The Australian Women's Register

Emma Crawford probably migrated to Brisbane in 1896 and almost immediately involved herself in the work of the Society of the Sacred Advent, a religious order committed to the care of Brisbane’s underprivileged women and children. She presided over the Society’s establishment of Anglican schools (all public teaching in Queensland was legislated secular) and made them financially viable. After developing an industrial school for wayward girls in Brisbane, the community took charge of a school in Stanthorpe in 1909 which was later moved to Warwick and named St Catharine’s. She also helped to establish boarding schools for girls in Townsville, Herberton, Charters Towers, Yeppoon and Brisbane.

By the time Mother Emma died, in 1939, the Society was active in three of Queensland’s five Dioceses – this despite never having more that thirty professed sisters working during the course of her lifetime.

A member of the Australian Labor Party, Jean Hearn served as a Senator for Tasmania in the Senate of the Australian Parliament from 1980 until the expiration of her term in 1985, when she retired.

Her first husband died in 1944 in a prisoner of war camp in Java, an event that sparked Jean Hearn’s life-long commitment to pacifism. She established the Tamar Community Peace Trust in 2015, seeking to promote a non-violent approach to conflict resolution.

Jean Hearn passed away in 2017.

A member of the National Party, Flo Bjelke-Petersen was elected Senator for Queensland in the Senate of the Australian Parliament in 1980. She held the position of Deputy Leader of the Opposition in the Senate from 1985 until 1990 and retired from parliament in 1993. She was married to Sir Joh Bjelke-Petersen, who served as Premier of Queensland from 1968-87.

A member of the Liberal Party of Australia, Susan Knowles was elected to the Senate of the Parliament of Australia as a Senator for Western Australia in 1984. In 1987 she was elected Deputy Opposition Whip in the Senate, a position she retained until 1993. She remained in Parliament until 30 June 2005, having served for more than twenty years.

Jo Vallentine was elected to the Senate of the Parliament of Australia as a Senator for Western Australia representing the Nuclear Disarmament Party in 1985. On her resignation form the Nuclear Disarmament Party, she remained in the Parliament as an Independent, until she joined the Western Australian Greens in July 1990. She resigned from Parliament in 1992.

A member of the Australian Labor Party, Ruth Coleman was elected as a Senator for Western Australia in the Senate of the Parliament of Australia, in 1974. She was one of only five women in the federal parliament at that time. On her retirement in 1987, there was some improvement in the numbers of women in the parliament; seventeen in the Senate and eight in the House of Representatives. A member of the Left wing of the Labor Party and a feminist, Ruth Coleman actively campaigned against uranium mining and fought to improve the position of women in Australian society.

A member of the Australian Labor Party, Mary Easson was elected to the House of Representatives of the Australian Parliament as the Member for Lowe, New South Wales at the 1993 election. She was defeated at the 1996 election, when the Labor Government lost office after thirteen years in power.

A member of the Australian Labor Party, Silvia Smith was elected to the House of Representatives of the Australian Parliament as the Member for Bass, Tasmania in 1993. She remained in the federal parliament for one term, suffering defeat at the 1996 election, when the Keating Labor Government was swept from power.
From 1997-2003 she served as a Legislative Councillor in the Tasmanian State Parliament representing the electorate of Windermere as an Independent Labor member.

Pauline Hanson was elected to the House of Representatives of the Australian Parliament as the Member for Oxley in 1996. Originally a Liberal Party candidate for the seat, the Party disendorsed her in February 1996, less than a month before the election. She contested the seat as an Independent and was successful. She remained in Parliament for one term only, suffering defeat at the 1998 election. Before entering the Federal Parliament, she served for one year as a Local Government Councillor for Ipswich City Council. She continues to hold political ambitions, and has stood unsuccessfully as a candidate for the Australian Senate in 2004 and was a candidate again at the Queensland state election, which was held in March 2009.

A member of the National Party, De-Anne Kelly was elected to the House of Representatives of the Australian Parliament as the Member for Dawson, Queensland in 1996. She has the distinction of being the first Nationals woman to be elected to the House of Representatives. She was re-elected in 1998, 2001 and 2004, but was defeated at the 2007 election. During her period in Parliament she served as Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Transport and Regional Services and to the Minister for Trade. She held the portfolio of Veterans Affairs from 2003 until 2006.

A member of the Liberal Party of Australia, Julie Bishop was elected to the House of Representatives of the Parliament of Australia as the Member for Curtin, Western Australia in 1998. She was re-elected in 2001, 2004, 2007, 2010 and 2013. During the period of the Howard Government her ministerial appointments included Ageing, Education, Science and Training, and Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for Women’s Issues. After the defeat of the Howard Government in November 2007, she was elected Deputy Leader of the Opposition and was a member of the Shadow Ministry. After the 2010 election, she retained the Deputy Leadership of the Opposition and was Shadow Minister for Foreign Affairs. On the election of the Coalition Government in September 2013, Bishop remained Deputy Leader of the Liberal Party and became Minister for Foreign Affairs.

Originally a member of the Australian Democrats Party, Cheryl Kernot was elected to the Senate of the Parliament of Australia as a representative for Queensland in 1990. She was elected leader of the Party in 1993, remaining in that position until her defection to the Australian Labor Party in 1997. She was elected to the seat of Dickson Queensland in the House of Representatives in 1998, but was defeated at the 2001 election.

A member of the Australian Labor Party, Kirsten Livermore was elected to the House of Representatives of the Australian Parliament as the Member for Capricornia, Queensland in 1998. She was re-elected in 2001, 2004, 2007 and 2010.

A member of the Liberal Party of Australia, Kathy Martin was elected to the Australian Senate as a Representative for Queensland at the 1974 federal election. She remained in the Senate until 1984, when she resigned to contest a seat in the House of Representatives under her married name, Kathy Sullivan. She served as the Member for Moncrieff, Queensland, from December 1984, until her retirement in 2001. She held the position of Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Foreign Affairs from 1997-2000. She was the first woman to serve in both Houses of the Federal Parliament and holds the distinction of being the longest serving woman in that institution.

A member of the Australian Labor Party, Mary Crawford was elected to the House of Representatives of the Australian Parliament as the Member for Forde, Queensland, at the 1987 federal election. In 1994 she was appointed Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Housing and Regional Development in the Keating Government and held that position until her defeat at the 1996 election.

Constance Caskey was a pastoralist who lived with her husband and four children on a remote pastoral property near Menindee, New South Wales.

Manda Ravlich emigrated to Broken Hill from the former Yugoslavia, and became a central figure in the town’s emerging Yugoslavian community.

Darriea Turley is chair of the National Rural Women’s Coalition and a member of the Premier’s Council for Women. Darriea was the first HIV/AIDS worker in the Broken Hill region. Elected to local government in 1995, she has served on numerous local and state government boards and ran for mayor in Broken Hill in 2004. In 2008, she was nominated for New South Wales Woman of the Year. Darriea currently works as Community Engagement Manager for the Greater Western Area Health Service.

The Broken Hill Munitions Annexe opened in 1942 for the manufacture of wartime munitions and employed dozens of Broken Hill women.

Born, educated and married in Scotland, Amelia Macdonald migrated to Australia in 1887, living first in Sydney where, for nine years, she ran a tailoring business. In 1896 she and her husband, Alexander, moved to Perth, where she lived for the rest of her life.

Her own experience of losing her mother at an early age, along with that of her niece who was orphaned as a young woman, no doubt made her acutely aware of the precariousness of women’s fortunes, and how intricately connected they were to those of men. Macdonald spent all her adult life working towards untangling these connections and reforming the legal, educational and social structures that operated to oppress women and children.

Connected to the church (she taught Anglican Sunday School classes), she was also deeply influenced by the ideas of the Theosophists. Their guiding ideals of spiritual force, service, social reform, universal education and equal citizenship provided the platform for the Women’s Services Guilds Of Western Australia, an organisation Macdonald helped to establish in 1909. She was also important on the establishment of the National Council of women in W.A. and she supported the Workers’ Educational Association and the Women’s Christian Temperance Union.

The U3A Warrani Chorale is a choir for senior women organised by volunteers, which is affiliated with the University of the Third Age, Australian Capital Territory. It was established in 1998 by its musical director and conductor, Pixie Gray, OAM, and its piano accompanist, Barbara Hall, OAM, and provides tuition in vocal and choral techniques and musicianship to its members. It holds annual free public concerts, as well as regularly performing at events organised by a wide range of community organizations. Its repertoire is drawn from a range of musical styles such as madrigals, classical, modern and sacred music, spirituals, ballads, folk songs and jazz, all usually sung in four part harmony. In 2006 it participated in the Australian Broadcasting Corporation’s Choir of the Year competition. Its name, ‘Warrani’, is derived from an Aboriginal word for ‘to sing’.

A member of the Australian Labor Party, Wendy Fatin was elected to the House of Representatives in the Australian Parliament as the Member for Canning, Western Australia at the federal election, which was held in 1983. She was the first woman from Western Australia to be elected to the House of Representatives. At the 1984 election, following an electoral redistribution, she won the new seat of Brand, which she held until her retirement in 1996. Her Ministerial appointments included Local Government from 1990-1991 and Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for the Status of Women. In December 1991 she was appointed Minister for the Arts and Territories, remaining in that position until after the 1993 election.

A member of the Australian Labor Party, Jeannette McHugh was elected to the House of Representatives in the Australian Parliament as the Member for Phillip, New South Wales in 1983. When the seat of Phillip was abolished, she was elected to the seat of Grayndler at the 1993 election. She retired at the 1996 election. During her parliamentary career she held the Ministerial portfolio of Consumer Affairs from 1992-1996.

A member of the Australian Labor Party, Carolyn Jakobsen was elected to the seat of Cowan, Western Australia in the House of Representatives of the Australian Parliament in 1984. She held the seat until she was defeated at the 1993 election. In 1990 she was elected chair of the Federal Parliamentary Labor Party (caucus), the first woman to occupy this position.

A member of the Barkandji people, Fiona Bates is an artist, tour guide, and member of the Broken Hill Aboriginal Justice Group.

Pam Lord moved to Thackaringa Station in outback New South Wales with her husband John in 1948. Conducting regular hospital visits since 1965, she has offered more than forty years of continuous service to the Flying Doctors auxiliary in Broken Hill.

Margot White was born and raised in Broken Hill, New South Wales, where she worked as a comptometrist and as a clerk. Margot is a dedicated member of the Broken Hill Family History Group and does other voluntary work in the community.