The Australian Women's Register

Freda Irving began her career in journalism in Melbourne in 1925, working with the Sun News Pictorial in various guises until about 1949 when she joined the Argus. She also edited Woman’s Day and the Australian Women’s Weekly for short periods of time. In 1978-79, she was president of the Melbourne Press Club.

During the war she joined the Australian Women’s Army Service as a private but before long she became Amenities Officer with the rank of captain for the three women’s services ­ Army, Air Force and Navy.

She was awarded an MBE for services to Journalism in 1981.

Born and educated in New Zealand, Stella Allan came to Australia in 1903 when her husband was invited to join the staff of the Melbourne Argus. An intelligent, well spoken woman with a keen interest in women’s affairs, she was a very important figure in the establishment and management of a number of women’s organisations.

In 1907 the Argus commissioned her to write a series of articles on the first Australian Women’s Work Exhibition held in October. They aroused much interest and next year the Argus invited her to join its full-time staff and begin a weekly section on the particular interests of women. She adopted the nom de plume ‘Vesta’ and called the column ‘Women to Women’. Her work was unique in an Australian daily paper at that time. Her pages extended to cover every aspect of women’s affairs, children’s interests and community welfare, and ‘Vesta’ became a household word for authoritative information and advice on such matters. In 1910 she was one of three women foundation members of the Australian Journalists’ Association.

Alice Anderson established the all-female business, Miss Anderson’s Motor Service, in Kew in 1918. The garage offered driving tuition, mechanical check-ups, hire cars, motor tours and chauffeuring.

Barbara Baynton was one of the first Australian short story writers to receive literary recognition abroad. She drew inspiration from her early existence in the harsh Australian bush.

Baynton published Bush Studies in 1902; Human Toll in 1907; and Cobbers in 1917.

Annette Bear-Crawford was born in Collingwood, Melbourne but trained in social work in England. There she became involved in the women’s movement and the National Vigilance Committee. She returned to Melbourne in 1890 and became a leading figure in the women’s movement in Australia, joining the Woman’s Christian Temperance Union and forming the Victorian Women’s Suffrage League.

Elsa Chauvel collaborated with her filmmaker husband, Charles Chauvel, on a number of feature films including Uncivilized (1936), Forty Thousand Horsemen (1941), Sons of Matthew (1949), Jedda (1955) and Heritage (1935).

Irene Crespin was a micropalaeontologist. After graduating from the University of Melbourne in 1919, she worked for the Geological Survey of Victoria, describing macro and micro-fossils found in sediment on the Mornington Peninsula. In 1927 she was appointed assistant palaeontologist to Frederick Chapman in the Geological Branch of the Department of Home Affairs. In 1936 she succeeded him as Commonwealth palaeontologist at half his salary and was located in Canberra.

Ruby Davy was the first Australian woman to receive a doctorate in music and to become a fellow of Trinity College of Music, London. Among her many compositions was Australia, Fair and Free, performed in Melbourne and Adelaide in 1934. With Issy Spivakovsky, she established the Davy Conservatorium of Music in her home at South Yarra.

The journal of Annie Dawbin opens in September 1834 when its author, then a 17-year-old bride, is voyaging to Australia with her new husband, Lieutenant Andrew Baxter. Over the course of her life – during which she had two marriages; worked on the land; voyaged to and from Australia several times; and raised her brother’s children after the death of his wife – Dawbin filled no less than 32 journals. Her complete diaries were edited by Lucy Frost and published in 1997.

Henrietta Dugdale was a pioneer of the women’s movement and a firm believer in equality of the sexes. She was a member of the Eclectic Society and the Australasian Secular Association, and president of the first Victorian Women’s Suffrage Society. Her booklet, A Few Hours in a Far Off Age, was published in 1883 and dedicated to George Higinbotham.

After the death of her first husband, Henrietta married William Dugdale and had three children. Her third marriage was to Frederick Johnson, about 1905.

A graduate of the University of Melbourne with a reputation as an outstanding mathematics teacher, Julia Flynn was appointed inspector of secondary schools in 1914. She became a senior inspector in the Victorian Department of Education in 1924, and in 1937 was appointed chief inspector of schools. Flynn was a devoted Catholic and a feminist reformer.

After searching out the best merino flocks in Germany, Eliza Forlong travelled with her husband and two sons to Launceston, arriving in 1831. Eliza managed their property, ‘Kenilworth’, while her husband maintained business interests in a nearby flour mill and sheep run. After the death of her husband, Eliza moved to Port Phillip and lived with her son William at his station, Seven Creeks, in Euroa.

Mary Fullerton was involved with the Victorian Socialist Party and Women’s Political Association, and was active in the suffrage movement in Australia. She wrote stories and poems for newspapers, sometimes using the pseudonyms of Alpenstock and Austeal. In 1922 she moved to England, where she developed a strong friendship with the author Miles Franklin. Over the course of her life, Fullerton published several novels and volumes of poetry. Her novel Two Women (written under a pseudonym) won a prize when it was published in 1923. Her childhood memoir, Bark House Days, was published in 1921, and reprinted twice.

Gertrude Halley was a founder and treasurer of the Queen Victoria Hospital for Women. An eye and ear specialist, she was an honorary surgeon at the hospital. In 1913 she established the medical branch of the Education Department in South Australia.

Catherine Henrys was sentenced to transportation for life and arrived in Hobart on the Arab on 25 April 1836. In 1841 she broke free from assigned service and lived in the bush dressed as a man and working as a timber splitter. Upon re-conviction in 1848, she escaped from the female factory but was recaptured. She was granted a conditional pardon in 1850. Various of her exploits were outlined in The Launceston Examiner.

Christian Brynhild Ochiltree Jollie-Smith studied law at the University of Melbourne, graduating with a Bachelor of Laws in 1911. She was admitted as a barrister and solicitor by the Supreme Court of Victoria on 1 October 1912. She practiced as a solicitor in Melbourne from 1914, was appointed professional assistant in the Crown Solicitor’s Office, Melbourne.

Jollie-Smith was a foundation committee-member of the Communist Party of Australia. A socialist and member of the Communist Party, Jollie-Smith published the Australian Communist journal. Her own work, The Japanese Labour Movement, was published in 1919. After moving to Sydney, Jollie-Smith established her own successful legal practice. In 1924 she became the second woman admitted as a solicitor in New South Wales. Jollie-Smith mainly dealt with political and industrial cases, and championed the working class. She was often employed by trade unions, or by those engaged in anti-eviction disputes during the depression years. Jollie-Smith regularly contributed to the Communist publication, Workers’ Weekly, and to Tribune.

Margaret Kiddle graduated from the University of Melbourne with a BA (1937), a Diploma of Education (1938), and an MA (1947). She joined the History Department at the University as a tutor and lecturer during wartime, and remained there until her death in 1958.

Moving around parts of the Northern Territory while her husband worked in the diamond mines, Jessie Litchfield raised her family and worked as a journalist. She published Far North Memories in 1930. After the death of her husband, she worked as editor of the Northern Territory Times and Government Gazette. In 1955 she became the first woman in the Territory to be appointed a justice of the peace.

Mary Mackillop was appointed head of the Penola Catholic School in 1866. In March of that year she was formally committed into the Institute of the Sisters of St Joseph of the Sacred Heart. In 1871, almost half the members of the Institute were dismissed by Bishop Sheil, and Mackillop was excommunicated for alleged insubordination. The excommunication was lifted as early as February 1872, when she was reinstated as superior of the Institute. She was elected superior general under the new Roman Constitutions in 1875. Mackillop founded a teacher training centre for the Institute in Sydney in 1888, enabling it to become a leader in Catholic education.

In 1923, following the death of her father James, Nell Martyn took over as managing director of the Steel Company of Australia. The company specialised in manganese and chrome steel, and employed over 100 workers. Martyn was a popular employer and a regular speaker at YWCA gatherings. When she died of cancer at the age of 39, over 1000 mourners attended her funeral.

Ethel McLennan was awarded her Doctor of Science degree in 1921 for a study of the endophytic fungus associated with the seed of the grass Lolium. She was awarded a fellowship by the International Federation of University Women in 1926, and became a central figure in the Botany Department at the University of Melbourne. She became associate professor in 1931, and enjoyed an excellent reputation nationwide as a leading plant pathologist and mycologist.

May Maxwell began her professional life as an actor but switched to journalism in 1907 when she discovered that it was a more stable career option than the theatre.

Louisa Meredith sailed for Sydney with her husband Charles in 1839. A keen naturalist, she collected plant, insect and seaweed specimens in Tasmania and was a member of the Tasmania Royal Society. She published several volumes of poetry as well as her accounts of colonial life, and often illustrated these works herself.

After winning a Bulletin prize in 1913 for a sonnet about Canberra, Nina Murdoch published a book of verse, Songs of the Open Air. She was one of the first women general reporters at the Sydney Sun, and from 1922 was working in Melbourne at the Sun News-Pictorial using the pen-name ‘Manin’. She was the first woman permitted to cover Senate debates. In 1930, Murdoch published Seventh Heaven, a Joyous Discovery of Europe, based on her own travels. Another book, She Travelled Alone in Spain, followed five years later. Her last book, Portrait in Youth of Sir John Longstaff, was published in 1948.

Nettie Palmer became involved in the suffrage movement and the socialist movement while she was completing her tertiary studies in London. It was there that she met her husband, Vance Palmer, and by 1917 the couple had returned to Australia with their first daughter, Aileen. A second daughter, Helen, was born that year. The family lived at Emerald, Victoria. Both Vance and Nettie were opponents of censorship and conscription, and Nettie had a regular column in the Argus. She also wrote for the Illustrated Tasmanian Mail and the Bulletin Red Page. Her essay on Modern Australian Literature 1900-1923 was published in 1924. Nettie Palmer became editor of the anti-fascist journal for women, Women Today, and edited memoirs, published short stories and poetry anthologies, made translations, and lectured to young writers.

Ethel Richardson was educated at Presbyterian Ladies’ College in Melbourne, and the Royal Conservatorium at Leipzig. As Henry Handel Richardson, she became one of Australia’s best-known and best-loved novelists, finding fame with Maurice Guest (1908) and The Fortunes of Richard Mahony (published in three parts between 1917 and 1929).

Kathleen Robinson trained at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art in London. With Lewis Casson and Dame Sybil Thorndike’s Australian tour, she played minor parts in Media, St Joan, Madame Plays Nap and Macbeth. From 1932-35, Robinson ran the Westminster Theatre in London with Osmond Daltry. In 1940 she returned to Australia and formed Whitehall Productions at the Minerva Theatre in Kings Cross, Sydney. She opened an academy for dramatic art in 1944.