The Australian Women's Register

In 1972 Pat Eatock became the first Aboriginal to stand for Federal Parliament in the Australian Capital Territory (ACT). She participated in the Aboriginal Embassy and Women’s Liberation in 1972. In 1973 she became the first non-matriculated mature aged student at the Australian National University(ANU), graduating as a Bachelor of Arts in 1977. In 1975 she attended the 1975 Women in Politics Conference and the International Women’s Year World Conference in Mexico City. She has worked as a public servant, university lecturer, and established and managed the Perleeka Aboriginal Television, producing films for community television and training Aboriginal film makers from 1992-96. Pat Eatock passed away on 17 March, 2015 after a long period of ill health.

Gay Davidson was the first female political correspondent for a major newspaper in Australia, the first woman President of the Australian Commonwealth Parliamentary Press Gallery, and a great mentor and friend to a vast array of journalists, not least women taking advantage of the openings to them in that profession during the 1970s and 80s.

The Australian Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies (AIATSIS) was founded in 1961 as the Australian Institute of Aboriginal Studies. The Institute is Australia’s premier institution for information about the cultures and lifestyles of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples. AIATSIS research staff conduct high-quality research and administer research grants. The Institute’s award-winning in-house publisher, Aboriginal Studies Press, publishes an extensive array of books, cassettes and CDs, films and videos, reports, and the Institute’s journal, Australian Aboriginal Studies. The Library holds the world’s most extensive collections of printed, audio, and visual material on Australian Indigenous topics, including the writing of, and oral interviews with, indigenous women.

Marilyn Beaumont was born in Canberra. She trained at the Prince Henry Hospital, Sydney between 1968 and 1971. She came to Adelaide in 1980 and worked in a counselling capacity with the Alcohol and Drug Addiction Treatment Board. In 1981 she became a Liaison Officer for the South Australian Branch of the Royal Australian Nursing Federation and in 1982 she successfully contested an election for Secretary of that association. She later took up the Federal Secretaryship.

The Federal Women’s Committee ( FWC) was established at the inaugural meeting of the Federal Council of the Liberal Party in August 1945. It is the peak body representing women in the Liberal Party and acts as a voice for women in the development of policy and party organisational matters. Its aims are to promote and encourage women to become involved in political life, to contribute effectively to the formulation of policy and to assist the Party in implementing its decisions through effective community interaction.

The National Labor Women’s Network ( NLWN) was established in 1996 and is the peak women’s organisation within the Australian Labor Party. It aims to increase the numbers of women active in the Labor Party at all levels, to facilitate and strengthen relationships between the state Labor women’s organisations and the National Network. Membership is open to all current financial women members of the Australian Labor Party. The National Executive comprises representatives from all states and territories. The current Convenor is Nicola Roxon, Federal Member for Gellibrand, Victoria.

Ann Dalgarno was the only female member of the Australian Capital Territory (ACT) Advisory Council, serving from 1959 to 1967 as a Liberal Member and from 1970 to 1974 as an Independent. She also ran the Nursing Service Agency.

She was a major advocate for Canberra’s women, youth, the physically handicapped, and the disadvantaged. She was an active member or leader of around twenty-two community organisations.

The Ordination of Catholic Women was founded by Zoe Hancock and Marie Louise Uhr in December 1993 to advocate the inclusion of women as ordained priests in the Catholic church. A national organisation, it held its first conference in Canberra in 1994 and its first international conference in 1999. It maintains a national office in Canberra, with regional convenors in the Australian Capital Territory, New South Wales, South Queensland, Tasmania and Victoria and contacts in South Australia, North Queensland and the Northern Territory.

Joy Warren was a tireless fundraiser and patron of the arts in Canberra. She was the owner-director of Solander Gallery since 1974 and ran a public relations business geared towards the arts.

She had been an arts journalist and spent fifteen years with Canberra Repertory Society.

On 26 January 2001 Joy Warren was awarded the Medal of the Order of Australia (OAM) for service to the arts, particularly in the Australian Capital Territory.

The Catholic Women’s League Archdiocese of Canberra and Goulburn was established on 8 November 1945. It began as a small group in St Christopher’s Parish, Canberra to provide hostesses for official parish occasions and to raise money for the church community. It spread later to the city of Goulburn, to town and country centres outside the Archdiocese. Its affiliation with the Federal Council of Catholic Women of Australia in 1953 meant that its agenda broadened from parish affairs to the wider community and to matters of national and global importance to women and their families. It now promotes the intellectual, spiritual, cultural and social welfare of women. It is affiliated with the Catholic Women’s League Australia Inc.

Sylvia Curley qualified as a nurse in 1926 and spent her early years of nursing in country New South Wales. She worked for the Canberra Community Hospital (later known as the Royal Canberra Hospital) from 1938 until her retirement in 1966 as deputy matron. In her ‘retirement’ years she ran a nursing employment agency in Canberra and was a strong advocate for changes to nurses’ education. In 1994 she donated her family home, Mugga Mugga, to the people of Canberra and oversaw its development into an environmental education centre. Sylvia Curley was awarded the Medal of the Order of Australia on 8 June 1992 for her services to nursing, to local history and to the National Trust.

Stasia Dabrowski has voluntarily run a mobile soup kitchen since 1979, providing hot soup, bread, drinks, clothes and blankets to the homeless and needy of Canberra, and is dedicated to the welfare of young people. For nine years she raised the funds herself to purchase ingredients for the soup kitchen.

She was the 1996 Canberra Citizen of the Year, and the 1999 inaugural Australian Capital Territory (ACT) Senior Australian of the Year.

Stasia Dabrowski passed away at the age of 94 in August 2020.

The Catholic Women’s League Australia (CWLA) was established in 1975. It evolved from the Australian Council of Catholic Women, which began in 1928. Its major objectives are to enable women to participate more effectively in working for and building Christianity by promoting the spiritual, cultural, intellectual and social development of women. It aims to foster ecumenism and inter-faith dialogue and provides a national forum for the voice of the Catholic Women’s League Organisations in Australia.

Dianna Lobb, the daughter of Leonard and Violet (née Davidson) Lobb, was educated at Fort Street Girl’s High School, Sydney. In 1978 she became the first woman to review guard at Headquarters 2nd Military District at Victoria Barracks, Sydney. The same year she became commanding officer and chief instructor of the Women’s Royal Australian Army Corps (WRAAC) School, Sydney. On 12 June 1971 Lobb was appointed a Member of the Order of the British Empire.

Jessie Clarke, daughter of Ivy Brookes and grand daughter of Alfred Deakin, trained in social work and was professionally active in the Port Melbourne, Victoria, area. She studied in New York in the 1930s, was a junior delegate to the League of Nations Union in Geneva and an activist on behalf of refugees. She founded the Nappy Wash delivery service in the period after the Second World War.

Stella Swinney completed her Bachelor of Arts at Sydney University and then worked at Farmer & Coy Ltd, Sydney, before joining the Women’s Australian National Services and the Australian Women’s Army Service. After completing a course at the Officers’ Training School she was posted to New South Wales Line of Command Area. Swinney was responsible for training and administration of the Australian Women’s Army Service in New South Wales. She took over from Major Eleanor Manning as Assistant Controller of New South Wales in May 1943.

Dawn Jackson was born in Kent, England, the daughter of Major-General R E Jackson CMG, DSO. Educated at St Catherine’s Church of England Girls School, Sydney, she served with the Voluntary Aid Detachment and subsequently with the Australian Army Women’s Medical Service. She was a member of the Australian Imperial Forces from 1941 to 1947 and saw service in the Middle East and New Guinea. Colonel Jackson was associated with the combined training of the Army Women’s Services Training Company and the Army Women’s Services Officers School.

On 2 December 1957 Dawn Jackson was appointed the second Director of the Women’s Royal Australian Army Corps, a post she held until February 1972.

Dawn Jackson was appointed to The Order of the British Empire – Officer (Military) on 11 June 1960 for her services to the Women’s Royal Australian Army Corps.

Colonel Dawn Jackson died on 20 January 1995 in Canberra.

Audrey Cahn was the first woman to complete the newly established agriculture degree at the University of Melbourne in 1928. Born to parents who were influential scientists themselves, she developed a life long interest in the field of nutritional science and went on to pioneer the academic field of dietetics. Regarded in the 1950s and 60s as a ‘soft science’ by the then university’s head of biochemistry, Victor Trikojus, Cahn fought a long battle for respect, one in which she was eventually supported by major funding bodies such as Nicholas Pty Ltd (Aspro).

Her research output in the field of nutritional biochemistry is well respected. Some of her studies undertaken during her time at the University of Melbourne (1947-68) included examining the physical properties and energy value of common dietary foods, so that she could compile calorie tables. She was an early proponent of the need to reduce fat intake and to substitute polyunsaturated fatty acids for saturated fats. With colleagues in the anatomy department, she participated in a 17-year longitudinal study of “Child Growth in Melbourne (1954-71)”. The study was compared with similar studies in the United States and Britain and found that Australian children were overweight and inactive compared with their peers elsewhere.

Cahn enjoyed a very long life, thanks, she said, to a combination of good luck and good genes.

Nancy Burbidge worked at the CSIRO between 1946-1973, rising from systematic botanist to Curator of the Herbarium. From 1973 to 1977 she was scientific leader of the Flora of Australia project. Burbidge published several books on Australian plants.

An amphitheatre located in the eucalypt lawn was erected as a memorial to Dr Burbidge’s contribution to Australian botany.

The federal government replaced the National Women’s Advisory Council with the National Women’s Consultative Council in 1984. The NWCC produced its last report in December 1992 and in late 1993 it was replaced by the Australian Council for Women.

The National Women’s Round Table is an annual meeting convened by the Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for the Status of Women. The Round Table was first held in 1994. It replaced the National Women’s Consultative Council as the primary direct mechanism for women’s input into government. For the first three years, the Round Table was held twice each year for one day, with just over 50 organisations represented. Meetings were held in Parliament House during sitting weeks to facilitate participants’ access to Parliamentarians.

In 1997, the Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for the Status of Women, Jocelyn Newman, changed the arrangements to two day meetings, once each year.

Sources: http://www.capow.org.au/AWOC/story.htm and http://www.nwjc.org.au/pamelaslist.htm

AWOC is a conference for representatives of Australian women’s organisations. It replaced the traditional ‘Pre-Round Tables’ which were generally held on the days preceding the National Women’s Round Table (NWRT). It brings the input of organisations not participating in the NWRT to that forum.

The inaugural AWOC was organised by the National Women’s Justice Coalition, the Nursing Mothers’ Association of Australia, Women’s Electoral Lobby Australia and the YWCA, with program input from representatives of national women’s organisations on Pamela’s List.

Sources: http://www.nwjc.org.au/pamelaslist.htm and http://www.capow.org.au/AWOC/story.htm

The Office for Women (previously the Office of the Status of Women) works to mainstream women’s issues in Australian society and internationally. Its work with governments, the women’s sector, and the broader community is focused on three priority areas:

• Reducing violence against women
• Women’s equal place in society
• Economic Independence.

CAPOW! is a networking coalition for women’s non-government organisations (NGOs) in Australia Since its foundation in 1992 at a WEL national conference CAPOW! has played a major role in developing cooperative ventures and mechanisms across the women’s movement. It held twice-yearly face-to-face meetings for this purpose.

CAPOW! helped coordinate NGO forums to facilitate submissions to the federal government and the United Nations World Conference on Women in Beijing, (September 1995). It has since worked to follow up the commitments made by the Government and NGOs at Beijing, and continues to encourage women’s’ NGOs to make submissions to the government.

By 1996 the CAPOW network linked more than sixty national women’s organisations and served to improve information flow and coordination of advocacy in international as well as domestic spheres.

Formed under the leadership of Sara Dowse, the Office of Women’s Affairs (OWA) was the bureaucratic support unit of the women’s adviser to the Prime Minister, a position created in 1973 under the Whitlam Labour government. OWA became the state apparatus through which many Australian feminists worked to achieve measures of women’s advancement in equal employment opportunity, legislation and law reform, health funding, refuges, childcare, arts and sport, media representations and school curricula.
The OWA played an important role in securing government funding for women’s services. The Office was originally located in the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet. However, in 1977, under the Fraser Liberal government, bureaucrats announced the Office was to move to the Department of Home Affairs, representing a significant loss of status given Home Affairs was ranked 26th out of 27 ministries in seniority. Dowse resigned over this move, having always argued for the importance of having the Office located in the chief policy-making agency of the government (Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet). The Office (by then called the Office of the Status of Women) was restored to the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet in 1983 when Labour returned to office; prominent feminist academic Anne Summers was then appointed its head.

Sources: Sawer, M. 1996 and Caine, B. 1998