WAY 79, also referred to as WAY '79 and WAY 1979, was the official 1979 sesquicentennial (150th anniversary) celebration of the European colonisation of Western Australia.
WAY 79, also referred to as WAY '79 and WAY 1979, was the official 1979 sesquicentennial (150th anniversary) celebration of the European colonisation of Western Australia.
Preliminary planning for WAY 79 began shortly after the March 1971 celebrations of Western Australia's population passing one million. The success of this celebration prompted the Perth Chamber of Commerce to begin planning for Western Australia's sesquicentenary. Planning proceeded slowly at first, and it was not until January 1974 that the State Government became involved.
When Charles Court became Premier of Western Australia in April of that year, the government took over planning, and preparations began in earnest. The following year the WAY 79 concept was officially launched by the premier. S. W. Dallymore was initially appointed executive officer for the celebrations, but he resigned after two years, and Slade Drake-Brockman was appointed in his place. According to Bolton in 1989, "It would be fair to assume that Court and Drake-Brockman played the most significant roles in determining the character of WAY 1979." [1] [ page needed ]
The first WAY 79 event was a New Year's Eve concert on the Perth Esplanade, attended by about 60,000 people. Performers included Rolf Harris, Fat Cat and Percy Penguin.
Ken Colbung had been invited to perform on the didgeridoo; the Indigenous activist used the occasion to hand an eviction notice to the Governor of Western Australia, Sir Wallace Kyle. Colbung claimed to be serving the notice on the white people on behalf of Western Australia's Aboriginal people. [2] The notice was pointedly in the same form as that used by the State Housing Commission for eviction notices to Aboriginal tenants. The act was intended both as a reminder of Aboriginal land rights and dispossession, and a reference to the contemporary plight of the State's indigenous people. Court was furious at the event, calling it "a cheap and ill-conceived stunt".[ citation needed ]
One of the major events held in Perth under the patronage of WAY 79 was the Miss Universe 1979 pageant. Maritza Sayalero of Venezuela won the pageant; as numerous press people crowded close to photograph her, the catwalk collapsed. Eight contestants and two media representatives were plunged to the ground, but there were no major injuries. [3]
In March Prince Charles made a state visit, representing the Crown. Among his many engagements was officially opening the Avondale Agricultural Research Station Museum by planting a tree near the entrance. His other tree planting activity included Government House. [4] He also followed the steps of the founders from the Swan River into what is now the city. [5] [6]
In August 1979, the first of two international conferences on the Indian Ocean region was held in Perth as the International Conference on Indian Ocean Studies; the second was held in 1984. [7]
Competitors in the Parmelia Yacht Race from Plymouth to Fremantle arrived in late November. [8]
Numerous other events were staged under the WAY 79 banner, from yacht races to family reunions and street parties. The government issued a commemorative twenty cent postage stamp. Both official and commercial merchandise was produced to mark the occasion, from books to tea-towels.
The iconic WAY 79 logo was designed by Norm Wilson, an art director and partner at Marketforce advertising agency. [9]
Some have noted the celebrations focused on its perpetuation of the "pioneer myth", [10] which "saw progress in terms of mineral development rather than social justice or environmental amenity".
In 1989 Bolton wrote that the WAY 79 celebrations:
offered a sanitised version of the past.... Nobody tried to replicate the heat, the insects, the dysentery, the alcoholism, the boredom and the discomfort which were so intimate a part of daily life in the Swan River Colony. [1]
Among the books published was the WAY 79 Sesquicentenary Celebrations Series, 14 volumes on a range of Western Australian topics.
The Women's Committee for the 150th Anniversary Celebrations produced the volume Reflections; Profiles of 150 Women who Helped Make Western Australian History. The West Australian contributed Swan River Colony– 96 pages of images selected from its newspaper archives. [11] The Education Department produced Western Australia: An atlas of human endeavour to provide schools with an up-to-date list of achievements by the state and its people, with graphics and accurate maps. [12] : 46
An editorial panel, all connected with the University of Western Australia, released a 437-page Who is Who, in which the candid aim was "to change as little as possible what people wrote about themselves". [13] The result was an engaging compendium of academic and political networks of the day; it omitted such eminent persons as Rolf Harris, Sir Paul Hasluck, Sir Laurence Brodie-Hall, Kim Beazley Jr, Sir Norman Brearley, building magnate John Roberts and champion Australian Rules footballer Bill Walker.
Parliament was provided with a report of the events of the year. [14] The various committees formed did produce ephemeral material – such as the list from the Commerce Committee of the names of those plaques on St Georges Terrace [15] and the Premier's Department and the Anniversary Board arranged for the New Year proceedings to be kept on record. [16]
Western Australia: An atlas of human endeavour is an atlas that was published by the Western Australian Department of Education and the Department of Lands and Surveys, [17] and distributed to all school children in WA.[ citation needed ] It has a foreword by Premier Charles Court, who was personally involved in a number of the projects that were conducted by the organisation.[ citation needed ]
Rather than being simply a collection of maps, like a traditional atlas, the atlas of human endeavour presents descriptive text and photographs illustrating the changes over time since the initial European settlement, in four broad categories:
It includes extensive usage of historical geography, such as historical maps and photographs, for comparison with those of the contemporary landscape:
The maps, photographs and text in this atlas present a story of discovery, exploration and economic and social development.
The front and rear covers of the book are false colour images created by processing satellite imagery from Landsat 1 and 2. The front image extends from Rockingham to Lancelin, the rear image from Mandurah to Yallingup. The colours in the images indicate human artefacts such as ploughed land, mining activity, bitumen and concrete, as well as the varying of vegetation. [17]
The atlas includes gazetteers and bibliographies - at some divergence from the Sesquicentenary Celebrations Series editions that lacked indexes and adequate reference materials.
It was originally published for the 1979 celebrations, and included "1829 •1979" as part of the title; [17] a second edition was published in 1986, without the years in the title. [12] [18]
One hundred and fifty commemorative plaques were installed along St Georges Terrace, Perth, [19] [20] honouring notable figures in Western Australia's history. Since then, more plaques have been added and, as of August 2014 [update] , the years to 1999 were included. [21] [22] In July 2014, the 1959 plaque of Rolf Harris was removed by the City of Perth following his conviction in the UK on charges of indecent assault. [23] [24] [25]
The Swan River Colony, also known as the Swan River Settlement, or just Swan River, was a British colony established in 1829 on the Swan River, in Western Australia. This initial settlement place on the Swan River was soon named Perth, and it became the capital city of Western Australia.
John Stephen Hampton was Governor of Western Australia from 1862 to 1868.
Parmelia was a barque built in Quebec, Canada, in 1825. Originally registered on 31 May in Quebec, she sailed to Great Britain and assumed British registry. She made one voyage for the British East India Company (EIC), in 1827–1828. In 1829 she transported the first civilian officials and settlers of the Swan River Colony to Western Australia. She then made two voyages transporting convicts to New South Wales, Australia. A fire damaged her irreparably in May 1839.
Boyup Brook is a town in the south-west of Western Australia, 269 kilometres (167 mi) south-southeast of Perth and 31 kilometres (19 mi) northeast of Bridgetown. The town lies on Kaniyang land within the Noongar nation.
George Essex Hampton was an unpopular public official in colonial Western Australia.
The Foundation of Perth 1829 is a 1929 oil-on-canvas painting by George Pitt Morison. It depicts a reconstruction of the ceremony by which the town of Perth, Western Australia was founded on 12 August 1829. Morison painted the work as part of Western Australia's centenary celebrations, and presented it to the Art Gallery of Western Australia in February 1929.
Kenneth Desmond Colbung AM MBE, also known by his indigenous name Nundjan Djiridjarkan, was an Aboriginal Australian leader from the Noongar people who became prominent in the 1960s. He was appointed an MBE and an AM for his service to the Aboriginal community.
Following Western Australia's convict era, 37 ex-convicts were appointed school teachers in the colony. The appointment of such a large number of ex-convicts to what was considered a respectable government position was highly unusual for a penal colony, as the social stigma of conviction usually excluded ex-convicts from such positions.
Western Australia was a crown colony from its establishment in 1829 as the Swan River Colony until the advent of representative government in 1870. During this time executive and legislative power was vested in the Governor of Western Australia, but from 1832 he had Executive and Legislative Councils to assist and advise him. The Western Australian Legislative Council met for the first time on 7 February 1832. This is a list of members of the Western Australian Legislative Council between 1832 and 1870.
The Royal Perth Yacht Club (RPYC) is a yacht club in Perth, Western Australia. It is the third oldest yacht club in Australia after the Royal Yacht Club of Victoria and the Royal Sydney Yacht Squadron. It is based at the Crawley Marina on Pelican Point and at the Fremantle Annexe in Challenger Harbour.
St Georges Terrace is the main street in the city of Perth, Western Australia. It runs parallel to the Swan River and forms the major arterial road through the central business district.
The Dictionary of Western Australians and the related Bicentennial Dictionary of Western Australians are two multi-volume biographical dictionaries containing details of European and non-European settlement in Western Australia from the foundation of the Swan River Colony in 1829 until 1888.
Since the first Europeans visited the west coast of Australia in the 17th century, Rottnest Island has seen numerous shipwrecks. The 11-kilometre-long (6.8 mi) and 4.5-kilometre-wide (2.8 mi) island is surrounded by hidden and partly exposed reefs whilst being buffeted by north-westerly winter gales as well as very strong south-west summer sea "breezes". It is situated 12 kilometres (7.5 mi) west of the port of Fremantle meaning that much of the maritime traffic to Western Australia's major port passes close by.
The Western Mail, or Western Mail, was the name of two weekly newspapers published in Perth, Western Australia.
The International Conference on Indian Ocean Studies (ICIOS) was an international symposium held in Perth, Western Australia in 1979 and 1984.
The Vegetation Survey of Western Australia commenced as a project of the Department of Geography of the University of Western Australia to provide vegetation maps for the state on the scales of 1:250,000 and 1:1,000,000. There were some offshoot publications apart from the maps and notes. The main author and worker of the project was John Stanley Beard, who was appointed a Member of the Order of Australia for the work in 2003.
In 1929, Western Australia (WA) celebrated the centenary of the founding of Perth and the establishment of the Swan River Colony, the first permanent European settlement in WA. A variety of events were run in Perth, regional areas throughout the state, and even across Australia such as the Western Australian Centenary Air Race.
Richard Gallop was among the first European settlers to arrive in the newly established Swan River Colony of Western Australia. He landed there on 6 October 1829 aboard the ship Lotus, accompanied by his brothers James and Edward. They were recruited as agricultural labourers from the English village of Sullington in West Sussex, and were indentured to work for Colonel Peter Latour for seven years.
John Acton Wroth (1830–1876) was a convict transportee to the Swan River Colony, and later a clerk and storekeeper in Toodyay, Western Australia. He kept a personal diary that recorded life on board the transport ship and his experiences at the country hiring depots of York and Toodyay. This diary is lodged in the archives of the State Library.
Mill Street is a short street at the western end of the central business district (CBD) of Perth, Western Australia. It runs between St Georges Terrace and Mounts Bay Road.
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