Our usual September regeneration of the site has added another 22,000 words of text, and hundreds of new images, links, entities and more. This rebuild takes the total number of words in Dictionary entries over the magic million mark, (although if you count captions, descriptions and other paratext, we’ve been over a million for quite some time).
The entries are, as usual, a mixed bag.
Nouvelle-Hollande, Nouvelle-Galles du Sud. Grottes, chasse et peche des sauvages du Port Jackson c1800, courtesy Dixson Library, State Library of NSW Q8282/41, 11 / a1477011
We have a major long essay on the Archaeological evidence of Aboriginal life in Sydney, by Val Attenbrow of the Australian Museum, lavishly illustrated. It’s a fascinating account of what is known of the lives of people in the Sydney region before Europeans arrived.
New people in the Dictionary range from the eminent to the forgotten: three of them are part of our joint project with the Sydney Mechanics’ School of Arts.
Peter Nicol Russell – pioneering engineer and manufacturer who endowed the School of Engineering at the University of Sydney.
George Kenyon Holden – lawyer and parliamentarian who reformed land title in NSW.
Elizabeth Kata, from The Australian Women's Weekly, 2 December 1964 p67 via Trove http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article48209664
We also have entries profiling
Walter Renny – oil and colour man, who was mayor of Sydney in 1869-70
Elizabeth Kata – the writer of the book upon which the film 'A Patch of Blue' was based, whose family was divided by World War II and its aftermath
John Lucas – son of convicts who became a parliamentarian and the protector of Jenolan Caves
As our final entry added this time, a piece of family history goes into the Dictionary in the form of Julie Watt’s article on the German vinedressers brought to Camden by Edward Macarthur in the 1830s.
As always, you’ll see a lot of other things added too – new connections, more images and a whole lot of material newly indexed by Subject.
It's always a pleasure announcing the new material on the website, because our authors have put so much work into it, and so have we. I hope you enjoy looking around and finding some new connections for yourself.
