Women lost to history celebrated

AN exhibition at Federation University’s SMB Campus’ Tippet Library is focusing on the achievements of girls and women who studied and worked at the university.

Trailblazing Women of Ballarat is open now and celebrates the women who have followed the footsteps of Bella Guerin, who was the first women to graduate university in Australia in 1883.

Women recognised in the exhibition include the head of the dressmaking department from 1945 to 1960 Sylvia Williams, pioneer photographer Effie Baker, and a craft teacher and conserver of the Eureka Flag Val D’Angri.

“We wanted to highlight some of the great women who have made achievements that have worked at Federation University or the organisations beforehand,” said Clare Gervasoni, co-curator of the exhibition.

“The opportunities for women back in history weren’t great as they were expected to be home with children, so they weren’t really in positions of power.”

The first female Premier of Victoria Joan Kirner, who was known as Joan Hood during her time as a teacher at the Ballarat Girls’ Technical College is also recognised in the exhibition.

“Someone asked some questions of her husband after she died and my memory of that conversation is that Joan thought they should have a magazine for the girls’ school,” said Ms Gervasoni.

“The thought was, why would you ever have a student magazine for girls? But Joan wanted a magazine and she got one.”

Ms Kirner was the Premier from 1990 to 1992 and introduced the Victorian Certificate of Education.

One of the reasons women’s histories can be hard to follow is because traditionally, when women married, they changed their names.

“You lost your own name back in those days so it’s really hard to determine who someone is,” said Ms Gervasoni.

“When we think about great women, we don’t necessarily have any evidence of them or any items.

“The really interesting thing is when you go looking for them, they are not well identified because in the collection when I put women in, we get about 300 results when we have about 10,000 items.”

If anyone in the community knows any trailblazing women which were missed, Ms Gervasoni welcomes suggestions for future exhibitions.

Trailblazing Women of Ballarat is open until Friday 13 October, enter through the jail gates at the SMB campus.