'Wash house and bath room, 48 Palmerston Street. The only water laid on is the tap over the gully trap. The only washing convenience the hand basin on the box. The piece of canvas was erected for the purpose of keeping the wood dry.'
The Australian colonies were often praised by enthusiastic observers from the Old World as places of prosperity and plenty. In fact, many people battled to keep themselves housed and fed and earning a living could be a precarious affair.
For adults rearing children, the difficulties of a new life in the colonies could be particularly pressing. English, Scottish and Irish people back home had a kinship network of grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins who could provide assistance for relatives in times of need. But for new migrants in the colonies, such relatives were too distant, and they found themselves living amongst virtual strangers for many years. Money could not easily be borrowed from such neighbours, nor help sought when illness, death, or unemployment struck, or at times of financial crisis.
Many of the families who moved to Carlton in the 1860s, 1870s and 1880s, from abroad or from rural areas, were in this position. The colony of Victoria had no Poor Law, nor government sponsored means of relief for the destitute.
In Carlton, as in the other fast growing inner suburbs of Melbourne, new residents faced another range of problems. Many Carltonites had been rural dwellers, accustomed to producing at least some of their own food. Even people who had not lived on farms had kept vegetable gardens and fruit trees. Many had owned a cow, goats, pigs or fowls, and perhaps a horse for transport and carting goods. Initially they attempted to maintain these sources of food and transport, but as housing expanded and open land was swallowed up for streets, parks and buildings, grazing animals became impossible. Everything the family needed now had to be bought with money. If the family breadwinner was out of work, there were no longer sources of 'free food' to sustain the group. In the early stages of industrial urban living, a wage earner's hope of keeping in steady employment was easily under mined. Ill health, for example, sapped the energies of adults who had to work long hours in factories, and then return to a crowded house without sewerage, pure water or adequate food supplies.
For skilled workers whose labour was always in demand and people with assured incomes, family life could still present problems. For the poor, and there were many of them, family life was constantly under pressure. The rosy picture of a blissful, happy home was, particularly for the working classes, no more than a myth. Each day was a struggle. High rents, lack of facilities in the home, long hours of work, unemployment and hunger, were common aspects of family life. Drunkenness and domestic violence sometimes placed further pressure on the poor. People in need of help were extremely vulnerable in a society which expected families to cope with their own problems.
The first major problem was the struggle to find decent accommodation. The southern parts of Carlton were developed as residential areas from the mid 1850s by wealthy middle class people who were being pushed out of the burgeoning city centre. As early as the 1880s, however, Carlton had become a 'predominantly working class' area.[1] This was true of central and North Carlton, settled some ten years after South Carlton. Princes Hill was generally inhabited by the lower middle classes.
The boom years of the 1880s witnessed the construction of many houses, some quite large and ornate, indicating the presence of affluent, bourgeois families. Many of these grander homes still exist today and can be seen in parts of South Carlton, North Carlton and Princes Hill. Yet the number of small, working men's cottages built in all parts of Carlton reflected the large working class population.
The boom years of the 1880s witnessed the construction of many houses, some quite large and ornate. The French family outside their home in Lygon Street, North Carlton. (left)
During the depression of the 1890s, the grand mansions of the wealthy were converted into boarding houses for the less fortunate. Housing conditions deteriorated rather quickly. Even by the mid 1880s, the Health Committee from the Melbourne City Council reported houses 'unfit for human habitation'.[2] Sanitary conditions were most unfavourable and reflected in the prevalence of epidemic diseases such as diphtheria, whooping cough, typhoid and scarlet fever. The general death rate for the municipality of Melbourne in the mid 1880s was 18 per 1000, and the infant mortality rate a very high 194 per 1000 births. The estimated population for Melbourne at that time was 70,882. The fact that the City, including Carlton, 'undoubtedly contain[ed] more than its proportion of the poorest classes'[3] only aggravated the deteriorating living conditions. There was very little consideration given to the proper planning of housing in some parts of Carlton, and the problems that arose as a consequence were to plague its residents for many years to come. The Melbourne City Council reported in 1884:
I venture to refer to two points, which are of great importance as regards the public health. One is an old error, from the effects of which we are still suffering, namely, the overcrowding due to the erection of dwellings in what should have been merely the courts or backyards of houses facing streets. This evil...still exists...even more largely in many parts of Carlton.[4]
James Jamieson, health officer, went on:
I have no doubt that the health of the residents in these parts of the City is injuriously affected by the liability thus caused to the stagnation of foul water and the accumulation of other offensive matters.[5]
Although some would not readily admit it, 'late nineteenth century Melbourne was not a particularly healthy place.'[6].
By 1895 the death rate had lowered to l5.1 per 1000 for the total population of Melbourne City, and infant mortality had decreased to 135 per 1000 births.[7] This was largely due to the better sanitary conditions. Deaths from epidemic diseases for the year 1895 were below previous averages: from typhoid, 20, diphtheria and croup, 8, whooping cough, 7 and influenza, 20, a total of 55. According to the Health Committee of that year, epidemic diseases were a relatively minor cause of death:
Somerset place: it is stated that there is at least one child in every house in this street who has had diptheria The condition of the gutter as shown in the photo would tend to support this contention.' (Slum Abolition Report)
From the point of view of fatality, certain other causes [were] of much greater importance. Tuberculosis, for instance, cause[d] 177 deaths, or more than 1/6 of the whole; pulmonary diseases (other than consumption), 139; diarrhoeal diseases, 95; diseases of the nervous system, 90; diseases of the heart and blood vessels, 71;and those of the renal system, 59.[8]
Deaths from typhoid during the period between 1871 and 1880 numbered 3,973; between 1881 and 1890, 5,585. Deaths from phthisis (tuberculosis) during the same periods numbered 10,155 and 14,090 respectively.[9] The polluted water, ineffectual drainage and lack of means for waste disposal, permitted such diseases to thrive and spread.
Melbourne took an unnecessarily long time to respond constructively to its unsanitary standard of living. This was not from a lack of interest. Many lengthy debates took place on what solutions should be applied to alleviate or eradicate the many existing problems. Legislative, administrative and economic difficulties impeded progress. It was not until 1897 that the first homes were connected to sewerage.
By early this century the evident improvements to public health were 'no doubt due in part to the extension of the sewerage system of the Metropolis.'[10] The overall mortality rate dropped to 12.5 per 1000, whilst the infant death rate decreased to 107 per 1000 births. Diphtheria was still a concern, since it was more contagious than typhoid and easily spread in schools and other places where children gathered. The incidence and deaths from tuberculosis were still high and presented a greater problem to health authorities than all the other epidemic diseases combined. Around the turn of the century, a Crusade Against Consumption was launched to educate people about improving their living conditions to ward off the disease. The Health Committee also made frequent inspections of homes whose inhabitants were reported to have tuberculosis, ensuring that the right procedures were taken.
Improving the housing in Carlton was no easy task. Given that many homes were condemned as early as the 1880s, by 1913, the situation had deteriorated considerably. It was then that the Select Committee of the Legislative Assembly and the Committee of the Legislative Council were appointed to form a Joint Select Committee to investigate the housing conditions of inner Melbourne areas. The Committee held seven meetings, examined sixteen witnesses and inspected certain slum areas, including Carlton. The minutes of evidence from the witnesses were taken over the period from the 19th of May, 1914, to the 23rd of June, 1915. By the end of their investigation, the Committee was:
convinced that the housing of the people in portions of the metropolis [was] most disgraceful, and that the conditions under which the unfortunate residents of some of the slum areas exist [were] a menace not only to themselves but to the health of the community at large. [11]
The Committee went on to:
strongly recommend the appointment of a Royal Commission to carry out the fullest and most searching investigation into every phase of this most serious problem, with the view of endeavouring to remedy the deplorable condition of things at present existing. [12]
The findings of the Committee reveal extensive existence of small, dilapidated houses, inadequate lighting and ventilation, lack of basic conveniences such as kitchen facilities, a bath or heating, overcrowding and excessively high rents. One witness, John Good, a clerk in Holy Orders from St.Judes Church, Carlton, told the Committee: We have a very large number of small lanes and alleys in Carlton, and naturally there is great congestion,...rents affect these people very seriously...there is rarely a bath in any of the small cottages, or even a copper...right through the whole of Carlton there is the same difficulty...such conditions do not make for health, and they certainly do not make for morality. [13]
Despite the moralistic overtones which frequently pervaded the housing reports on slum areas, there was genuine concern and horror regarding the appalling conditions which so many had to endure.
Since many houses were condemned as unfit for habitation, the shortage of places to live forced several families to share the one house. Opportunists took advantage of this situation by sub letting rooms at higher rentals. Not only did the tenants suffer exorbitant rents (often with insufficient wages to cover basic living costs), but also faced daily the inadequate facilities provided by landlords and landladies. In some cases ten or more people, including children, had shared access to the one toilet, bath, kitchen and small backyard. Some tenants were not even allowed these basic amenities so that cooking, washing and passing of bodily wastes were conducted in the same room where they slept. Yet despite all this, let rooms were in great demand, because there were very few alternatives and Carlton became a large 'boarding house district'.[l4]
It was clear then that the choice to live in an inner city suburb like Carlton was not only to enjoy the 'comforts and pleasures of city life'[15], but based on economic factors. Carlton was close to the city and the Queen Victoria Market. Hence workplaces and shops were accessible. Living in the outer suburbs meant high transport costs and fewer conveniences. In the inner city, if people did not own a house, they had to search for a place to rent; the lack of houses available to meet the demand, kept rents high. In 1924, the Royal Commission on the High Cost of Living found that rents had risen over the previous ten years from between 50% to 120%, with an average increase of 85%.[16] This phenomenon was attributed to the 'law of supply and demand, the increase of wages, the great increase in value of building material, the tariff, and the reduction of output from labour.'[l7]
There was a proliferation of factories in areas like Carlton which also contributed to the shortage of space that could well have been used for houses. The factories were an obvious site of employment, drawing many people from the outer suburbs and the country in search of work, but the availability of housing frequently posed many problems and even the construction of new homes was difficult. The Commission was told that a man submitted a plan for two nice cottages, which could have been built there, but he was not allowed to build them. The only thing he could do was to put up on factory...it really is a disgrace ..any one would have preferred to have seen two fine cottages going upon that land instead of that eyesore of a factory. [18]
During the Depression years of the 1930s the situation became decidedly worse for many families, even those who had previously managed to live in reasonable comfort. Many wage earners lost their regular jobs and the poor were crowded into cramped, inadequately equipped dwellings to share the cost of rent. For many, the final blow came when they were sent eviction notices after falling behind with their rent payments.
Children often found ways to help the family make ends meet. One Carlton school girl reported to Wendy Lowenstein, in Weevils in The Flour, that she and her four brothers and houses in the back yards of houses, sisters would search for wood for the open fire on which their mother cooked. The children used to take a billy cart or an old pram and scavenge for firewood. Sometimes they would sell a pram load of wood for a shilling.[19] At thirteen she left school to work in an office and part of her wage would go towards the family budget. She recalled, 'it meant some little luxury, or something which was badly needed, could come into the family because of you. The kids those days felt more needed in the family situation.'[20] At school she felt deflated when the teacher would say 'All those who are on the State stand up,' when they were to receive free schoolbooks: It was most humiliating. You were singled out.'[21]
Not all children from poor families felt deprived: Dave Campbell recalled
if you had something, you had something. If you didn't, you didn't. I never had the feeling that we did without anything. Everybody was in the same boat and that was it. So you didn't worry about things.[22]
As young boys, he and his two brothers managed to earn a small income by selling Heralds, or they would go to the Victoria Market on Saturday mornings with a wooden cart. For a penny or twopence they would help carry other people's vegetables in the cart. Dave remembers:
'there'd always be something about, you'd find something if you wanted something.'[23] During the years 1936 and 1937, the Housing Investigation and Slum Abolition Board inspected 674 homes in Carlton. It was estimated that 3,007 people (of whom 1,335 were children) occupied these premises. Of the 674 houses inspected, 84 per cent had no kitchen sink, 31 per cent no bathroom and 61 per cent no wash house. Many were poorly lit, drained and ventilated, and almost 35 per cent were infested with rats. Half of the houses had ceilings only eight feet high or less, often water stained and with holes. Over crowding was common; three adults and nine children occupied the one four roomed house. Many homes adjoined factories or stables which polluted the air, were noisy, and contributed to the rat and vermin problem. The burden fell most heavily on those least able to cope with it:
The women, who are unable to escape from their sordid surroundings despite their intense and heroic struggle to maintain a state of cleanliness, and the children suffer most.[24]
Behind the wide, well planned streets of Carlton, there existed numerous small, dilapidated houses crammed together in 'slum pockets'. From the beginnings of white settlement to the slum abolition movement of the 1930s, social reformers tried to assist poor families, especially the women and children who lived in Carlton.
'In hundreds (of houses) primitive bathing and laundry facilities were found'
The difficult conditions of life and work, which resulted in numerous problems for the Carlton poor, were part of an industrial process which also led to a growth in the middle class of Melbourne. Women within these more affluent families did not undertake paid employment outside the home. They often hired servants to carry out the harder and more tedious house work, and to take care of small children for at least part of the day. Appalled at the poverty endured by other women, particularly when they observed that many of them were driven to prostitution or crime, some of these middle class women joined together to assist poorer women, particularly working mothers, in suburbs like Carlton.
The reformers sought to improve the housing, health and working conditions of the less fortunate. They saw a need for maternity hospitals, health centres, temporary accommodation for the needy and homes for single mothers. High infant mortality made many people concerned for the survival of young babies, and for the health of the mother.
Women were particular targets for reform. The Australian Health Society was one group which aimed their pamphlets and lectures at Melbourne's female population. They held many public lectures, mainly in poor, working class areas, on health and sanitary reform. 'Meetings for Wives and Daughters' was one series of lectures held to secure the co operation of the home ruler, be she mother, wife or daughter. ....They alone have the power of enforcing cleanliness, admitting air and sunshine into their homes, tending to the sick intelligently, and in many other ways keeping their households free from disease.[25]
For well over a century Carlton residents have been cared for by their own networks, and by numerous institutions, many catering especially for women. Some institutions have died out as their need diminished, and others have survived into the present.
This family were sent home from school when thought to have measles. However a medical examination determined that they were flea bitten
Some of the many institutions established in Carlton were The Refuge, later The Carlton Home; Hope Hall; The Queen Elizabeth Centre and the Royal Women's Hospital.
The Carlton Home was founded in 1857, but originally called The Refuge. It was situated on Madeline Street, now the northern end of Swanston Street. The purpose of the institution was to rehabilitate prostitutes and unmarried mothers, or as the early annual reports phrased it:
To provide a refuge for females who have fallen into vice, and who are desirous to return to the paths of virtue....To reclaim them from their evil courses, and fit them to become useful members of society...To assist in procuring them situations, or otherwise providing for them on leaving the Institution.
The Refuge also attended to the 'restoration of the bodily health of the inmates; and to the inculcation of proper religious feelings and principles'.[26]
The Refuge was conducted on Protestant Evangelical principles, although women were admitted regardless of their beliefs or racial origins. It was financed by voluntary subscriptions, donations and the earnings of the women, who were employed to do outside laundering and needlework. The majority of the women were between 15 and 25 years of age. In 1890 The Refuge moved to Keppell Street, where The Queen Elizabeth Centre now stands, and in 1896 it was renamed The Carlton Refuge.
According to the annual reports of the 1930s and 1940s the women were well cared for, all efforts were made to ensure that they felt at home and even entertainment was provided. However in its early years of operation, the Refuge was more like a prison, as this annual report of 1864 suggests:
one costly and most pressing work still needs completion the covering of the present fence round the ground with corrugated iron, or other material capable of utterly preventing communication from outside with the inmates.[27]
The refuge encouraged the mothers to care for their babies by training the women in domestic work, so they would 'be more efficient housewives in their own homes'. The women were also given 'moral and spiritual guidance' to 'thus fortify them against any future temptation'.[28] Despite the moralisation and religious indoctrination, the home provided some kind of support and comfort (even if it was only material) which would have been extremely difficult to find elsewhere. Undoubtedly they were not only refused assistance by their families but completely ostracized by the majority of society. Therefore, as one of the few options open to women in such circumstances, the home was certainly a refuge.
The Carlton Refuge continued and expanded. Another name change occurred in 1930 when it became known as the Carlton Home. Around the late 1920s the Home became more involved with married women and their children, particularly those in destitute circumstances. Women who were waiting entrance into the Women's Hospital, or were receiving pre natal or after child birth care were also admitted into the Home. A considerable number of children from the Welfare Department were given board as well.[29]
The Home was also a Subsidiary Baby Health and Mothercraft Training School and therefore its work was conducted according to the Baby Health and Mothercraft methods.[30]
The Home encouraged the unmarried mothers to keep their babies if possible, for the strong maternal instinct is thus developed and strengthened, and the child then gets the full benefit of a mother's care, which is better than all things for it to have. [31] The Home also ensured that women received instruction in the proper care of their young.
In 1949 a proposal was received from the Hospitals and Charities Commission suggesting that the site and buildings of the Home could be put to better use in the interests of the community.[32] With the knowledge that other existing organisations would continue to assist women, it was decided to close The Carlton Home. Thus, after 92 years of service to women in need, the Carlton Home closed in August, 1949.
The Salvation Army also provided shelter and assistance to Melbourne's needy women both in the city and in Carlton. Dave Campbell remembered the work and activities of 'The Army:'
The Salvation Army has, is, and will be a great help to people in need, financially, socially, spiritually. The more depressed an area, the more active the Salvationists. When we were kids the Salvation Army bands would play on street corners during late night trading on Fridays....a brass band backed by the ladies with their tambourines, lit by a lamp on the end of a rod. Young kids have always had plenty of cheek and we were no different. One Friday night when the Army was on the corner we sang:
"Salvation Army free from sin,
All went to heaven in a kerosene tin."
One of the fellows in the band looked around and softly
said: "Beats going to hell in a motor car."[33]
The Salvation Army has a long history in Carlton. In fact, a small, two roomed blue stone house on Lygon Street was the very first institution in the world to be established by the Army for exprisoners. It was founded by Major James Barker who had been sent out to Australia from London to take charge of the Army's work here.[34] The Prison Gate Home was relocated to 37 Argyle Place South in December 1883, and a home for female ex prisoners opened at 11 Barkly St., Carlton on the 4th of January 1884.[35] Little Lonsdale Street was the first site for the Salvation Army's women's hostel. Here, as described in The War Cry, 'a number of infirm or partly incapacitated women were accommodated. Some of these earned a little by working part time; others were invalid pensioners....the Shelter was used as a temporary home for women and children who, for a variety of reasons, would find themselves stranded and without money in the big city.'[36]
The Salvation Army also established barracks in Bouverie Street in 1891, a Children's Creche in Canning Street, North Carlton, in 1915, and the New Carlton Hall in Drummond Street, Carlton in 1921.
Opened on the 5th of October 1927, Hope Hall continued to provide help for women in various circumstances. Mothers with children who had been deserted or thrown out of home by their husbands were given 'a temporary rest place'; young women who had been 'betrayed and had fallen into evil ways' were received; women on remand or discharged from prison, and those seeking shelter were also given assistance.
It was here, as the Army's War Cry reported, that the often thankless task of caring for 'women inebriates, betrayed girls, potential criminals and other women engulfed in Melbourne's underworld' was carried out by the hard working soldiers of the Salvation Army. (4)
'Two mothers "under the influence of liquor". One of the babies was ill and expected to die of neglect.'
The Baby Health Centre Movement was founded in Victoria by Dr. Isabella Younger Ross, Mrs. J. Hemphill and Mrs. W. Ramsay in 1917. The establishment of the Movement was enabled by voluntary effort and funds. The first centre was opened in Richmond in June 1917. Carlton, along with other neighbouring suburbs, established its own centre later that year. The aims of the movement were to maintain the life and health of babies and their mothers, to prevent sickness and to teach women the proper care of their children. Preservation of new life was seen as imperative if Australia was to continue to expand. Infant mortality was unnecessarily high, due to poverty, insanitary living conditions and, frequently, ignorance regarding the welfare of infants.
In 1928 the first residential Centre for Infant Welfare Training nurses was built next door to the Women's Hospital. This new building also housed mothers who were experiencing difficulties in caring for their babies and some infants requiring special care.
The Victorian Baby Health Centres Association,(V.B.H.C.A.), needed to transfer its work in 1951, to Keppel St., on the site of the Carlton Home. The training and care of mothers and their infants would now be carried out at the recently renovated Queen Elizabeth Maternal and Child Health Centre and Infant's Hospital
The hospital is now called The Queen Elizabeth Centre, incorporating the V.B.H.C.A., The Queen Elizabeth Hospital for Mothers and Babies, The Queen Elizabeth Maternal and Child Health Centre, and The Queen Elizabeth Day Nursery (opened in 1979). The Centre sees its current role as one of social family preventative medicine, centred around child development and family care...The diversity of the Carlton population is reflected in the families attending the Centre. There are parents with professional or academic backgrounds and business people from the area. There are many lone parents including some teenage mothers. Migrant families comprise approximately 40% of Centre users.[38]
Another institution, along with the Carlton Home, Hope Hall and the Queen Elizabeth Centre, is the Royal Women's Hospital which has also been a 'sure refuge to hundreds upon hundreds of women who have come to unknown depths of suffering and distress'.[39]
Australia's first lying in (obstetrical and gynaecological) hospital was originally situated on Albert Street, Eastern Hill (East Melbourne), in a converted private house. It was established in 1856 and called The Melbourne Lying in Hospital and Infirmary for Diseases Peculiar to Women and Children. On October 22nd, 1858, the hospital moved to Madeline Street (renamed Swanston in March 1925), the present site. The two corner sites on Grattan Street were granted in 1863 64 and 1869 respectively. The institution was renamed the Hospital for Women in 1884, although commonly known as the Women's Hospital. It received a Royal Warrant in 1954.[40]
The hospital has been a training ground for many years. As far back as 1897, The Weekly Times reported that 'students from the other colonies are found within its walls who attend there for the reason that special facilities are afforded for study in that particular branch of medical science which is practiced in a women's hospital'.[41]
The hospital admitted women regardless of their marital status. It was less concerned with morals than with the practical matters that needed to be dealt with. The Weekly Times reported in 1897:
It has often been asserted that the keeping up of such an institution leads to immorality...It is pointed out that, while the admirable work of reforming those who areinclined to waywardness is going on, some thing practical must be done to aid those who must be assisted at a critical time. If all doors were closed against them there wouldbe a terrible state of things indeed.[42]
The benefits of the Women's Hospital and similar institutions are shown in the annual decrease of the infant mortality rate and the lowered number of deaths of mothers in child birth. Not all women were able to give birth at home, as most middleclass mothers did, so the care and security provided by the Hospital was, and continues to be, a comfort to thousands of Carlton women.
During the 1870s, many women, some being members of social or moral reform groups such as the Ladies' Benevolent Societies, Philanthropic Associations or Church groups, were concerned with the plight of mothers who had to work. Their children were in obvious need of looking after, and these women were particularly interested in helping in the poorer, working class areas of Melbourne. In middle class families, where mothers had the leisure to devote a considerable amount of time to the care of small infants, children were regarded with greater seriousness in the later nineteenth century. It was natural, therefore, that when reforming women looked at the condition of the poor, they disliked the fact that many working class mothers did not, or could not, rear their little ones in similar ways. Children were viewed as the citizens of the future and therefore, needed particular attention.
Reformers in the 1870s encouraged the setting up of compulsory schools at primary level, to ensure that all children received a basic education. From the age of five or six, all children would have somewhere to attend each working day of the week, where they would be supervised instead of running around the streets. But many children under the age of five were not cared for in the manner that the middle class reformers would have liked, especially when their mothers were forced to undertake paid work. Other children of course, were left orphans when both parents died, or, in some cases, deserted their young. Carlton therefore saw a number of enterprises aimed at caring for little children.
The Carlton Creche and the North Carlton Children's Centre are two of Carlton's oldest childcare institutions.
In 1900 a committee of local women, mostly wives of M.C.C. councillors, local business people and merchants, doctors and other professionals, was formed in Carlton and established a creche which operated in the front room of a private house in Lygon Street. The creche moved to other premises at 558 Lygon Street around 1913.[43]
The committee provided, voluntarily, a safe, secure environment for children whose families were in poor circumstances, often through no fault of their own. Wars, economic depression, droughts, strikes and epidemics severely affected many families. The creche viewed its place in society to see that young children from such homes have the best of care, and at the same time to help the mother so that she can be reassured and contented, and thereby retain the best basis for a happy home for the children. [44]
Whether or not these working mothers managed to create the strived for 'happy home', and no doubt many could not, the creche did endeavour to provide a place for these underprivileged children to play and obtain some food and rest.
The committee assisted the mothers by finding them suitable employment, usually as domestics, and by establishing monthly meetings for them as a means of receiving education and social contact with other mothers. They were supportive of single and widowed mothers and those with 'useless' husbands.
Land was purchased at 111 Neill Street for the construction of new premises; the creche was reopened in 1919 and skill remains in operation as the Carlton Day Nursery. The majority of the creche's costs were covered by funds raised voluntarily, donations, and the small fees charged to parents who could afford to pay. Initially the fee was 3d for one child and 4 1/2d for two children. In 1944 the State Government began to provide financial assistance in the form of a grant. This was issued by the M C.C. The struggle to receive a grant continued each year until 1950, when it was then given on a per capita basis of £50 per child, per annum. By 1971 it was $250, but following a change in government policy it became, and still remains, a subsidy. The creche now receives eighty percent of all staff salaries, yet it was still considered necessary to augment the children's fees to maintain the number of trained staff.
Attendances increased with the opening of the Neill Street building, and also during the war years when both parents were engaged in the essential services. In 1941 some 9,150 children attended the creche over the year; by 1944 the figure had increased to 11,286. But after the war, the number of attendances dropped to an average of 7,145 during the l950s. The last few years of the 1940s also witnessed out breaks of typical childish ailments such as mumps, measles and whooping cough, keeping numbers down. Like the other childcare centres around Carlton, the children at the creche were given free medical examinations, whilst dental treatment and immunisation was carried out at the Lady Gowrie Child Care Centre in Newry Street North Carlton.
Changes in the wider Carlton community after the war were reflected in the changes at the creche. Most women who were working during the war had to give up their jobs and return to traditional home duties, thus fewer Australian born children were attending the creche. With the influx of European migrants, the number of 'new Australians' seeking child care quickly filled the vacancies. In fact, by the early 1960s, the majority of the children coming to the creche were from migrant families.[45] Average daily attendance during this period was 34.
The buildings went through several alterations to improve the facilities. In 1959 the Committee purchased three cottages in Kay Street that were owned by the M.C.C. The council also helped with the levelling of the property and the establishment of a garden. A donation of £1000 was received in 1962, enabling the creche to make extensions. After completion, the nursery had accommodation for up to 47 infants, ranging from babes in arms to five year olds. The hours of opening were from 7.30am to 5.30pm., recently extended to 5.45pm. for the convenience of those parents who work.
The annual reports of the 1970s and of this decade refer to the ever increasing need for adequate child care, particularly for children with special requirements. The difficulties experienced with migrant children, who had many problems adjusting to the food, customs and language of their new country, highlighted the need for specialised care and well trained staff. Many of the children also come from single parent families, presenting diff erent problems.
The Lady Gowrie Child Centre was another centre catering to Carlton's young children. Established in 1939 in response to the needs of inner city children, it was one of several Lady Gowrie Centres operating in different capital cities in Australia. All placed a particular emphasis on pre school education and research into child development. The Carlton Centre played a crucial role in providing a service for the children of North Carlton.
The North Carlton Children's Centre, situated at No.481 Canning Street, has been operating for some seventy two years since opening in 1915. The property was a gift to the Salvation Army from the late Mrs. E. Wakely, who requested the establishment of a child minding centre for preschool children. A two storey red brick building was erected and then officially opened on the Army's Founder's Day, 20th of August 1916. It was then called the Children's Creche. This building still stands today.
Facilities provided day care for children of various age groups, ranging from babies to six year olds, whose parents were at work or were ill. In addition, the centre temporarily accommodated orphaned and abandoned infants until more permanent homes could be found for them. The opening hours were officially from 8.00am to 6.00pm, but there were many exceptions made. For instance, one mother who worked as a pantry maid (her husband having deserted her), was forced to leave her baby at the creche from 6.30am to 9.30pm, paying sixpence a day.[47]
Like so many of the child care places which began as charitable institutions, the Salvation Army was dependent on monetary and material donations, as well as voluntary assistance, to ensure the continuation of their services. Most of the staff worked beyond the call of duty 'for the comfort of the Little Ones.' And their duties were indeed endless, as the matron reported in 1917:
our laundry work is immense...We never have an idle moment. There are three meals a day to prepare for them, besides a little 'snack' morning and afternoon; there is cleaning up after them, and washing of hands and faces and legs, and kissing away of bruises and settling of disputes, besides the sewing and the house and clerical work.[48]
It is difficult to estimate the number of children being cared for at any one time. Early in its operation there were about 25 in residence plus several 'day children'. Extensions were considered necessary just 18 months after the opening. Thus in 1917, a dormitory and dining area were added for a further fourteen children. This need arose as family structures changed with the First World War. As men were fighting at the front and women were taking on jobs more children were in need of care.
During the Second World War, the Melbourne City Council requested that the Salvation Army assist in the war effort by preparing emergency accommodation for 'persons rendered homeless' in the event of an air raid.[49] The Children's Home and the Carlton Salvation Army Hall in Drummond Street held provisions for about 100 people each. The provisions included various foodstuffs and mattresses. The Carlton Hall had 100 places set for meals in anticipation of an air raid.[50]
On the 24th of November, 1947, the M.C.C. bought the entire property and buildings of the Children's Home for the sum of £5,500. The Salvation Army transferred its facilities to Geelong. The State Government assisted the purchase and a weatherboard pre school centre was built on an adjacent block of land, costing £10,827.
By the early 1970s, Carlton's child population had increased rapidly with many living in the recently erected high rise Housing Commission (now the Ministry of Housing) flats. An estimated 430 out of 700 families living in the Housing Commission flats had children under the age of five. Eighty percent of new admissions to the flats were single parent families.[51]
Consequently, a centre with fifty full day ,care vacancies was urgently required for local residents. The. was becoming more aware of the need for better child care in the Carlton area and on the 4th of September, 1973, the construction of a new centre on the site of the old creche was approved by the Commissioner of Public Health. The facade of the original 1915 building was retained, as requested by the local residents, whilst the old weatherboard extension was demolished and a replacement then completed by January 1976.
Right up to the present day, the children's centre has 'continued to explore the needs of families and where possible adapt the service to cater to these needs.'[52]
The Free Kindergarten, Bouverie Street, Carlton also began in response to needs in the community.
In 1901, Fanny Maud Wilson and a group of concerned friends from the Baptist Church founded Carlton's first kindergarten in Bouverie Street, specifically for underprivileged children. By 1914, Wilson was the General Superintendent of some 90 to 100 children. Many children who had both parents at work, or absent for other reasons, were often left at home on their own or wandering the streets. When asked if parents were shirking their responsibilities, Wilson replied,
It may not necessarily be neglect, not wilful neglect. Some cannot look after them, and some will not. In some cases the parents have to go out working. In many cases the people are poor, and the housing conditions are dreadful.[53]
The kindergarten offered a safe, caring environment, away from the numerous dangers that confronted children on the streets. Wilson described the function of the kindergarten as being a means of taking these little people out of the streets...where they would be growing up and learning what they should not learn...[and] to give them a bonny, happy time, and to prepare them for their school life later on. [54]
This was, and skill is, the essential difference between kindergartens and creches in that they provide pre school education, based on Froebelian and Montessorian methods, by qualified staff.
The kindergarten was always full, and there was usually a long waiting list of children wanting admission. The nationality of the those who were enrolled (We have Jewish children attending, and the children of foreigners of various kinds.')[55] reflected the cosmopolitan nature that Carlton has had since its early years of settlement. There were also Italians, Chinese and Assyrians.
Wilson and her assistants strove not only to provide basic education in a pleasant environment, but were also concerned about the general poor health of the children. Wilson asked the Free Kindergarten Union (of which the Bouverie St. kinder was one of the first members) in 1909 to 'interest itself in the medical inspections of kindergartens.'[56] Thus the union employed its own medical officers to do regular check ups and give advice to parents on matters concerning the children. Melbourne City Council employed Dr. Hilda Kincaid, under the direction of its Medical Officer of Health, to carry out the inspections at the Carlton kindergarten, thus relieving the Union of this task.
Poverty among the families of the children who attended was more than obvious; they came poorly clothed and insufficiently fed. As the historian Lyndsay Gardiner has commented.
The conditions of the poor (and there were thousands of them) were unbelievably bad. Certainly they deteriorated in the late 1920's and reached an all dine low about 1932, but at no time was the spectre of unemployment, bad housing, inadequate diet and clothing absent from the houses of the working people.[57]
In the mid 1920s, some forty per cent of the children present at the kindergarten were undernourished, and four of them died of pneumonia in 1924.[58] Milk and biscuits became a regular source of food for these little ones, and as dental needs were recognised, apple rations and whole meal bread were provided. [59]
At the height of the depression, the kindergarten began to provide hot lunches and special areas were set up for afternoon naps. Many children did not obtain adequate sleep at home. The annual report of The Carlton Methodist Mission, now Church of All Nations: a source of comfort and support for many, 1932 pointed to the consequent results of insecurity of home life, of lack of nourishing food, proper facilities for rest, and of living in an atmosphere tense with unhappy family relationships and divided control of children due to many adults living in a limited area .[60]
Because of the housing shortages, many families were sharing their homes with other relatives or were forced to board in cramped conditions. The one house would often contain so many children, as well as adults, that illness and psychological problems were common. At the kindergarten these consequences of poor living situations would manifest in the appearance and general behaviour of the children who were, according to the same report,
often pale, hungry and cold, ... show[ed] nervous excitability and instability, evidence of the wrong conditions in which they [were] living. The effects of malnourishment [was] also shown by lowered physique and tendency for sores to cover bodies and be slow in healing....When children are crowded in homes so insecure, comforts so few, and the necessities of life so limited, we must ask ourselves: What will be the results? [61] The kindergarten was one of the few places that provided fires to warm the little children.[62]
Older school pupils were not so fortunate. The Faraday Street School Committee commented on the painful sight of the 'poorly clothed mites shivering with cold during the winter months.'[63] The lack of adequate clothing, coupled with the absence of heating in the classrooms, left hundreds of children susceptible to ill health.
This situation only seemed to continue, if not deteriorate, over the years with the Depression and the following war. Behavioural problems amongst the children were noted in all the centres in the Carlton area: difficulties with eating and sleeping, frequent nail biting, head banging, thumb sucking, and the occurrence of tantrums, violent tempers and night terrors were very common.
The poor health of the children present at the kindergarten was only a reflection of the wider community's health. One of the most serious epidemics to hit Melbourne was poliomyelitis. The kinder, along with other centres and schools, was closed from August 1937 to March 1938 in an attempt to hinder the spread of the disease.
In the 1938 report of the Health Committee, Dr. Hilda Kincaid, who was responsible for visiting the Carlton Kindergarten, pleaded for better housing, rest and food for pre school conditions for childhood development to ensure a 'happy family'.[64]
Ironically, for many families the Second World War improved their standard of living. Unemployed men were being absorbed by the Armed Forces, or the workforce, and women were now encouraged to work outside the home for the war effort. Therefore at least one incoming salary, as meagre as it was, enabled many families to survive, possibly more comfortably than during the depression. But even if there was comparatively less poverty, the acute housing shortage and the emotional stress of the war were still burdens that many had to bear.
Financial relief came to many families who were able to receive the Child Endowment that the Commonwealth Government, under Robert Menzies, had introduced around 1940. Initially it was five shillings per week for second and subsequent children under 16 years of age. In 1950, Menzies extended the allowance to include first and only children, and in 1964, families with students between 16 and 21 years were entitled to receive payments. (Now it has dropped back to age 16).
As families began to expand and become more prosperous in the 1950s, they started to shift into the outer suburbs of Melbourne. The inner suburbs were widely seen as slum areas and were therefore less desirable. Since many of the so called 'slums' were being demolished by the Housing Commission, for several families resettlement was a necessity, not just a choice. The Carlton Kindergarten closed as a result of these changes.
Other child care centres have continued to operate despite all the social changes that have occurred over the years, and some have been established especially to accommodate new needs that have arisen. For example, the Central Carlton Kindergarten was built in 1966 to service the families residing in the Housing Commission flats. The University of Melbourne has also been catering for its staff and students for some years. Children were first cared for in the colleges. Around 1976 Queen's College opened an actual centre, which was later closed. The university has opened centres in Faraday Street (now also closed), Swanston and Bouverie Streets in more recent years.
There was also the Melbourne University Family Club Day Nursery and Kindergarten, catering for the children of working couples and students associated with the university, as well as the children of local residents. The Day Nursery and Kindergarten was situated on rented premises at 885 Drummond Street, North Carlton. In 1969, plans were being made to buy a site in Lygon Street. [65]
The need for adequate child care continued throughout the 1970s, as awareness of children being left at home alone provoked much concern within the community. The extensive waiting lists that all centres carried for children requiring admission were indicative of the lack of child care available. This was/is particularly apparent in industrial and surrounding areas such as Carlton, as many residents, particularly the women, work in factories. A large proportion of these workers are migrants. The parents become 'highly distressed' because they have no alternative but to leave their children at home or with obliging neighbours whilst they go out to work.[66]
Most poor families in Carlton were able to get by without help from charity workers and without living in institutions. As one woman who lived in Carlton in the 1930s reported in Weevils in The Flour, everyone hated the idea of 'Homes'. She knew a prostitute who lost her children when they were taken into care by welfare workers and the police.
We knew they were coming, there were very few cars about in those days. I screamed to those kids to run, run and run! The children ran to a nearby park to hide but they were soon caught.
Those kids were neglected I suppose. They were extremely poorly dressed and looked after, but to be taken to a Home was the worst thing that could happen to you because it was the unknown. They were terrified [67]
With such fears of charitable institutions, it is not surprising that people took every possible step to raise enough money to survive. If incomes were not sufficient to keep the whole family, then wives and even children would take on work. Many mothers did other people's housework, laundry or child minding. Older children often managed to assist their parents by selling newspapers, doing odd jobs for neighbours or helping in local shops. Many of them were forced to leave school at the age of twelve or thirteen to secure a regular job. In some instances, boarders were taken in to supplement the family income.
Although many new migrants did not have relatives who could help them in times of crises, others who had shifted to Carlton with family members were able to establish kinship networks by the second generation. Such relationships could be highly useful for economic survival. With new migrants of different ethnic origins from the predominantly British Carlton population, fellow migrants, both relatives and non relatives, would often assist each other. In the post Second World War period Carlton witnessed such support networks helping migrant groups. In the years before that war, the notable ethnic minority to settle in Carlton were Jewish people.
Jews were among the first European settlers to come to Australia. As free settlers arrived in later years Jewish communities around the colonies expanded.[68] Many came during the 1880s to escape the pogroms (massacres) of Tsarist Russia. Thousands of Jews were being driven out of the country and many who did remain left in the 1920s after the years of war and the Russian Revolution of 1917.
For many Jews a sense of security and stability was found in their new home, Melbourne. The Melbourne City Council expressed its sympathy with the Russian Jews, deploring the cruel and inhuman treatment they were subjected to, and condoled 'with our fellow Jewish citizens in their hour of sorrow.'[69]
The Jewish population was centred in the city, but the rapid growth and expansion of Melbourne forced them to relocate. The community itself was not homogeneous, but consisted of two main groups: Anglicised and East European Jews. The majority of the former chose to live in the more fashionable (and therefore more desirable) suburb of St.Kilda. However the East European Jews settled in Carlton where rents were cheaper and they remained in close proximity to the city. The desire to remain together for mutual support and familiarity with similar minded people is comparable to any immigrant group.
Jews were one of the first non British immigrants to settle in Carlton. They resided mostly in the older parts of Carlton: in 1891, approximately 850 of the 1,000 Jews lived south of Palmerston Street where they accounted for 4.9% of the total population.[70]
Subsequent migrants from East Europe were encouraged to establish themselves in Carlton so that this once peripheral group became the foremost Jewish community in Victoria.[71] Shuls in Kay and Neill Streets, (both no longer existent), a community hall, restaurants, bakeries and Kosher butcher shops, and the Kadimah on Lygon Street reflected this growing community.
Social progression for the Jewish community entailed moving from Carlton to North Carlton and then to Princes Hill. To shift to St.Kilda was most desired. Some rivalry existed between the Carlton Jewish community and the St.Kilda one. However the latter group was considered less orthodox and many Jews who had moved there would still return to Carlton for Shabbos and Yomtov (Sabbath and Holy Day).
The Jewish population peaked in the 1920s as two thirds of the city's total population were residing in Carlton and North Carlton about 2,000 people. By the mid 1930s, Jews were 4% of the Carlton population.[72] Dave Campbell remembered his Jewish neighbours:
'There were many Jewish people in North Carlton and directly opposite our shop was Polonsky the butcher. A couple of mornings a week a horse and cart loaded with crates of fowls would pull up in McPherson St. and Jewish people would congregate to make a purchase. They would take their fowls into Polonsky's who had a killing room in the yard at the rear of the shop.
Next door to Polonsky was MacCusker's fruit shop, then next door again on the corner of McPherson St. was King and Godfree, the grocer shop. Living above the grocer shop was the Hyde family and there were three children, Magorie, Ted, and Bob, whose back yard was the rear of the fruit and grocer shops and one fence divided them from Polonsky's yard.
By climbing on this fence we could watch the killing of the poultry. The birds had to be killed and bled to meet religious demands and inside the killing room was a trough with a row of hooks above it. The fawls' feet were tied together, the head bent back, the throat slit, then the birds were hung over the trough to bleed. The first couple of times watching the tummy was a bit squeamish, but after that it was not so bad and before long interest was lost.
The Jewish boys and girls would go to state school with the rest of us, but after coming home would attend a session of Jewish lessons. The hall on the corner of Amess and McPherson Streets was used for this purpose. The hall was also used as a meeting place for the Jewish community but in time they built the Kadimah in Lygon St. between McPherson and Fenwick Streets. They also had a library on the corner of the lane between Richardson and Pigdon Streets in Rathdowne Street.
The Jewish people had strict religious beliefs and stuck to them closely. There were days when they would only travel by foot. Transport of any sort was out and handling of money was taboo. At one time the family on the south east corner of the McPherson Rathdowne St intersection asked me to light their candles for them. It was either every Friday or one Friday a month and at a particular time I would go to various rooms and light the candles....'[73]
A new wave of Jewish refugees was to arrive in the late 1940s after the war, particularly from Germany.
Following the Calwell Immigration policy of 1947, Carlton became more widely known for its South European migrants. By 1960, 25% of the suburb's population were Italian, 20% having actually been born in Italy. Carlton was then being called 'Little Italy'.[74]
Dave Campbell (bottom left) and family
1. Logan, William S., The Gentrification of Inner Melbourne. University of Queensland Press, Queensland, 1985. p.29.
2. Report of the Health Committee, 1884 85, Proceedings of Council, M.C.C., p.4.
3. Ibid., p.2.
4. Ibid., p.2.
5. Ibid., p.2.
6. Dunstan,D., 'Dirt and Disease', The Outcasts of Melbourne. Allen and Unwin, 1890 91.
7. 'Report in Regard to the Health, Cleanliness and General Sanitary State of the City for the Year1895', M.C.C., p.2.
8. ibid., p.3.
9. Victorian Year Book, 1890 1891.
10. Report to the Health Committee, 1905., M.C.C., p.1.
11. Progress Report From the Joint Select Committee on the Housing Conditions of the People in the Metropolis., V.P.P. 1913.
12. Ibid.
13. Good, John (witness), Second Progress Report, Minutes of Evidence, V P.P., pp.105 7
14. Sharp, Edward W.,(witness), Ibid. p.9.
15. Kelly,E.C.W., Reseigh,E., Report No.3. House Rents, Report of the Royal Commission on the High Cost of Living, V.P.P., 1924, p.1.
16. Ibid., p.4.
17. Ibid., p.4.
18. Sharp, op.cit., p.9.
19. Lowenstein,Wendy, Weevils in The Flour, Scribe Publications Pty Ltd, Melbourne, 1978, p.231.
20. Ibid., p.234.
21. Ibid., p.233.
22. Campbell' Dave, interviewed by Elizabeth Stafford and Annemarie Law on 2/9/1987.
23. Ibid.
24. Housing Investigation and Slum Abolition Board, First (Progress) Report, Slum Reclamation, Housing for the Lower paid Worker, V.P.P.,no.4,
vol.l, 1937. p.5.
25. The Meetings for Wives and Daughters, Melbourne, 1884, quoted by David Dunstan, op. cit., pp.l60 161.
26. Annual Report, The Refuge, 1866.
27. ibid, 1864.
28. ibid, 1928.
29. ibid, 1927.
30. ibid, 1941.
31. ibid, 1937.
32. ibid, 1949.
33. From Dave Campbell's notes on his childhood; circa, late 1920s to 1930s. Courtesy Dave Campbell
34. Bolton, Barbara, Booths Drum, Hodder and Stoughton, 1980.
35. The Prison Gate Brigade, The Salvadon Army Media and Information.
36. The War Cry, October 22, 1927., p.9. Acknowledgement: George Ellis, archivist, The Salvation Army, 1 Drill Street, Hawthorn.
37. The War Cry, May 28, 1927.
38. 68th. Annual Report., Queen Elizabeth Centre,1986
39. Ibid., p.371.
40. Nattrass, John, 'The First Lying In Hospital...'in The Australasian Colonies. Development of The Royal Women's Hospital. Melbourne. Additions to Our History, The Royal Women's Hospital, Carlton., 1978. p.l5.
41. The Weekly Times, 31/7/1897
42. The Weekly Times, 31/7/1897.
43. Annual Report, Carlton Creche, 1913 14.
44. ibid, 1946 47.
45. ibid, 1960 61.
46. ibid, 1974 75.
Acknowledgement: Rosemary Waite, Hon. secretary of the Victorian Association of Day Nurseries, for historical notes and access to the annual reports.
47. Hibiscus, 'For the Comfort of the Little Ones', The Victory. 1917., p.82.
48. Ibid., p.79.
49. The War Cry, March 21st, 1942.
50. The Australian Municipal Journal, May 20th,1942.; The War Cry, Sept.12th, 1942.
51. Proposal for the Establishment of an Emergency Residential Child Care Unit in Carlton by the Catholic Family Welfare Bureau, March, 1981.
52. Annual Report, 1985.
53. Wilson,F.M., 'Minutes of Evidence Taken by the Commission', Second Progress Report on the Housing Conditions of the People in the Metropolis,
1914-1915., V.P.P., p.89.
54. Ibid., p.88.
55. Ibid., p.88.
56. Wilson, quoted by Gardiner, Lyndsay, The Free Kindergarten Union of Victoria. 1908 1980, The Australian Council for Educational Research,Radford House, Victoria, 1982. p.42.
57. Gardiner, L. p.86.
58. ibid. p.87.
59. ibid. p.88.
60. Rosner,Dorothy, Annual Report, 1932, quoted
by Gardiner, op.cit., p.89.
61. Ibid., pp.89 90.
62. The Carlton Times, 1/7/1937.
63. The Carlton Times, 22/4/1937.
64. Ibid., p.11.
65. The Carlton News, 6/5/1969
66. The Melbourne Times, 14/2/1973, p.7.
67. Lowenstein, Wendy, Weevils in The Flour, Scribe Publications Pty Ltd, Fitzroy 1978. p.230.
68. Rubinstien, Hilary L., The Jews in Victoria, 1835-1985., George Allen and Unwin, Sydney, 1986, p.1
Price, Charles A., Jewish Settlers in Australia, The Australian Nationality University, Canberra, 1964. p.8: estimates that at least six Jewish convicts arrived with the First Fleet.
69. Jeffries, Councillor, for Melbourne City Council, 27/11/05, Town Council Proceedings, 1905-06., M.C.C.
70. Jones, F.L., 'Italians in the Carlton Area: The Growth of an Ethnic Concentration', The Australian Journal of Politics and History, vol.x, April-December, 1964. pp.88-89.
71. Rosenbaum, Yankel, 'Religiously Carlton: Jewish Religious Life in Carlton 1914-1939'.
72. Logan, William S., The Gentrification of Inner Melbourne, University of Queensland Press, 1985. p.30
73. Form Dave Campbell's notes. Courtesy Dave Campbell.
74. Logan, op.cit., p.30
p3. Victorian Ministry of Housing, Slum Abolition Report, 1937. All quotes underneath photographs copied from original quotes used in Report.
p.4. Courtesy Carlton Library.
p.5. Victorian Ministry of Housing, Slum Abolition Report, 1937.
p.7. La Trobe Library Collection, State Library of Victoria.
p.8. La Trobe Library Collection, State Library of Victoria.
p.9. Victorian Ministry of Housing, Slum Abolition Report, 1937.
p.11. Victorian Ministry of Housing, Slum Abolition Report, 1937.
p.13. Victorian Ministry of Housing, Slum Abolition Report, 1937.
p.l5. Carlton North Primary School archives.
p.17. Courtesy Church of All Nations, Carlton.
p. l9. Victorian Ministry of Housing, Slum Abolition Report, 1937.
p.21. Courtesy Dave Campbell.
Research: Annemarie Law
Written by: Annemarie Law with Pat Grimshaw
Edited by: Katie Holmes and Marg Fallshaw
Historical advisor: Pat Grimshaw
Layout and design: Marg Fallshaw and Katie Holmes
Cover design: Catherine Gleeson
Thanks to Princes Hill School Park Centre, Ann Clendinnen and Biddy Williams, for accommodating and sponsoring us; Dave Campbell; George Ellis, Archivist at Salvation Army Headquarters; Rosemary Waite, Honorary Secretary at Victorian Association of Day Nurseries; Jan McIntosh, librarian at Carlton North Primary School; John Foster for information on Jews in Carlton; and to Colin Fairweather, archivist at Melbourne City Council. Thanks also to the Victorian Ministry of Housing and the staff of the La Trobe Library for their patience and assistance in our search for photographs. Barson Computers provided a computer, Co Design ergonomic chairs, and CEP the funding to make the project possible.
CARLTON FOREST GROUP:
Catherine Gleeson, Katie Holmes (coordinator), Annemarie Law, Elizabeth Stafford, Marie Sturt
Printing: Ability Press, Regent, Vic.
Publisher: Carlton Forest Project, C/o Princes Hill School Park Centre, Arnold St., Nth. Carlton, Vic.
Copyright: This book is copyright. Apart from any fair dealing for the purposes of private study, research, criticism or review, as permitted under the Copyright Act, no part may be reproduced without the written permission of the publisher.
Photos on pp. 7, 8, courtesy of the La Trobe Collection, State Library of Victoria. Copyright for photos, pp. 7, 8, La Trobe Collection, State Library of Victoria. Photos on pp. 3, 5, 9, 11, 13, 19, courtesy of Victorian Ministry of Housing. Copyright unknown.
ISBN: 0 9587922 4 0
0 9587922 5 9 (for series)