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VICTORIAN HISTORICAL Journal VICTORIAN HISTORICAL Journal VOLUME 855 NO. 2 DECEMBER 2014 The Victorian Historical Journal is a fully refereed journal dedicated to Australian, and especially Victorian, history published twice yearly by the Royal Historical Society of Victoria. The Royal Historical Society of Victoria acknowledges the support of the Victorian Government through Arts Victoria—Department of Premier and Cabinet. Publication of this edition of the Victorian Historical Journal is made possible with the support of the estate of the late Edward Wilson. Cover: Bust of Justice Thomas Fellows (Courtesy of Supreme Court of Victoria.) Sculptor: James Scurry VICTORIAN HISTORICAL JOURNAL Volume 85, Number 2 December 2014 Articles Sincere Thanks ....................Richard Broome and Marilyn Bowler 185 Introduction............................................................Marilyn Bowler 186 Exodus and Panic? Melbourne’s Reaction to the Bathurst Gold Discoveries of May 1851 ...............Douglas Wilkie 189 The Birth of the Melbourne Cricket Club: a New Perspective on its Foundation Date.................Gerald O’Collins and David Webb 219 The Point Hicks Controversy: the Clouded Facts ............................................................................Trevor Lipsombe 233 Charles La Trobe and the Geelong Keys.....................Murray Johns 254 Attempts to Deal with Thistles in Mid-19th Century Victoria..............................................................John Dwyer 276 So New and Exotic! Gita Yoga in Australia from the 1950s to Today. ...............................................Fay Woodhouse 299 Greyhound Coursing of Live and Tin Hares at Albury ..........................................................Noel Jackling and Doug Royal 321 Historical Notes Commemorating Judges: Statues, Portraits, Busts and Street Names....................Joanne Boyd 340 A Nefarious Transaction: the Charter of the Polynesia Company Limited of Melbourne and Fiji.................Darren Watson 353 Reviews Starvation in a Land of Plenty, Wills’ Diary of the Fateful Burke and Wills Expedition By Michael Cathcart...................(Don Gibb) 362 Ballangeich and Ellerslie: Bridging the Years By Robert McLaren; Saving St Brigid’s By Regina Lane; The Church on the Hill: a Centenary History of St Brigid’s, and Its Irish Australian Community By Helen Doyle.......................................(Peter Yule) 363 The Making of Australia: a Concise History By Robert Murray..................................................(Andrew Lemon) 366 Neither Power nor Glory: 100 Years of Political Labor in Victoria, 1856–1956 By Paul Strangio. .....................................(Peter Love) 368 Melbourne’s Water Catchments: Perspectives on a World-Class Water Suppl. By James I. Viggers, Haylee J. Weaver and David B. Lindenmayery..............................................(Don Garden) 370 Coranderrk. We Will Show the Country By Giordano Nanni and Andrea James................................................(Richard Broome) 371 Missionaries, Radicals, Feminists: a History of North Yarra Community Health By Hamish Townsend.............(Judith Smart) 373 Bishopscourt Melbourne: Official Residence and Family Home By Elizabeth Rushen..........................................(David Hilliard) 375 W. Macmahon Ball: Politics for the People By Ai Kobayashi ............................................................................(Nicholas Brown) 378 Marshall-Hall’s Melbourne: Music, Art and Controversy 1891–1915 Edited by Thérèse Radic & Suzanne Robinson.........(John Rickard) 380 Notes on Contributors....................................................................... 384 Royal Historical Society of Victoria................................................. 388 Guidelines for Contributors to the Victorian Historical Journal...... 389 SINCERE THANKS t is with sadness that we announce the retirement of Dr Kate Jones from work on the Victorian Historical Journal. Kate became involved Iin the production side of the journal in 2009. Since then she has laid out twelve editions over almost six years. She has not only donated enor- mous amounts of time to this, but also purchased the software herself to complete the work. This commitment was undertaken while pursuing an academic life in tertiary education. Kate provided expertise on all issues to do with the layout, illustration and appearance of the Journal from the raw text to the printed page. She initiated a schedule for all the tasks that needed to be carried out to get the Journal out on time. She has worked with three editors and also initiated a new design for the journal, which will be implemented at a future date. Her working habits, attitudes, commitment and relationships within the editorial team are outstanding, drawing high praise. A former editor remarked: ‘Kate was always patient with my too-frequent and often unreasonable requests for revision of copy and extremely efficient in carrying them out’. The current editor commented Kate is ‘a pleasure to work with’ and working with her ‘has been one of the better professional relationships of my working life’. Her hard work has continued despite the onset of a serious health problem. Kate Jones’ voluntary work for this Society has been nothing short of exemplary and was fully deserving of the Distinguished Service Award to the RHSV that she received at the recent AGM. To Kate, we extend the heartfelt gratitude of all members, and all those who read the Victorian Historical Journal. Richard Broome Chair, Publications Committee Marilyn Bowler Editor 185 INTRODUCTION hen I returned to full-time academic study in my retirement, I found puzzled friends asking me why I was doing it. ‘Because WI want to’ hardly seemed an adequate explanation, so I found myself pondering why people study history and what people think they have learned from their historical studies. The RHSV has community historians and academic and professional historians amongst its members. The Victorian Historical Journal publishes contributions from those who make their living as historical researchers and those who have a love for the history of a particular community or a particular topic. Out of curiosity, I emailed some members and contributors to ask them why they studied history and what they considered they had learned. The reasons members study history includes a desire to expand their horizons and their experience. Richard Broome, our Vice President and the Chair of the Publications Committee, said: ‘I study history to enter other lives and worlds beyond my own, and because we stand on many layers of previous experience and existence. This interest is in the first instance due to a strong fascination with diversity and difference—a sort of armchair travel and time travel.’ Associate Professor Don Gibb echoed Broome’s belief that history enlarges our experience and challenges our world view and hoped that it provided ‘similar experience and enjoyment for countless students as well’. Former VHJ editor Judy Smart considered that history ‘has widened my appreciation of different cultures and provided insights into disparate and often challenging world views’. Liz Downes, a postgraduate student at La Trobe University, liked ‘the way that history gives another dimension to the world around me. I have learned to read places to see the evidence of the past that shapes the communities of the present’. 186 Marilyn Bowler — Introduction 187 Another motive for historical study was the desire to make sense of the world, to understand how people and societies work or to understand why historical events happened, often echoing Santayana’s well-known dictum that those who do not learn from history are forced to repeat it. From the age of eight, Smart knew she wanted to ‘study and teach history’, because the ‘only way I could make sense of my life and identity, after I ditched religion, was to trace their origins in the past’. Andrew Lemon, professional historian and immediate past president, studied ‘history to help make sense of the world in which I live, from the personal and local through to the universal. I believe there is truth, not multiple truths, but there are multiple experiences and understandings that help us in the impossible quest to find the truth: context is often the key’. Another reason, and perhaps one more common than historians would care to admit, is the desire to solve the puzzle of the past. Lemon commented: ‘And then history has the best stories, an endless supply—and I enjoy solving the mysteries inherent in every story.’ In keeping with this, John Daniels, who, in the last edition, wrote about his search for Batman’s route on his first historic trip to Melbourne, when asked why he researched that particular topic, replied that ‘it was a puzzle that needed solving—a search for the truth. Typically, more questions were raised, so the puzzle (and the research continues)’. When asked what he had learned from the study of history, Broome remarked: ‘Through such experiences of being taken outside myself, I have become more knowledgeable and tolerant of the people and the world around me.’ Gibb considered that the study of history ‘has given me deeper understandings of how individuals and societies work and a healthy scepticism towards claims about the present and the future’. Judy Smart explained: ‘As a teacher, I wanted to help others escape from a crippling presentism and sense of powerlessness by demonstrating through studies of past conflicts that things don’t have to be as they are.’ And me?
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