settlers and pursued a vacillating role, sometimes supporting the Protectors in the hope that they would convert the Aborigines into an economic asset, more often turning a blind eye to abuse. The Protectors tried to stamp their own philosophy and religion — a philosophy and religion which had been successfully applied in England for the reform of the lower classes — on the Aborigines. Each of these groups, then, tried to impose a particular pattern of behaviour on the Aborigines, but the Aborigines, having their own ideals and aspirations, regarded all of these groups as hostile and rejected them. This thesis attempts to describe and examine these conflicting ideas, and in particular, to examine the Aborigines reactions to the schemes devised for their reform. (From Introduction)
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    The origins and rise of the Victorian brown coal industry 1835-1935
    Spaull, Andrew D. ( 1966)
    This history thesis was written at a time when the Victorian brown coal industry approaches its jubilee. It is also a period when the industry, together with the power and fuel industry, faces a new era of challenge and expansion. With this in mind, I have attempted to analyse, firstly, the various forces behind the establishment of a brown coal industry. Often these forces have been neglected or taken for granted, generally on the basis, that here was an expensive mineral resource open for exploitation. This particular reasoning is far from accurate, as I will attempt to show by a detailed study of the course and tempo of developments before the formal establishment of the industry. The second concern has been an attempt to capture and assess the problems of the industry in its gradual rise to the eventual position of a modern and vital Victorian industry.
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    Temperance and the liquor question in later nineteenth century Victoria
    Mitchell, Ann M. ( 1966)
    Progressive research into the temperance movement in Victoria made it quite clear that the subject could not be organised as a conventional narrative. Its wide-ranging nature led me to dispense with a formal chronology and group events according to 'idea' rather than to 'time'. The result is a series of self-contained chronologies which sometimes overlap. This aids the interpretative presentation although it has obvious limitations from the point of view of narrative.