THE MARRIED WOMAN, THE TEACHING PROFESSION AND THE STATE IN VICTORIA, 1872-1956 Donna Dwyer B.A., Dip. Ed. (Monash), Dip. Crim., M.Ed. (Melb.) Submitted in fulfilmentof the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the Faculty of Educafion at The University of Melbourne 2002 , . Abstract This thesis is a study of married women's teaching labour in the Victorian Education Department. It looks at the rise to power of married women teachers, the teaching matriarchs. in the 1850s and 1860s in early colonial Victoria when married women teachers were valued for the moral propriety their presence brought to the teaching of female pupils. In 1872 the newly created Victorian Education Department would herald a new regime and the findings of the Rogers Templeton Commission spell doom for married women teachers. The thesis traces their expulsion from the service under the 1889 Public Service Act implementing the marriage bar. The labyrinthine legislation that followed the passing of the Public Service Act 1889 defies adequate explanation but the outcome was clear. For the next sixty-seven years the bar would remain in place, condemning the 'needy' married woman teacher to life as an itinerant temporary teacher at the mercy of the Department. The irony was that this sometimes took place under 'liberal' administrators renowned for their reformist policies. When married women teachers returned in considerable numbers during the Second World War, they were supported in their claim for reinstatement by women unionists in the Victorian Teachers' Union (VTU). In the 1950s married women temporary teachers, members of the VTU, took up the fight, forming the Temporary Teachers' Club (TIC) to press home their claims. The TIC's 'cooperative campaign' would eventually force the Department to pass the Teaching Service (Married Women) Act, repealing the marriage bar in 1956. The thesis takes gender as a central category of analysis and draws on recent perspectives in feminist history on women teachers' lives. Through case studies and interviews it explores the educational bureaucracy's reshaping of the teaching service in the Victorian Education Department. ii Declaration This is to certify that (i) the thesis comprises only my original work towards the PhD, (ii) due acknowledgement has been made in the text to all other material used, (iii) the thesis is less than 100,000 words in length, exclusive of tables, maps, bibliographies and appendices. iii Table of Contents Abstract II Declaration III List of Illustrations v Timeline VI Abbreviations VII Acknowledgements Vlll Introduction I Chapter one The Rise of the Teaching Matriarchs 19 Chapter two Imagining the Departmental mind: gendered politics and 41 married women teachers in the Victorian Education Department 1872 - 1895 Chapter three The legacy: 'married' women teachers as a reserve army 74 oflahour 1901-1934 Chapter fOill 'Outsiders', Martha Grace Neven. Alice Jardine and 94 Lottie Bartlett, married women temporary teachers Chapter five The reinstatement of the married woman teacher in the 124 Victorian Education Department: another perspective on women teachers in the VTU from 1939 - 1950 Chapter six Success at last: married women teachers, the VTU and 142 the Temporary Teachers' Club Chapter seven Not such brilliant careers? Married women teachers 173 in New South Wales and their encounters with the marriage bar(s), 1895-1947: .. comparison Chapter eight Making sense of the marriage bar in married women 196 teachers' lives: Reflections on the theory and practice of oral history Chapter nine Partial profiles: married women teachers, Alfrieda 208 (Alvie) Booth, Nancy (Nan) Gallagher and Audrey Dodson, speak for themselves Chapter ten Inthe grip of maternity? Another look at the married 249 woman teacher Conclusion 262 Bibliography 269 ;v List of illustrations I. Anne Drake. nineteenth-century teaching matriarch 33 2. New York Trib une, 'The Ideal Candidate' - a feminist 81 response to restrictions on married women teaching 3. Education Jo urnal, 1939, Counsel for the defence gives 193 notice of appeal to the High Court of Public Opinion 4. Alvie Booth 220 5. Nan Gallagher 231 6. Audrey Dodson 243 v Legislative Tirneline 1881 ABOLITION OF PENSIONS ACT (RAMSAY ACT) Abolished the payment of government-funded pensions to civil servants 1883 PUBLIC SERVICE ACT Teachers became public servants 1888 EDUCATION (TEACHERS) ACT Allowed women teachers to retire at fiftyyears of age or after thirty years servlce 1889 PUBLIC SERVICE ACT Marriage bar introduced 1893 TEACHERS SALARIES ACT Married women whose names were on an employment register in 1889 eligible for employment 1893 TEACHERS ACT Women appointed prior to 1881 exempt from the marriage bar and not eligible for compensation on marriage 1895 TEACHERS ACT Retrenched widows eligible to apply for reinstatement in the Department 1932-1947 MARRIED WOMEN (LECTURERS AND TEACHERS) ACTS (NSW) The marriage bar was implemented in New South Wales in 1932, amended in 1935 and removed in 1947 1956 TEACIUNG SERVICE (MARRIED WOMEN) ACT Reinstatement of married women teachers in the service vi List of Abbreviations ADB Australian Dictionary of Biography AGTA Australian Geography Teachers' Association AS Australasian Schoolmaster and Literary Review FWTAO Federation of Women Teachers' Association of Ontario MAUM Movement Against Uranium Mining MWLTA Married Women (Lecturers and Teachers) Act, 1932,00.28, George V. MLA Member Legislative Assembly (Lower house of parliament) NSWPD New South Wales Parliamentary Debates PND People for Nuclear Disarmament TAFE Teclmical and Further Education TPTC Trained Primary Teachers' Certificate TIC Temporary Teachers' Club UAW Union of Australian Women UAW United Associations of Women (in New South Wales) VCE Victorian Certificate of Education VPD Victorian Parliamentary Debates Vpp Victorian Parliamentary Papers VPRO Victorian Public Record Office VPRS Victorian Public Record Series VSTA Victorian Secondary Teachers' Association VSMPA Victorian Secondary Masters' Professional Association VTU Victorian Teachers' Union vii Acknowledgements This thesis has been a long time in the making. There have been many people who have been generous in their support and, in numerous ways, have contributed to this work. lowe them a greatdeal. My supervisor Marjorie Theobald has been long-suffering, generous and always challenging. I thank her for years of outstanding supervision, incisive comments on too many drafts, good humour, wonderful scholarship and friendship. lowe a great deal to the women who volunteered to be interviewed for this thesis, who so generously gave of their personal lives and their time. I would like to thank the women who entrusted their stories to me and asked to remain anonymous. lowe a particular thanks to the late Ruth Crow. who, as she has done for many others, pointed me in the right direction. I would like to thank Sheila Byard, who introduced me to Ruth Crow. I am indebted to Alvie Booth, Nan Gallagher and Audrey Dodson for their time, their professional expertise and their personal encouragement. Their contributions infonned my approach and constitute a significant proportion of the thesis. Thanks are also due to Margaret Benson for giving me a wonderful account of the life of her mother, Lottie Bartlett. John and Joan Drake supplied a superb photograph of Anne Drake, offered generous hospitality and corroborated my account of John's great grandmother. I want to acknowledge the support of my friends and colleagues in the Faculty of Arts at Victoria University. Inparticular I thank Helen Borland for her support and assistance over the past years. lowe a special debt to Jane Madden and Gayle Barker who have borne the burden of my dual commitment to work and study. Jane Madden's unwavering faith in my abilities and determination that teaching responsibilities not stand in my way has come at some personal cost. lowe her much. Similarly Gayle Barker has been there when I most needed her. I would also particularly like to thank Jim Davidson for his constant encouragement. Thanks also to Caterina Caferella, Barbara Shields, Vicki Kapetanakos, and Jennie Hooke who viii have come to my aid on many occasions. I owe, too, a special thanks to Sam De Silva for her research assistance and sympathetic support. I also thank the librarians and archivists at the following institutions: Baillieu Library; Education Resource Library; Victoria University Library; Public Record Office of Victoria; State Library of Victoria; Noel Butlin Archives and the New South Wales State Archives. In particular] wish to acknowledge the assistance of Mary McPherson, librarian at the Department of School Education, New South Wales and Susan Brownmiller, archivist at the Australian Education Union. Catherine Herrick of the Directorate of School Education (Victoria), Education History Research Service provided invaluable professional guidance, support and assistance. I also owe a debt to friends and colleagues who listened and contributed to my thinking as I 'tried out' my ideas in papers at conferences held by the Australia and New Zealand History of Education Society. I thank my sister, Rhonda Martin, and Peter Moloney who have helped me greatly over the past years with urgent technical assistance and generous hospitality. My nephew, Christian Martin, constantly checked on my health and progress. He will be relieved that this thesis is finished. I am also indebted to my daughter, Natasha Dwyer, who has sympathetically followed my progress and more recently stepped in to make sure the project came to fruition. Patricia Riedl of the Information Technology Department at Victoria University ofTeclmology has made this thesis a reality. I have drawnheavily on her technical expertise. I thank her for the time she has given to this project, her enthusiasm and kindness. Her dogged detennination to produce an error-free thesis has been quite extraordinary, Nevertheless, of course, this thesis, errors included, is my responsibility. Finally. I dedicate this thesis to my parents, who believed in educating girls. ix INTRODUCTION This thesis began as a study of the marriage bar in the Victorian Education Department, but it has become much more.