Here we keep track of the many initiatives commemorating the centenary of World War I, particularly the centenary of the landing at Gallipoli in 1915 – the centenary of Anzac. (Most recent updates.) We are particularly interested in what is…
Centenary Watch September-November 2018
Update 28 September 2018: Centenary Watch out; Minister Chester stays in place; Director Nelson makes some speeches; buy a piece of the famous MV Krait; Anzac Bears in schools; poppies and a beam of light Centenary Watch out As we approach…
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Stephens, David: Australian War Memorial consults the public on mooted massive extensions: is anything ‘sacred’?
David Stephens* ‘Australian War Memorial consults the public on mooted massive extensions: is anything “sacred”?’, Honest History, 3 August 2018 updated The Australian War Memorial has been talking for more than a year about its desire to extend its building…
Avoiding entertainment and including a warning to youngsters, the War Memorial does the Battle of Hamel all over again – virtually and immersively
Update 3 July 2018: I saw the Hamel show today and was pleasantly surprised. Despite some moderately lurid advertising, this is a sober presentation. It offers a brief outline of World War I, a summary of General Monash’s plans, and…
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Stephens, David: ‘Same old, same old’ and asking the big questions: two contrasting approaches to war and the future
David Stephens ‘”Same old, same old” and asking the big questions: two contrasting approaches to war and the future’, Honest History, 20 June 2018 Armistice Centenary Grants Program Sometimes serendipity plays into the hands of bloggers. Such is the case…
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Centenary Watch June-July 2018
Update 4 August 2018: War Memorial consultations on its proposed extensions: ‘Look on my Works’ The Memorial announces consultations; Honest History puts some questions. Shelley’s ‘Ozymandias’, a pithy comment on the urge to leave a legacy in stone. Update 28…
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Budget summary: Anzac centenary winds down, War Memorial digitisation gets thumbs up, Captain Cook rewarmed, non-MSM comments
Honest History has done some work on past Budgets, tracking the Commonwealth spend on Anzac centenary commemoration (which had reached $342 million spent by June last year, plus another $260 million or so by the States and Territories and corporate…
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Some schadenfreude about Picardy (une joie malicieuse à propos de Picardie)
We thought this little story deserved a multilingual headline. Close followers of the Anzac season will have caught up with the despatches about the error-ridden Villers-Bretonneux piece in some Fairfax papers by veteran ‘storian Jonathan King. The article has now…
Nine alternative views for Anzac Day – including Lisa Barritt-Eyles on how Lake Macquarie tackled the Frontier Wars
Rather than keep up with the flood of formulaic Anzac Day stories, we collected these few, some of them from our associates, all of them, to varying degrees, coming at ‘the One Day of the Year’ from different angles. (There…
Broinowski, Alison: Anzackery and the preening peloton
Alison Broinowski ‘Anzackery and the preening peloton‘, Pearls and Irritations, 24 April 2018 Honest History vice president weaves together Australian Defence Force duchessing of politicians, MSM Anzac cliches, critiques of Anzackery, culminating in praise for Richard Flanagan’s recent NPC speech.
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Brooker, Ben: 100 years of Anzac: ludicrous spending for nationalist validation
Ben Brooker ‘100 years of Anzac: ludicrous spending for nationalist validation‘, Overland, 24 April 2018 updated Sets the Monash Centre at Villers-Bretonneux against the broader context of commemorative spending, quoting Honest History estimates. Sharp points on opportunity cost and musing…
Hamilton, Andrew: Remembering shared humanity on Anzac Day
Andrew Hamilton ‘Remembering shared humanity on Anzac Day’, Eureka Street, 22 April 2018 [Politicians have] spent heavily on facilities for remembering the war, focused on the site of the battle rather than on the hometowns of those who grieve, and…
Changing the guard at Veterans’ Affairs: Liz Cosson is new Secretary as Simon Lewis retires
Simon Lewis PSM is to retire on 18 May as Secretary of the Department of Veterans’ Affairs. Thanking Mr Lewis for his work, Prime Minister Turnbull referred particularly to his management of the Anzac centenary over the last four years.…
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Centenary Watch April-May 2018
Update 11 May 2018: Budget summary, including Anzac centenary winds down, War Memorial digitisation gets thumbs up A brief round-up, also including a look at Captain Cook in memoriam, plus non-MSM takes on the Budget. With some relevant cross-references. Update…
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Australian War Memorial Fellow Dr Chau Chak Wing has cameo role in Clive Hamilton book on Chinese influence in Australia
Update 26 May 2018: David Wroe and Sally White in Fairfax with some reaction from the Memorial’s Dr Nelson, who says the Memorial will not be giving Dr Chau’s money back. Update 25 May 2018: Sally Whyte in Fairfax goes…
New Deputy PM’s workload raises questions about treatment of Veterans’ Affairs, Centenary of Anzac and Defence Personnel: new Ministry list
Update 5 March 2018: new Ministry List released. Update 1 March 2018: Sorted. McCormack’s former jobs (and the ticket for Villers-Bretonneux in April) passed to Chester. Update 28 February 2018: Reports (for example, this one) circulating of a reshuffle of…
Bombing of Darwin 76 years on: Territory tourism to have even stronger khaki tinge (but focus is still too narrow)
Minister for Veterans’ Affairs pro tem* Michael McCormack reminds us that today marks the 76th anniversary of the bombing of Darwin in February 1942. Around 400 people were killed in Darwin and in later raids on other northern towns. SS…
Centenary Watch February-March 2018
Update 29 March 2018: Commemorative dates for the rest of the year Minister Chester’s presser on important dates for the rest of the year, including the opening of the Monash Interpretive Centre on 24 April. ‘As the last year of…
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Grishin, Sasha: Arthur Streeton: The art of war at the National Gallery of Australia combines beauty and barbarity
Sasha Grishin ‘Arthur Streeton: The art of war at the National Gallery of Australia combines beauty and barbarity’, Canberra Times, 10 January 2018 Review of an exhibition at the National Gallery, Canberra, until 29 April, just after Anzac Day. Reminds…
Dan Tehan promoted to Minister for Social Services; Michael McCormack is new man at Veterans’ Affairs-Centenary of Anzac
Minister Tehan (Twitter) The Honourable Dan Tehan, formerly Minister for Veterans’ Affairs, Minister for Defence Personnel, and Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for the Centenary of Anzac, and for Cyber Security, has been promoted to the job of Minister for…
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Divided sunburnt country: Australia 1916-18 (32): Alfred Deakin in retirement supports conscription
‘Divided sunburnt country: Australia 1916-18 (32): Alfred Deakin in retirement supports conscription’, Honest History, 19 December 2017 The ‘Divided sunburnt country’ series Deakin in his prime (Wikipedia) By the end of 1917, former prime minister Alfred Deakin had been out…
UPDATE: Dr Nelson reappointed to Australian War Memorial Director’s position
Update 15 August 2019: After a further reappointment, Dr Nelson’s final term expired on 31 December 2019. Update 30 January 2018: Dr Nelson’s new term expires on 30 May 2019. Update 31 December 2017: outgoing Minister Tehan announced the reappointment…
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Divided sunburnt country: Australia 1916-18 (31): Returned soldiers speak out against conscription
Divided sunburnt country: Australia 1916-18 (31): Returned soldiers speak out against conscription’, Honest History, 6 December 2017 The ‘Divided sunburnt country’ series The newspaper, the Woman Voter, run by Vida Goldstein, Cecilia John and other radical women, was often a…
Newton, Douglas: First World War centenaries that really matter are looming
Douglas Newton ‘First World War Centenaries that really matter are looming‘, Pearls and Irritations, 30 November 2017 Centenary moments of huge significance are upon us: the centenary of the so-called “Lansdowne Peace Letter” of 29 November 1917, and the centenary…
Stephens, David: The Australian War Memorial is still doing well out of arms manufacturers – how well, we don’t quite know
David Stephens* ‘The Australian War Memorial is still doing well out of arms manufacturers – how well, we don’t quite know’, Honest History, 30 November 2017 updated Update 13 September 2018: Senate Estimates information provides a partial update, showing $1.3…
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Centenary Watch December 2017-January 2018
Update 10 January 2017: Arthur Streeton: The art of war at the National Gallery of Australia combines beauty and barbarity Sasha Grishin’s Canberra Times review of an unconventional war artist, Arthur Streeton, on show at the National Gallery till after…
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Stephens, David: Faulty abacus? DVA and the cost of commemoration
David Stephens ‘Faulty abacus? DVA and the cost of commemoration’, Honest History, 30 November 2017 The Department of Veterans’ Affairs, working through the French government tourist bureau, Atout, recently squired a couple of Australian-based journalists around the battlefields of the…
Divided sunburnt country: Australia 1916-18 (30): Officially sponsored 2017 view of the conscription battles of 1916-17
‘Divided sunburnt country: Australia 1916-18 (30): Officially sponsored 2017 view of the conscription battles of 1916-17’, Honest History, 20 November 2017 The ‘Divided sunburnt country’ series Some Fairfax papers today carry an article by Michael Grealy on the conscription referendums…
Four late offerings for Remembrance Day: what should we remember really?
We have already posted some material relevant to 11 November, Remembrance Day, the 99th of that designation. That little collection links to the other posts. There’s also Simon Jenkins from The Guardian, who says ‘enough already’ of Remembrance Day. Two…
Winging it with Dr Chau: Clive Hamilton’s suppressed book has more about the War Memorial’s Fellow
Update 26 February 2018: the book has been published by Hardie Grant. Update 1 March 2018: Our take on the Dr Chau angle. Update 1 December 2017: Dr Chau hosts a policy conference in China, where speakers include President Xi.…
Beyond the poppies row on row: Remembrance Day is a good day to think
Remembrance Day (Armistice Day, if you prefer) – like Anzac Day, Christmas, Easter, Passover, Ramadan, Diwali, Melbourne Cup Day, and other regular ceremonial and commemorative occasions – triggers virtually automatic reactions among many of us. Poppies, stories of old Diggers,…
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Down the Remembrance Trail to Villers-Bretonneux with the (fairly self-effacing – so far) DVA publicity machine
Readers of the Launceston Examiner, North-west Tasmania Advocate and Canberra Times earlier this week will have seen some articles under the byline of Michael Grealy. The articles in the Canberra Times were headed ‘New tribute to Diggers in Europe’, ‘“Mad…
Centenary Watch October-November 2017
Update 20 November 2017: Officially sponsored 2017 view of the conscription battles of 1916-17 The Department of Veterans’ Affairs-Fairfax ‘contributed content’ partnership has produced a sober and balanced short article on the conscription plebiscites of 1916-17. Can it last? Update…
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War Memorial Director Brendan Nelson at the Press Club: speech or performance art? Centenary Watch update
David Stephens of Honest History analyses last week’s National Press Club address by the Director of the Australian War Memorial, Dr Brendan Nelson. The speech was called ‘Tragedy and triumph – 1917’ and looked at Passchendaele and Beersheba, two key…
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Centenary Watch September-October 2017
Update 28 September 2017 updated: War Memorial Director Brendan Nelson at the Press Club: speech or performance art? Polygon Wood ‘remembered’ We said (21 September, below) we would look more closely at Dr Nelson’s 19 September National Press Club speech…
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Better late than never: Minister says best form of commemoration is to look after today’s veterans and families
Update later 15 August 2017: Minister welcomes report of the Senate References Committee into suicide by veterans and ex-service personnel. (The report is here.) SBS Insight program ‘Coming Home’ on issues faced by ADF personnel coming back into the civilian…
Stanley, Peter, ed.: Charles Bean: Man, Myth, Legacy
Peter Stanley, ed. Charles Bean: Man, Myth, Legacy, UNSW Press, Canberra, 2017 Proceedings of a 2016 conference at UNSW Canberra. Australia’s official war correspondent during WWI, Charles Bean was also Australia’s first official war historian and the driving force behind…
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From the Honest History archives: Lest We Forget Hiroshima 72 years ago this week
Repost from last year. Why? Well, we faithfully and annually commemorate wartime events involving Australians. Some of these events are relatively insignificant, even trivial, in the scheme of things or when compared with other wartime events. It seems only right…
Minister says stand-alone DVA will continue – but here’s some advice, just in case
We don’t quite know why he felt the need but Minister for Veterans’ Affairs, Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for the Centenary of Anzac, Minister for Defence Personnel, and Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for Cyber Security [pause for breath],…
Newton, Douglas: The centenary of the Third Battle of Ypres
Douglas Newton ‘The centenary of the Third Battle of Ypres‘, Pearls and Interpretations, 3 August 2017 The carnage at Ypres and Passchendaele is ‘an object lesson in what happens when an Australian government allows our Allies to dominate in the…
Lockhart, Greg: What were we fighting for at Gallipoli, in Palestine and on the Western Front?
Greg Lockhart ‘What were we fighting for at Gallipoli, in Palestine and on the Western Front?’ (Part 1; Part 2; Part 3; Part 4; Part 5), Pearls and Irritations, 24-28 July 2017 updated Update 15 August 2017: Lockhart’s further thoughts,…
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Dark irony and dishonesty of Dunkirk: misrepresentations, exaggerations, and clunky bits
‘Dark irony and dishonesty of Dunkirk: misrepresentations, exaggerations, and clunky bits’, Honest History, 1 August 2017 Peter Stanley* reviews Dunkirk Just as Theresa May’s government writhes over the implications of Brexit, there is a dark irony in the appearance of…
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Nolan, Christopher (dir.): Dunkirk
Christopher Nolan Dunkirk, Syncopy, Warner Brothers and others, UK, US, France, Netherlands, 2017 Set during the Second World War, [the film, with an ensemble cast] portrays the Dunkirk evacuation … Nolan wrote the script, told from three perspectives—the land, sea, and air—to contain…
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Centenary Watch July-August 2017
Update 15 August 2017: Better late than never: Minister says best form of commemoration is to look after today’s veterans and families Comment on the inaugural Ministerial Statement on Veterans and their Families, pointing to the Minister’s creative accounting, which…
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Menadue, John: By accepting funding from weapons suppliers the Australian War Memorial demeans Australia’s war dead
John Menadue ‘By accepting funding from weapons suppliers the Australian War Memorial demeans Australia’s war dead‘, Pearls and Irritations, 30 June 2017 John Menadue, former senior public servant and businessman, wrote to Brendan Nelson, Director of the War Memorial, to…
Stephens, David: Now that the Ataturk Memorial at Gallipoli is being restored … some options for President Erdogan to consider
David Stephens ‘Now that the Atatürk Memorial at Gallipoli is being restored … some options for President Erdoğan to consider’, Honest History, 18 June 2017 updated Update 13 July 2017: interesting questions posed (in Turkish) by veteran Gallipoli tour guide,…
Turkish Gallipoli memorials refurbishment takes out Ataturk’s apocryphal ‘Those heroes’ words – for now at least
Update 18 June 2017: our considered view on all of this, including three options for what to do next – addressed to President Erdogan. Update 18 June 2017: Yahoo 7; Courier Mail; Stuff Co NZ; Daily Mail; News Limited; West…
Honest History: Second edition of Honest History’s Alternative Guide to the Australian War Memorial
Honest History ‘Second edition of Honest History’s Alternative Guide to the Australian War Memorial‘, Honest History, 13 June 2017 updated Update 1 October 2017: the For Country, For Nation exhibition (discussed in the Alternative Guide) closed in Canberra in September…
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Centenary Watch June-July 2017
Update 5 July 2017: Enlistment news from a century ago: Australians prefer not to be there We run this graph from time to time (courtesy of Joan Beaumont, Broken Nation, where the original graph and Ernest Scott’s figures appear in…
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Werskey, Gary: The Anzac Christmas card
Gary Werskey ‘The Anzac Christmas card‘, Honest History, 22 May 2017 Tells the story of the Anzac Christmas card of 1915, produced under the direction of Lady Birdwood, wife of General Birdwood, and illustrated by the Australian artist AH Fullwood,…
Gallagher, Emily: The first war for country, for nation
Emily Gallagher ‘The first war for country, for nation‘, Inside Story, 18 May 2017 A review of the For Country, For Nation exhibition at the Australian War Memorial. Another review, by David Stephens for Honest History, is here and should…
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Budget provisions on commemoration, Veterans’ Affairs, more space at the War Memorial, cultural institutions – and a machinery of government proposal
Update 12 May 2017: For a non-mainstream media view of the overall Budget, see the articles by Michael Keating, former Secretary of the Departments of Finance and Prime Minister and Cabinet, in Pearls and Irritations. Part 1, Part 2. There’s…
ABC Q&A comments by Minister Tehan and others show how far past Peak Anzac we have come
The ABC’s Q&A program last night (video; transcript; Twitter; ABC story) tackled a number of questions with compere Virginia Trioli and panellists including Dan Tehan, Minister for a number of things including the Centenary of Anzac and Veterans’ Affairs. Honest…
Centenary Watch May-June 2017
Update 22 May 2017: The Anzac Christmas card Gary Werskey on the project run by Lady Birdwood and the artist AH Fulwood to produce 50 000 Christmas cards for Anzac troops to send home in 1915. Update 20 May 2017:…
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Bond, Catherine: Anzac: The Landing, The Legend, The Law
Catherine Bond Anzac: The Landing, The Legend, The Law, Australian Scholarly Publishing, Melbourne, 2017 The year 2016 marks an ‘Anzac’ anniversary of a different kind: the centenary of legal regulation over use of the term ‘Anzac’ in Australia and internationally.…
Piggott, Michael: Indigenous war service: two exhibitions at the National Archives of Australia
Michael Piggott ‘Indigenous war service: two exhibitions at the National Archives of Australia’, Honest History, 2 May 2017 A review of two exhibitions, Indigenous Australians at War from the Boer War to the Present (touring from the Shrine of Remembrance,…
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Stephens, David: ‘Afghanistan: The Australian Story shows war is about much more than “love and friendship”
David Stephens ‘Afghanistan: The Australian Story shows war is about much more than “love and friendship”’, Honest History, 2 May 2017 A review of Chris Masters’ double DVD for the Australian War Memorial. (Trailer; ABC story.) The DVDs contain footage…
Afghanistan: The Australian Story shows war is about much more than “love and friendship”
David Stephens ‘Afghanistan: The Australian Story shows war is about much more than “love and friendship”’, Honest History, 2 May 2017 Serendipity can be illuminating. This reviewer began to watch Chris Masters’ double DVD, Afghanistan: The Australian Story, on the…
Angry Anzac Day 2017: three pieces from Guardian Australia: get those responses rolling in
Update 1 October 2017: Autobiographical piece from Yassmin Abdel-Magied covers the Anzac fuss. Update 18 August 2017: Yassmin Abdel-Magied talks about being Australia’s most publicly hated Muslim. Update 7 August 2017: Yassmin Abdel-Magied wonders where the free speech defenders were…
On every Anzac Day: a rapid round-up of reports before rumbling on to the next ridge
Related material: earlier; later. *** Two years ago, media academic Sharon Mascall-Dare wrote about how journalists every year slip into a standard Anzac Day reporting mode. Look for an old Digger, some attractive young kiddies waving flags, and someone crying,…
The full set: seven pieces of non-mainstream, non-marked up, non-profit commentary for Anzac Day
Related material: later; later still. *** Updated with a few more on Anzac Day itself This Anzac season, as in a number of previous years, Australian children – and possibly some adults, too – can pick up some Anzac mementoes…
Wearing three hats, an interesting collection of pressers from Minister Tehan
The member for Wannon, Dan Tehan, is minister for a number of things, although we mostly track his activities as Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for the Centenary of Anzac. A clutch of media releases from the Minister this week…
Stephens, David: Allusions in Beanland: two exhibitions at the Australian War Memorial
David Stephens ‘Allusions in Beanland: two exhibitions at the Australian War Memorial‘, Honest History, 21 March 2017 updated This is a combined review of For Country, for Nation, about Indigenous service in defence of Australia, and A Home on a…
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Phillips, Walter: My late pilgrimage to Gallipoli
Walter Phillips ‘My late pilgrimage to Gallipoli‘, Honest History, 21 March 2017 Honest History is pleased to publish this piece from Walter Phillips, Emeritus Scholar at La Trobe University, Melbourne. It is comparable with the elegaic Anzac commemoration pieces from…
Allusions in Beanland: two exhibitions at the Australian War Memorial
David Stephens ‘Allusions in Beanland: two exhibitions at the Australian War Memorial’, Honest History, 21 March 2017 In September 2016, the War Memorial opened For Country, for Nation, an exhibition about Indigenous service in Australian defence forces from the Boer…
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My late pilgrimage to Gallipoli
Walter Phillips* ‘My late pilgrimage to Gallipoli’, Honest History, 21 March 2017 Since my childhood I have been aware of a connection with Gallipoli. This was largely because my father fought there and bore the marks of war in his…
Centenary Watch March-April 2017
Update 27 April 2017: Angry Anzac Day 2017: three pieces from Guardian Australia: get those responses rolling in Articles in Guardian Australia by Honest History’s David Stephens, Mariam Tokhi of Muslims for Progressive Values Australia, and Guardian Australia‘s Brigid Delaney,…
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The bombing of Darwin, 75 years on: some alternative views
Honest History has been interested in the bombing of Darwin almost since we began the website, though our interest has extended to aspects that are not likely to be front and centre this week during the 75th anniversary events. Obviously,…
The Fall of Singapore, 75 years on: some alternative views
Update 20 February 2017: The Strategist has three articles on the Fall of Singapore, from James Goldrick, Joan Beaumont and Hugh White. On Wednesday in Ballarat, Minister Tehan will attend a national service in Ballarat to commemorate the 75th anniversary…
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Stephens, David: Cooking the (visitors) books: the Australian War Memorial struggles with statistics – again
David Stephens ‘Cooking the (visitors) books: the Australian War Memorial struggles with statistics – again’, Honest History, 7 February 2017 The article looks at the statistics in the Memorial’s Annual Report 2015-16 for real (flesh-and-blood) visitors to the Memorial and…
Crotty, Martin: In their footsteps? Anzac fun runs and the consumption of the past
Martin Crotty ‘In their footsteps? Anzac fun runs and the consumption of the past’, Honest History, 7 February 2017 The author, a fun runner, describes some Anzac-themed running events and what they say about the current desire of some of…
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Centenary Watch February-March 2017
Update 16 February 2017: The bombing of Darwin, 75 years on: some alternative views A brief reading guide, showing how commemoration of this event could just as easily be filed under ‘tourism bonanza’ as under ‘Lest We Forget’. The post…
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Stanley, Peter: Review of The Holocaust: Witnesses and Survivors at the Australian War Memorial
Peter Stanley* ‘Review of The Holocaust: Witnesses and Survivors at the Australian War Memorial’, Honest History, 13 December 2016 updated Update 26 February 2020: expanded exhibition opened by the Treasurer. Update 29 April 2019: speech by War Memorial Director Nelson…
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Centenary Watch December 2016-January 2017
Update 13 December 2016: Peak Anzac passes as ministers come and go; elsewhere in this edition Peak Anzac passes as ministers come and go We have forgotten who coined the term ‘Peak Anzac’, but we know what it means: the…
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Shield, John: Top End Anzackery: an illustrated review note (featuring a mouse who flys a Spitfire)
Shield, John* ‘Top End Anzackery: an illustrated review note (featuring a mouse who flies a Spitfire)’, Honest History, 22 November 2016 Re-enactment, 74th anniversary of Darwin bombings, 2016 (Defence department) In 2012, the 70th Anniversary of the Bombing of Darwin…
Frances, Raelene & Bruce Scates, ed.: Beyond Gallipoli: New Perspectives on Anzac
Frances, Raelene & Bruce Scates, ed. Beyond Gallipoli: New Perspectives on Anzac, Monash University Publishing, Melbourne, 2016 Much of the scholarship on the Great War, and especially the Dardanelles/Çanakkale campaign, has been viewed through a narrow national prism and focused…
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Stanley, Peter: AWM sixtieth anniversary: the Memorial and its people
Stanley, Peter ‘AWM sixtieth anniversary: the Memorial and its people, 11 November 2001‘, Australian War Memorial Today, Peter Stanley is Associate Director of the School of Humanities and Social Sciences at the University of New South Wales Canberra, as well…
The Australian War Memorial is opened, 11 November 1941
The Australian War Memorial was opened 75 years ago today. The Australian War Memorial at Canberra, symbol of a young nation’s courage and sacrifice, was officially opened yesterday [began the report in the Canberra Times]. The impressive service of tribute…
Two years of commentary on the Australian War Memorial: from the Honest History archives
Rationale Critiquing the Anzac-centred received view of Australian history necessarily involves forensic examination of the work of our premier commemorative institution, the Australian War Memorial. The Memorial – rather surprisingly, in view of its interest in warlike matters – has…
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Australian War Memorial Annual Report, another new exhibition and Story Time
The Australian War Memorial’s Annual Report 2015-16 is now available on the Memorial’s website. From our quick look the Memorial’s overall visitor numbers seem much the same as last year though there are the usual quirks in measurement which mean…
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Veterans’ Affairs team visits Estimates Committee for another round
Last week, the Senate Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade Committee hosted a phalanx of officers from the Defence portfolio which included, as usual, a team from the Department of Veterans’ Affairs and a smaller team from the Australian War Memorial.…
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Stephens, David: Turks did the heavy lifting: a longer look at the building of the Atatürk Memorial in Anzac Parade, Canberra, 1984-85: Part II
David Stephens ‘Turks did the heavy lifting: a longer look at the building of the Atatürk Memorial in Anzac Parade, Canberra, 1984-85: Part II’, Honest History, 25 October 2016 updated This is a revised and extended version of an article…
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Conscription plebiscite centenary in Sydney, Melbourne and Canberra
Those who follow only the official Great War centenary bandwagon may not be keeping up with commemoration of events on the home front. Next Friday, 28 October, is the centenary of the first conscription referendum (technically a plebiscite) and events…
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Stephens, David: ‘Awkward humility’: The speeches of the Hon. Dr Brendan Nelson AO: Part II: Long bows, Holly Golightly and political baseball bats
Stephens, David ‘“Awkward humility”: The speeches of the Hon. Dr Brendan Nelson AO: Part II: Long bows, Holly Golightly and political baseball bats‘, Honest History, 20 October 2016 This article continues our analysis of ten of Dr Nelson’s speeches from…
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‘Awkward humility’: The speeches of the Hon. Dr Brendan Nelson AO: Part II: Long bows, Holly Golightly and political baseball bats
David Stephens ‘“Awkward humility”: The speeches of the Hon. Dr Brendan Nelson AO: Part II: Long bows, Holly Golightly and political baseball bats’, Honest History, 20 October 2016 updated In our previous article we looked at the structure, themes and…
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‘Awkward humility’: The speeches of the Hon Brendan Nelson AO: Part I: Thrice more with feeling
David Stephens ‘“Awkward humility”: The speeches of the Hon. Dr Brendan Nelson AO: Part I: Thrice more with feeling’, Honest History, 11 October 2016 The received Australian view of war can be encapsulated in phrases like ‘Lest we forget’, ‘the…
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Stephens, David: Turks did the heavy lifting: a longer look at the story of the Ataturk Memorial, Canberra, 1984-85: Part I
David Stephens ‘Turks did the heavy lifting: a longer look at the story of the Atatürk Memorial, Canberra, 1984-85: Part I’, Honest History, 11 October 2016 updated This material revises and extends an article published in April 2016 and based…
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Stephens, David: ‘Awkward humility’: The speeches of the Hon Brendan Nelson, AO: Part I: Thrice more with feeling
Stephens, David ‘” Awkward humility”: The speeches of the Hon Brendan Nelson AO: Part I: Thrice more with feeling‘, Honest History, 11 October 2016 The article analyses ten speeches from 2007 to 2016 regarding their structure, recurring themes and sets…
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Centenary Watch updates October-December 2016
[Links checked 17 November 2017 and all found to be live. Honest History may be able to help users track down resources where a link is broken. Please contact admin@honesthistory.net.au. HH] Update 2 December 2016: Holocaust exhibition at War Memorial…
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Centenary Watch updates September-October 2016
[Links checked 17 November 2017 and all found to be live. Honest History may be able to help users track down resources where a link is broken. Please contact admin@honesthistory.net.au. HH] Updates 30 August 2016: Minister Tehan back in harness;…
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Australia’s Vietnam War – and keeping it in context: Honest History series
‘Australia’s Vietnam War – and keeping it in context: an Honest History series’, Honest History, 15 August 2016 updated UPDATE 11.45 am FRIDAY: Still difficulties with access. UPDATE 6.00 AM THURSDAY: Restricted access to be allowed. STOP PRESS: Cancellation of…
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Lamperd, Ruth: Families speak about military loved ones lost and how we failed them
Lamperd, Ruth ‘Families speak about military loved ones lost and how we failed them‘, Sunday Herald-Sun, 13 August 2016 The story reveals 41 military personnel and veterans died this year from suicide, the same as the number of Australians who…
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Horrocks, Lucinda: Memories of war: A film and research project in Ballarat
Horrocks, Lucinda ‘Memories of war: A film and research project in Ballarat‘, Honest History, 8 August 2016 Hearing about this Ballarat project, Honest History agreed with producer Lucinda Horrocks that she should describe what the project set out to do,…
Baker, Mark: The myth of Keith Murdoch’s Gallipoli letter
Baker, Mark ‘The myth of Keith Murdoch’s Gallipoli letter‘, Inside Story, 26 July 2016 Extract from the author’s new book, Phillip Schuler: The Remarkable Life of One of Australia’s Greatest War Correspondents, just published. A brief biographical note on Schuler…
Lone Pine commemorative service will not be held this year
A media release today from Minister Tehan advises that the annual Lone Pine commemorative service, scheduled for 6 August, will not proceed this year. This follows discussions with the Turkish Government. Private visits on 6 August will still be possible…
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Riches, Leah & James Bennett: We can’t see the war for the memorials: balancing education and commemoration
Riches, Leah & James Bennett ‘We can’t see the war for the memorials: balancing education and commemoration‘, The Conversation, 25 July 2016 This article raises issues similar to those that have concerned Honest History over the last three years; some…
Sweetman, Terry: Great War remembrance high in cost, low on inclusion for Australians
Sweetman, Terry ‘Opinion: Great War orgy of remembrance high in cost, low on inclusion for Australians‘, Sunday Mail (Brisbane), 24 July 2016 Veteran columnist is provoked by Fromelles-Pozieres commemoration into questioning the whole commemoration extravaganza. He uses Honest History estimates…
Centenary Watch updates July-August 2016
[Links checked 17 November 2017 and all found to be live. Honest History may be able to help users track down resources where a link is broken. Please contact admin@honesthistory.net.au. HH] Update 15 August 2016: Australia’s Vietnam War – and…
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Stephens, David: How some Turks would rather that Johnnies and Mehmets were not equal
David Stephens ‘How some Turks would rather that Johnnies and Mehmets were not equal: research report’, Honest History, 19 July 2016 updated The equality of death ‘There is no difference’, we are told every Anzac Day, ‘between the Johnnies and…
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Ozakinci, Cengiz: 25 April 1985: Arıburnu, “Anzac Cove”, the Mehmets and the Johnnies
Özakıncı, Cengiz ‘25 April 1985: Arıburnu, “Anzac Cove”, the Mehmets and the Johnnies’, Butun Dunya (Ankara), April 2016 (English translation) This article looks from the Turkish perspective at how Arıburnu became Anzac Cove, as part of a Turkish-Australian deal in…
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Pennell, Catriona & Mark Sheehan: Official World War I memorial rituals could create a generation uncritical of the conflict
Catriona Pennell & Mark Sheehan ‘Official World War I memorial rituals could create a generation uncritical of the conflict‘, The Conversation, 12 July 2016 A New Zealand-United Kingdom co-written article with some Australian input from Christina Spittel of UNSW Canberra…
Australian War Memorial Council prefers not to hear about Honest History’s Alternative Guide to the Memorial
On Anzac Day Honest History posted on our website our Alternative Guide to the Australian War Memorial. The Guide is intended for students from middle to senior Secondary level, for teachers and for members of the general public. Since Anzac…
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Sharpe, Matthew: Battle of the Somme and the death of martial glory
Sharpe, Matthew ‘Friday Essay: The Battle of the Somme and the death of martial glory‘, The Conversation, 1 July 2016 Commemorating the death today 100 years ago of over 19 000 British soldiers in a stupid venture. The generals learnt…
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Review note: Irish Easter Rising commemoration has lessons for Australia
‘Review note: Irish Easter Rising commemoration has lessons for Australia’, Honest History, 23 June 2016 I am just one-eighth Irish and by no means an expert in being Irish or in Irish history. But Honest History’s recent collecting of material…
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New anti-war song is counterpoint to War Memorial rejigging donations policy
There is an anti-war event in London this weekend, organised by the No Glory in War and Stop the War coalition. The event commemorates the Battle of the Somme. A feature will be the song ‘Dandelions’ by Steve Donoghue, the…
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Two invasions in Australian history: can we now stop using euphemisms about 25 April 1915?
Both Prime Minister Turnbull and Opposition Leader Shorten have used the word ‘invasion’ to describe what happened in Australia in 1788. (They still differ over reconciling, recognising, and whether or not to have a treaty.) Now that we have bipartisan…
Centenary Watch updates June-July 2016
[Links checked 16 November 2017 and all found to be live. Honest History may be able to help users track down resources where a link is broken. Please contact admin@honesthistory.net.au. HH] Update 13 July 2016: Official World War I memorial…
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Tendering for the knight: film-makers bid to document Sir John Monash for the green fields of France
Regular readers of Honest History will have followed our coverage of the proposed Sir John Monash Interpretive Centre to be built next to the Australian memorial at Villers-Bretonneux in France. We have described the Centre as a boastful Aussie boondoggle.…
Honest History sends copy of Alternative Guide to Australian War Memorial to every member of Memorial Council
Which word should we use to describe what happened on 25 April 1915: ‘landing’ or ‘invasion’? Why do we refer to dead soldiers as ‘the fallen’? Does the ‘freedom’ we are said to have fought for in our many wars…
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Snyder, Timothy: Poland vs history (Australian comparisons not far beneath)
Timothy Snyder ‘Poland vs history‘, New York Review of Books, 3 May 2016 updated In its exhibitions, the Museum of the Second World War [in Gdańsk, Poland] promised to tell the story of the 1930s and 1940s in an entirely…
Their Great War and ours: the commemorative view from Europe
There was an interesting presentation at UNSW Canberra yesterday from Professor Oliver Janz of the Free University of Berlin. It brought out some differences between the way World War I is being commemorated in Germany, France and the United Kingdom.…
Anzac Day miscellany 2016
Update 30 August 2016: Mick Cook (The Dead Prussian Podcast) talked to Sharon Mascall-Dare about Indigenous and non-Anglo Celtic Anzacs. Thirty minutes but no transcript. Update 27 May 2016: we found this one much later, paragraphs lurking at the beginning…
Honest History: Honest History’s Alternative Guide to the Australian War Memorial
Update 13 June 2017: Look for the second edition of the Alternative Guide here. It contains pretty much everything that was in the first edition plus new material on World War II and later conflicts. The first edition has been…
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Ankara calling: the rush to build the Ataturk Memorial in Anzac Parade, Canberra, 1984-85
‘Ankara calling: the rush to build the Atatürk Memorial in Anzac Parade, Canberra, 1984-85’, Honest History, 26 April 2016 (Note: a summary version of this article appeared in Pearls and Irritations.; an extended two-part version, using more sources, commences here.)…
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More on the Australian pilgrimages to Gallipoli, 1960 and 1965
‘More on the Australian pilgrimages to Gallipoli, 1960 and 1965’, Honest History, 26 April 2016 In Honest History’s work on the provenance of the alleged ‘Atatürk words’ of 1934 (‘Those heroes that shed their blood …’), we have found isolated…
Review note: a reasonably flexible Anzac Day package from DVA for little kids
‘Review note: a reasonably flexible Anzac Day package from DVA for little kids’, Honest History, 26 April 2016 Honest History has often been critical of the products the official commemoration industry puts in front of children. We thought the prize-winning…
Centenary Watch updates April-June 2016
[Links checked 16 November 2017 and all found to be live. Honest History may be able to help users track down resources where a link is broken. Please contact admin@honesthistory.net.au. HH] Update 24 May 2016: Honest History sends copy of…
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Irving, Nick: Glorifying the Anzac myth and our attitudes to violent men
Irving, Nick ‘What does glorifying the Anzac myth say about our attitudes to violent men today?‘ Junkee, 21 April 2016 Reflections on Anzac leave out the violence that soldiers inflict. The author looks at remarks by David Morrison as head…
Newton, Douglas: Hard questions we should face on Anzac Day 2016
Newton, Douglas ‘The hard questions we should face on Anzac Day 2016‘, Pearls and Irritations, 20 April 2016 Short, sharp piece by historian of the Great War. He asks: Why were Australians so exposed in this protracted catastrophe? (essentially, because…
A quieter year this year? Anzac Week news and reflections
These few links are taken at random from media coverage of what looks like being a quieter Anzac Day. Perhaps we are wrong. We’ll see. In any case, the quieter build-up has given some observers a chance to make some…
Reynolds, Henry: Unnecessary Wars
Henry Reynolds Unnecessary Wars, NewSouth, Sydney, 2016 Update 21 October 2017: Henry Reynolds on unnecessary wars (Brisbane Peace Lecture 2017, as broadcast on ABC RN) ‘Australian governments find it easy to go to war. Their leaders seem to be able…
Fathi, Romain: Is Australia spending too much on the “Anzac centenary”? (plus HH background on spending politics)
Update 14 April 2016: Kaching! Another $5 million from corporates The Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for the Centenary of Anzac, Dan Tehan, has announced a $5 million donation to the Anzac Centenary Public Fund from Suncorp, one of Australia’s…
Keeping up with the Anzac centenary: have we passed ‘Peak Anzac’?
‘Keeping up with the Anzac centenary: have we passed “Peak Anzac”? Honest History, 13 April 2016 The PHA seminar of 5 April The Professional Historians Association (Victoria) held a seminar on 5 April ‘reflecting on the Anzac centenary and memorialisation’.…
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Protest at Turkish government treatment of dissidents
Updated 8 April 2016: John Tulloh, former foreign editor, makes a useful point at the beginning of a piece in Pearls and Irritations on current Turkish politics: It is the time of the year when we have our annual bout…
Stanley, Peter, et al: From the Honest History Archives: five April takes on Anzac and Anzackery
Stanley, Peter, et al. ‘From the Honest History Archives: five April takes on Anzac and Anzackery’, Honest History, April 2016 Honest History as a coalition has been going for three years. We have been publishing newsletters since May 2013 and…
Smith, Tony: I didn’t raise my son to be a soldier
Smith, Tony ‘“I didn’t raise my son to be a soldier”: a presentation to the National Folklore Conference, Canberra, Easter 2016‘, Australian Folklore Network, April 2016 Starts from the broad context of the Anzac centenary, looks at the range of…
Honest History’s David Stephens on 6PR Perth Drive with Adam Shand
Adam Shand on 6PR looked at issues to do with travel to Turkey, in the wake of DFAT upgrading travel alerts. He put questions to HH’s David Stephens about commemoration and appropriateness. Among other things, Stephens said that, if Anzac…
Many more Kiwis at Gallipoli than previously thought
New evidence uncovered in New Zealand strongly suggests twice as many New Zealanders served in the Dardanelles campaign than has previously been thought. Research by the Ministry for Culture and Heritage and the New Zealand Defence Force shows more than…
Edwell, Penny: Review note: First World War Commemoration and Memory Conference, IWM North
Penny Edwell* ‘Review note: First World War Commemoration and Memory Conference, IWM North’, Honest History, 17 March 2016 Organised by the Imperial War Museum North Postgraduate and Early Career Researchers Network (FWW Network), the First World War: Commemoration and Memory…
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Walsh, Michael JK & Andrekos Varnava, ed.: Australia and the Great War
Walsh, Michael JK & Andrekos Varnava, ed. Australia and the Great War: Identity, Memory and Mythology, MUP Academic, Carlton, 2016 Australia and the Great War explores both the immediate and long-term consequences of the war on this complex relationship, looking in…
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Martyrs’ Day in Turkey and what probably did not happen on 18 March 1934
‘Martyrs’ Day in Turkey and what probably did not happen on 18 March 1934: recent research from Cengiz Özakinci’, Honest History, 15 March 2016 updated Background The date 18 March marks the anniversary of the Ottoman naval victory in 1915,…
Centenary Watch updates March-April 2016
[Links checked 16 November 2017 and all found to be live. Honest History may be able to help users track down resources where a link is broken. Please contact admin@honesthistory.net.au. HH] Update 22 April 2016: Glorifying the Anzac myth and…
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PM’s remembrance rhetoric and alleged DVA performance: a fascinating juxtaposition
Two events in the last week juxtaposed enlightened commemorative rhetoric and complaints about bureaucracy. The rhetoric came from the prime minister on 26 February, opening the new Soldier On Robert Poate Reintegration and Recovery Centre in Canberra. It is critical…
Stephens, David: Malcolm Turnbull’s post-Anzac pitch to the Australian Defence Force
Stephens, David ‘Malcolm Turnbull’s post-Anzac pitch to the Australian Defence Force‘, Pearls and Irritations, 2 March 2016 Looks at a recent speech from the prime minister and a later doorstop (just prior to the release of the Defence White Paper)…
New Minister gets (smaller) commemoration bandwagon rolling
The latest Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for the Centenary of Anzac, Dan Tehan MP, was on his feet today in the Parliament taking note of the 25th anniversary of the end of the Gulf War in 1991 and setting…
Stephens, David: ‘The Australian War Memorial is happy to let your opinion stand as it is’
Stephens, David ‘“The Australian War Memorial is happy to let your opinion stand as it is”: the Memorial’s response to recent posts on the Honest History website‘, Honest History, 22 February 2016 Commentary on recent response from the Memorial to…
Bombing of Darwin remembered – in context
Update 10 March 2016: a new book by Brett Bowden on the bombing of Darwin. The new Minister for the Centenary of Anzac, Dan Tehan MP, has issued his first media release. It marks the 74th anniversary today of the…
Singing country: the importance of the song On every Anzac Day
David Stephens ‘Singing country: the musical legacy of David Morrison, Australian of the Year – and a straw in the wind at the Australian War Memorial?’, Honest History, 2 February 2016 Before David Morrison became Australian of the Year he…
‘Visitation’ numbers at the Australian War Memorial since 1991: is this joint really jumpin’?
David Stephens ‘“Visitation” numbers at the Australian War Memorial since 1991: is this joint really jumpin’?’ Honest History, 2 February 2016 updated The title of this piece needs some explanation. First, ‘visitation’. The author thought this word meant the visit…
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Stephens, David: Singing country: the importance of the song On every Anzac Day
Stephens, David ‘Singing country: the musical legacy of David Morrison, Australian of the Year – and a straw in the wind at the Australian War Memorial?’, Honest History, 2 February 2016 The article looks at the story behind the song…
Stephens, David: ‘Visitation’ numbers at the Australian War Memorial since 1991
Stephens, David ‘“Visitation” numbers at the Australian War Memorial since 1991: is this joint really jumpin’?’ Honest History, 2 February 2016 updated Update 7 February 2017: One year on: analysis of visitor statistics in the Memorial’s Annual Report for 2015-16. (The…
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Centenary Watch updates February-March 2016
[Links checked 16 November 2017 and all found to be live. Honest History may be able to help users track down resources where a link is broken. Please contact admin@honesthistory.net.au. HH] Update 4 March 2016: PM’s remembrance rhetoric and alleged…
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Minister defends expensive Monash boondoggle* while sod is turned
Update 25 October 2017: the publicity machine cranks up as the opening of the centre approaches. Update 21 January 2016: augmented version now up on Independent Australia. FRENCH COVERAGE NOW ADDED; SEE BELOW Anzac centenary minister, Stuart Robert, has wielded…
Ozakinci, Cengiz: Tale of the Anzacs who took Mustafa Kemal prisoner in 1918
Ozakinci, Cengiz ‘The tale of “the Anzacs who took Mustafa Kemal prisoner” in the Australian press’, Butun Dunya (Ankara), December 2015 (English translation: part I; part II) Chauvel, 1919 (AWM ART03340/JP Quinn) This is a translation provided by the author…
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Kaching! Australia’s Anzac centenary spend hits $A562 million
Australia’s projected spend on the Anzac centenary-century of service now stands at an estimated $561.8 million, following an announcement today of a $10 million donation by Rio Tinto to the Anzac Centenary Public Fund. Anzac centenary minister, Stuart Robert, said:…
Villers-Bretonneux boondoggle construction contract announced
Update 26 December 2015. It is interesting that the Minister’s media release says nothing about the cost of the project ($A100m) but mentions employment and investment benefits in Picardy, France, where the project is located. Meanwhile, the Minister’s announcement has…
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Stephens, David: A century since we stole quietly away
Stephens, David ‘A century since we stole quietly away‘, Honest History, 23 December 2015 updated Marks the centenary of the evacuation of ANZAC troops from Gallipoli and describes the commemorative ceremony at the Australian War Memorial. Anzac remains, according to…
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Former Anzac centenary minister Ronno to resign; ex-Digger to head War Graves
Ronno pulls the plug Victorian Senator Michael Ronaldson is to resign from Parliament. The former Minister for Veterans’ Affairs and Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for the Centenary of Anzac (and Special Minister of State) announced his intentions today. Honest…
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Villers-Bretonneux boondoggle survives blunt Budget axe
The annual Mid-Year Economic and Fiscal Outlook (MYEFO) has been released, along with the list of Budget tweaks. The Treasurer claimed $10.6 billion in savings, offset by $10.2 billion in new spending since the May Budget, which amounts to net…
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Review note: where are all the war books this Anzac centenary Christmas?
‘Review note: where are all the war books this Anzac centenary Christmas?’ Honest History, 13 December 2015 Any bookshop these days seems to include a lot of military history books. The present reviewer is duty bound (as a website wrangler)…
Scates, Bruce, Rebecca Wheatley & Laura James: 100 Stories
Scates, Bruce, Rebecca Wheatley & Laura James World War One: A History in 100 Stories, Penguin, Melbourne, 2015 A long-awaited product of a complex project to tell the stories of many people affected by the Great War. There is also…
Stephens, David: will the new Anzac centenary minister be too busy to bother?
Stephens, David ‘Will the new Anzac centenary minister be too busy to bother?‘ Honest History, 1 December 2015 Update 4 December 2015: the Minister has responded on Twitter. The article looks at the ministerial workload implications of the machinery of…
No sign of Ataturk’s minister at Anzac, April-May 1934
‘Gold, rum but no sign of Ataturk’s minister at Anzac, April-May 1934’, Honest History, 1 December 2015 We return to the provenance of the famous ‘Ataturk words’ of 1934 – the ones commencing ‘Those heroes that shed their blood and…
Centenary Watch updates December 2015-January 2016
[Links checked 15 November 2017 and a few were found to be broken, due to removal of material from websites or simply the passage of time. Honest History may be able to help users track down resources where a link…
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Spittel, Christina: Australia in the Great War (review of AWM WWI galleries)
Spittel, Christina* ‘Australia in the Great War‘, reCollections, vol. 10, no. 2, October 2015 This review of the refurbished World War I galleries at the Australian War Memorial was published in the online journal of the National Museum of Australia.…
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Nelson, Robert: honour those who refused to go to war
Nelson, Robert ‘We should honour those who refused to go to war‘, Age, 11 November 2015 The author considers who and what is worthy of remembrance, noting the recently published book World War One: a History in 100 Stories. The…
100 Great War stories book well and truly launched
World War One: a History in 100 Stories has been written by Bruce Scates, professor at Monash, and Monash PhD students Rebecca Wheatley and Laura James, but the clearest message that emerged from its launch this evening in Melbourne was…
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Daley, Paul: lavish spending on memorials cloaks reality
Daley, Paul ‘Australia’s lavish spending on Anzac memorials cloaks a more distasteful reality‘, Guardian Australia, 11 November 2015 [A] century after the first world war began, I think it is well and truly time to reflect on how it is,…
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Wellings, Ben: conscription referendums made our Great War different
Wellings, Ben ‘Only the conscription referendums made Australia’s Great War experience different‘, The Conversation, 10 November 2015 ‘Relegating the global and transnational dimensions and reiterating familiar – if erroneous – national narratives’, the author argues, ‘creates distortions in the image…
A building, a book launch and Berlin: Remembrance 2015
Remembrance Day is on Wednesday. The Department of Veterans’ Affairs is marking remembrance with a massive poppy in the windows of its Canberra building, Lovett Tower. It is a simple but imaginative gesture. The Department’s Dave Chalmers, speaking this morning…
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Another sniff at Rose of No Man’s Land
For those who want to splash out: 100 ml of Rose of No Man’s Land will cost you a smidgen over $A300 ($US200) and 50 ml will cost you around $A200 ($US145). For our earlier kicking up a stink on…
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Another Monash juggernaut rolls across Northern France: boondoggle update
Lots of things happen late at night in Parliament House, Canberra: destructive testing of furniture; plotting against leaders; inappropriate propositions in the private dining rooms. And Additional Estimates hearings by Senate Committees. Typically, the Department of Veterans’ Affairs and the…
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From machine-gun pits to intimate bits: Rose of No Man’s Land perfume
Update 13 November 2015: questions remain about the proportion of profits going to charity, though MSF Sweden has confirmed there is a ‘collaboration’. Update 10 November 2015: Fairfax columnist Ian Warden has been advised by perfume blogger Jessica that the…
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Canberra Youth Theatre & Long Cloud Youth Theatre, New Zealand: Dead Men’s Wars
Canberra Youth Theatre & Long Cloud Youth Theatre, New Zealand Dead Men’s Wars A play by Ralph McCubbin Howell, directed by Brett Adam, a joint Aotearoa New Zealand-Australia production, which premiered in Canberra, 14 October 2015 with support from The…
Centenary Watch updates October-November 2015
[Links checked 15 November 2017 and all were live. Honest History may be able to help users track down resources where a link is broken. Please contact admin@honesthistory.net.au. HH] Update 20 November 2015: missing the target in the AWM’s Great…
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Adelaide prepares for the first Anzac Day, 1915
Today it is exactly 100 years since a notice appeared on page 2 of The Register, an Adelaide newspaper. The notice commenced: ANZAC DAY IMPORTANT PUBLIC NOTICE CERTAIN MISLEADING STATEMENTS have been circulated regarding the objects of the Anzac Day…
Review note: commemoration theme sits lightly on an old Canberra perennial
‘Review note: commemoration theme sits lightly on an old Canberra perennial’, Honest History, 22 September 2015 When an event has been going for 27 years it will be looking for new twists. Canberra’s venerable Floriade spring festival has done night-time…
Ministerial reshuffle leaves Anzac centenary minister out of a job
Update 21 September 2015: farewell media release from Senator Ronaldson. Prime Minister Turnbull’s new ministry does not include Senator Michael Ronaldson, formerly Miniser for Veterans’ Affairs and Minister assisting the Prime Minister for the Centenary of Anzac. The prime minister…
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Commemoration focus shifting, says Minister
Not the most memorable output from Parliament House today, but worth noting nevertheless, was a media release from Minister for the Centenary of Anzac, Senator Michael Ronaldson, entitled ‘Funding round opens for Vietnam War Commemorative Grants’. The release provided details…
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World War I: a history in 100 stories
Honest History is pleased to mark two important stages in a project it has been following for more than two years, 100 Stories, wrangled from Monash University by Professor Bruce Scates and his team. First, from 12 October, an online…
Ozakinci, Cengiz: how Ataturk did not meet Birdwood in 1918
Ozakinci, Cengiz ‘One hundred years of error: Ataturk, Birdwood, Harington and Canakkale 1915‘, Butun Dunya (Ankara), September 2015 (translated into English) In this article, Ozakinci busts the myth that Ataturk and British General Birdwood met in Istanbul in October 1918 and…
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Minister’s bloody fantasies emerge in his speeches
Honest History’s secretary and editor, David Stephens, writes in Fairfax today about the obsession with blood sacrifice that has characterised the thoughts and actions of authority figures and their acolytes down the ages. He finds plenty of examples in the…
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National duty of care neglected on repatriation records
Professor Bruce Scates of Monash University points out that only five per cent of the cost of digitising the World War I repatriation files has been found as part of Australia’s Anzac commemoration budget. ‘One thing is without dispute about…
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Honest History evidence on Anzac centenary splurge featured in News Limited
Ian McPhedran’s article on the News website ‘Government spending more than $8800 for every digger killed during WW1‘ draws upon material on the Honest History site about commemoration spending (especially here and here) and quotes Honest History’s David Stephens along…
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Centenary Watch updates September 2015
[Links checked 15 November 2017 and a couple were found to be broken, due to the passage of time. Honest History may be able to help users track down resources where a link is broken. Please contact admin@honesthistory.net.au. HH] Update…
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Stephens, David: Freedom and the Australian War Memorial: is Honest History not a force for good?
Stephens, David ‘Freedom and the Australian War Memorial: is Honest History not a force for good?‘, Honest History, 1 September 2015 Honest History’s secretary and editor traces the often fraught relationship between Honest History and the Australian War Memorial, which…
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Stephens, David: Anzackery: parochial puffery a century on
David Stephens ‘Anzackery: parochial puffery a century on‘, Honest History, 25 August 2015 This speech, including Powerpoint slides, was prepared for a professional development session for Museums of New South Wales. The session was cancelled but the speech has been…
Stephens, David: ‘There will be blood’: ministers and the military responsibility of children
David Stephens ‘“There will be blood”: ministerial remarks on the responsibility of children‘, Pearls and Irritations, 22 August 2015 Traces the fascination of authority figures with the concept of blood sacrifice. The blood sacrifice of children was evident in ancient…
Talking about Turkey in the 1960s: highlights reel
‘Talking about Turkey in the 1960s: highlights reel’, Honest History, 22 August 2015 The Returned and Services League (RSL) papers in the National Library of Australia constitute about the largest of that cultural institution’s massive collection of manuscripts. And about…
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War propaganda for children should not win prizes: Honest History media release 21 August 2015
Update 24 August 2015: ABC report ‘It is disgraceful that a piece of sanitised war propaganda has won a Children’s Book Council Award’, the Honest History coalition said today. ‘Giving a prize to the book Audacity endorses promotional material from…
Stephens, David: Public Works Committee’s paddle in Monash museum
Stephens, David ‘Public Works Committee’s paddle in Monash museum‘, Honest History, 19 August 2015 Our third article on the Sir John Monash Interpretive Centre proposed for Villers-Bretonneux in France. It briefly analyses the Public Works Committee report, tabled in the…
Public Works Committee’s paddle in Monash museum
David Stephens ‘Public Works Committee’s paddle in the Monash museum’, Honest History, 19 August 2015 This is the third in our series considering the Monash project at Villers-Bretonneux, France. Earlier articles looked at the submission from the Department of Veterans’…
Comment on Salahi Sonyel’s 1989 Ataturk biography
David Stephens ‘Comments on Salahi Sonyel’s 1989 Ataturk biography’, Honest History, 14 August 2015 Thank you to Turkish correspondents on Twitter for passing on details of the book by Salahi R. Sonyel, Ataturk: the Father of Modern Turkey, Turkish Historical…
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Ozakinci, Cengiz: two more articles on ‘Ataturk words’ of 1934
Ozakinci, Cengiz Updates 14 August 2015: (1) we provide a comment on Turkish-supplied information about a 1989 book; (2) note that, for footnote 5 to the second (August) Ozakinci article, you need to go to the notes in the original…
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Leadbeater, Tim: Anzac Day and politics of forgetting (Aotearoa New Zealand)
Leadbeater, Tim ‘Anzac Day and the politics of forgetting‘, 100yearsoftrenches.blogspot, 8 August 2015 Text of (long) speech delivered to International Socialist Organisation meetings in Wellington and Dunedin. It is a fascinating ‘compare and contrast’ exercise for readers on the western…
Stephens, David: Monash interpretive centre, Villers-Bretonneux (II)
Stephens, David ‘Monash interpretive centre (Immersion II of II): Public Works Committee dips toe in water‘, Honest History, 4 August 2015 The article considers further the proposal to build the Sir John Monash Interpretive Centre at Villers-Bretonneux, France, at a…
Centenary Watch updates August 2015
[Links checked 14 November 2017 and a couple were found to be broken, due to the passage of time. Honest History may be able to help users track down resources where a link is broken. Please contact admin@honesthistory.net.au. HH] Update…
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Monash interpretive centre, Villers-Bretonneux (II)
David Stephens ‘Monash interpretive centre (Immersion II of II): Public Works Committee dips toe in water’, Honest History, 4 August 2015 updated We find it difficult to treat this project as anything other than a massively self-indulgent and boastful boondoggle*,…
Centenary Watch updates July 2015
[Links checked 14 November 2017 and none were found to be broken. Honest History may be able to help users track down resources where they find a link is broken. Please contact admin@honesthistory.net.au. HH] Update 7 July 2015: Minister still…
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Stephens, David: Money, Monash and motive: analysing a project in France (I)
Stephens, David ‘Money, Monash and motive: the Sir John Monash Centre, Villers-Bretonneux (Immersion I of II)‘, Honest History, 7 July 2015 An analysis of the Department of Veterans’ Affairs submission to the Public Works Committee hearing on the Monash centre…
Money, Monash and motive: analysing a project in France (I)
David Stephens ‘Money, Monash and motive: the Sir John Monash Centre, Villers-Bretonneux (Immersion I of II)’, Honest History, 7 July 2015 The Parliamentary Standing Committee on Public Works (PWC) considered the Sir John Monash Interpretive Centre on 26 June and…
Stephens, David: Australia spending so much more on WWI centenary
Stephens, David ‘Why is Australia spending so much more on the Great War centenary than any other country?‘ Pearls and Irritations, 20 June 2015 Honest History’s David Stephens writes for John Menadue’s blog, Pearls and Irritations. The article compares Australia’s…
Commemoration wedging?
There has been a lot of discussion recently about whether one side of politics is trying to wedge the other on national security issues. For example, Jack Waterford in Fairfax: There has been nothing subtle about the innuendo that Labor…
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Centenary Commemoration Watch
We had a slight technical glitch this month. You can find the latest Centenary Watch updates for June 2015 here with links to archived material. For latest updates go to Centenary Watch link on our homepage.
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Centenary Watch updates June 2015
[Links checked 13 November 2017 and some were found to be broken, due to removal of material from websites or simply the passage of time. Honest History may be able to help users track down resources where a link is…
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Stephens, David: ‘The Next War’: two speeches on Australia 2015
Stephens, David ‘”The Next War”: two speeches on Australia 2015’, Honest History, 23 May 2015 The first speech, ‘Anzac and the militarisation of Australian society‘, was given at Politics in the Pub, Glebe, on 9 April 2015. It discussed Anzac…
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Ministerial error to be corrected
Unofficial advice from the Veteran’s Affairs portfolio is that the error in the ministerial statement on the centenary of Anzac will be corrected in the final version of the Senate Hansard, available in a couple of weeks. The original wording…
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Daley, Paul: Australian War Memorial’s rise and rise
Daley, Paul ‘Australian War Memorial: the remarkable rise and rise of the nation’s secular shrine‘, Guardian Australia, 19 May 2015 Lengthy extracts of interview with Director Brendan Nelson. He touches on the AWM’s tourism pulling power (one ahead of the…
Stephens, David: constructing emotions (centenary spend)
Stephens, David ‘Constructing emotions: Australia leads world in WWI commemoration spend‘, Independent Australia, 19 May 2015 (This is an updated version of the piece here, dated 12 May.) The recently (re-)announced $100 million for a hi-tech museum in France is…
Ronaldson, Michael: Ministerial statement Anzac centenary 2015
Ronaldson, Senator Michael ‘Ministerial statement on the centenary of Anzac and Anzac Day 2015‘, Minister’s Web Site, 13 May 2015 Statement tabled in the Senate, along with ministerial remarks. This is the third such statement and it reports on the…
Honest History miscellany: yet more angles on Anzac 100
‘Honest History miscellany: yet more angles on Anzac 100’, Honest History, 17 May 2015 This is our third and final round-up of centenary-related items that came to our attention around Anzac Day 2015, although some of them have been around…
Two Anzac zingers as parliament resumes
Bipartisan wrap-up yesterday from prime minister and opposition leader on recent Anzac commemorations at Gallipoli, which they both attended. The speeches were similar, revealing the bipartisan approach to Anzac – almost as if both sides fear wedging by the other…
Budget 2015: Honest History Factsheet: centenary spending $551.8 million
Update 12 May 2017: after 2017 Budget: The additional $19.6 million in the Budget for DVA, would take the [total commemoration] figure [from $566. 8 million] to $586.4 million, comprising around $351 million Commonwealth, $140 million states and territories, and…
Tuck, John & Anthony Forsyth: social media misuse in workplace
Tuck, John & Anthony Forsyth ‘”Maybe I shouldn’t have tweeted that!” social media misuse in the workplace‘, Corrs Thinking Insights, 1 May 2015 Employers should take away three lessons from this [Scott McIntyre] incident. First, you must have a clear…
Bacon, Wendy: getting Scott McIntyre
Bacon, Wendy ‘Getting Scott McIntyre: lest we forget the role of pundits, politicians and a social media mob‘, New Matilda, 6 May 2015 (updated) The author exhaustively analyses Twitter streams leading up to the sacking of SBS journalist, Scott McIntyre,…
Holman, Brett: one day of the century
Holman, Brett ‘The one day of the century‘, Airminded, 3 May 2015 A level-headed description of the writer’s personal ‘Anzac journey’ plus a comment on Anzac commemoration 2015. The comment on screaming military jets in fly-past deserves quoting: So why…
Bach, Willy: Anzac-ed out 2015
Bach, Willy ‘Anzac-ed out 2015‘, Honest History, 5 May 2015 Willy Bach is a postgraduate research student, School of History, University of Queensland. He says this poem was written ‘in response to the tidal wave of ANZAC promotion’. He has…
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Snuck out on Sunday: more commemoration dollars
Federal spending on the Anzac centenary is to go up by $35.5 million in this month’s 2015-16 Budget. Anzac centenary minister Ronaldson has announced the additional spend today ‘as planning for commemorative events marking the 100th anniversary of major battles…
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Inglis, Ken: Gallipoli 1965
Inglis, Ken ‘Letters from a pilgrimage‘, Inside Story, 23 April 2015 Ken Inglis introduces reprints of his seven articles for the Canberra Times reporting the Gallipoli visit of 1965 by veterans and descendants. Two are printed here and the others…
Medical Association for Prevention of War: Statement in commemoration of WWI
Medical Association for Prevention of War (Australia) ‘Statement in commemoration of World War I‘, MAPW, 27 April 2015 The Medical Association for Prevention of War (Australia) commemorates World War 1, including the Gallipoli landings of 25 April 1915, with a…
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Scates, Bruce & Rebecca Wheatley: search for The Water Diviner
Scates, Bruce & Rebecca Wheatley ‘The search for “The Water Diviner”‘, Monash University, 23 April 2015 Short documentary tracing the story of Thomas Murray of Gippsland, Victoria, who travelled to Gallipoli after the Great War in search of his son,…
Honest History miscellany: more angles on Anzac 100
Update 1 May 2015: Last posts? On the Mcintyre case, Gillian Triggs in Fairfax noted the limited mileage in free speech arguments, given Australia’s current legal arrangements. Anticipating some of Mcintyre’s remarks, Tasmanian Greens Senator Peter Whish-Wilson had his thoughtful…
Valentine, James: Gallipoli, the story we all grew up with
Valentine, James ‘Gallipoli: the story we all grew up with‘, Age, 26 April 2015 (Story has different titles in other Fairfax outlets.) We are highlighting this one because of its remarkable resonance with the ideas that have been put forward…
Stanley, Peter: Anzac Day Norfolk Island 2015
Peter Stanley ‘Dawn, Emily Bay, Norfolk Island, Anzac Day‘, Honest History, 27 April 2015 Honest History’s president finds a country-town sort of Anzac Day commemoration on the island of the descendants of the Bounty. The author concludes ‘that Anzac Day…
Dawn, Emily Bay, Norfolk Island, Anzac Day 2015
Peter Stanley ‘Dawn, Emily Bay, Norfolk Island, Anzac Day 2015’, Honest History, 27 April 2015 What may be Australia’s first dawn service is held each Anzac Day at Emily Bay on Norfolk Island. (They may get up as early on…
Daley, Paul: Quarantining Anzac Day from politicians
Daley, Paul ‘Anzac Day should be quarantined from politicians – a solemn moment to reflect on the agony of war‘, Guardian Australia, 23 April 2015 In a generation’s time the Anzacs will have slipped from living memory entirely. None of…
Sentiment, thought and jingoism in war commemoration
We ran this post as a ‘highlights reel‘ back in September and we have quoted it a number of times since. It says such profound things about commemoration we thought it was worth running again at a time which Minister…
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Stephens, David: rebooting Anzac
David Stephens ‘Rebooting Anzac for the next century‘, Sydney Morning Herald, 23 April 2015 (and in other Fairfax) Traditions that are not continually refreshed become quaint and irrelevant and eventually die. The Anzac tradition has waxed and waned over a…
Daley, Paul: Ataturk’s words about Anzacs shrouded in doubt
Daley, Paul ‘Ataturk’s “Johnnies and Mehmets” words about the Anzacs are shrouded in doubt‘, Guardian Australia, 20 April 2015 and updated Examines the famous Ataturk words of 1934, drawing upon research by the Turkish scholar, Cengiz Ozakinci. Links to a…
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Tracking Ataturk: Honest History research note
Tracking Ataturk: Honest History research note NB: for later research on this subject go here Introduction Myths often take the place of history, particularly when stories are complex, facts are lacking, and audiences need comfort. This outcome seems to have…
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Honest History miscellany: angles on Anzac 100
So much stuff; so little time. Rather than try to recognise and categorise everything that’s whizzed past in the last couple of days, we’ve just grabbed a handful, as follows, before we settle down to take in Kate Aubusson’s Lest…
Freedom of speech in Burwood: Honest History Factsheet
Update 7 May 2015: further light shed Open letter by Socialist Equality Party to University of Sydney. Update 28 April 2015: meetings held The Socialist Equality Party meetings were held, with audiences of workers and youth. Update 2.30 pm 18…
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TV3NZ News: Australia’s Anzac obsession
TV3NZ News ‘Australia’s Anzac obsession‘, The Nation, 18 April 2015 Anzackery gets introduced to the people of Aotearoa New Zealand by producer-presenter Tony Wright with interviews with Peter Stanley and David Stephens from Honest History. There is to be a…
Aubusson, Kate: Gen Y on questioning Anzac
Kate Aubusson ‘Why my generation grew up thinking it was un-Australian to question Anzac‘, Sydney Morning Herald, 17 April 2015 Article from a young journalist, presaging presentation of her TV documentary Lest We Forget What? (Iview for limited time) She…
Anzac commemoration spending around $500 million – and rising: Factsheet
Update 7 May 2015: local spinoff in latest spend? (updated; later update estimating spend at $551.8 million) Minister Ronaldson (lifetime resident of Ballarat) has announced that $8.8 million of the additional $35.5 million (below) will go towards ceremonies including ‘major…
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ABC Four Corners: Anzac to Afghanistan
ABC TV ‘Anzac to Afghanistan’, Four Corners, 13 April 2015 Chris Masters intersperses interviews with Gallipoli veterans from 1988 and Afghanistan veterans from recent years, noting the similarities and differences in their experience. Also contributing are James Brown, author of…
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Bucket tipped on Raise a Glass
[Note: related material is in this post. Some of the material below could just have easily gone in the other post or in both but we decided just to keep one updated after about 18 April. HH] Someone, possibly in…
Rotten fresh: can it get more crass?
Woolworths thought they had a great idea. It created an online gizmo which allowed punters to upload their chosen images of people killed or maimed or made mad by war. The gizmo then created an image with the words ‘Lest…
Stanley, Peter: Gallipoli 1915: a century on – conference report
Stanley, Peter ‘Gallipoli 1915: a century on – conference report‘, Honest History, 14 April 2015 A report on the Australian War Memorial-Australian National University conference held in Canberra in March 2015. The conference attracted some 4oo participants, who heard from…
Gallipoli 1915: a century on – conference report
Peter Stanley ‘Gallipoli 1915: a century on – conference report’, Honest History, 14 April 2015 Those interested in Gallipoli had been anticipating the conference convened jointly by the Australian National University and the Australian War Memorial and held in Canberra…
Stephens, David: magic Anzackery pudding
Stephens, David ‘The magic Anzackery pudding‘, Honest History, 9 April 2015 Guest posting on 7 April on John Menadue’s blog. Norman Lindsay was busy during World War I. When he wasn’t doing propaganda posters of slavering Huns or sketching buxom…
Daley, Paul: Indigenous Diggers and Anzackery
Daley, Paul ‘Indigenous Diggers and the new age of Anzackery‘, Meanjin, 2 April 2015 Contrasts the commemorative festival with the treatment of an atypical Indigenous Digger, caught between cultures. The opening paragraphs are a good summary of the history of…
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Stephens, David: Five arguments for downsizing Anzac
David Stephens ‘Five arguments for downsizing Anzac’, Teaching History (History Teachers’ Association of New South Wales), 49, 1, March 2015, pp. 16-19 Pdf accessible here made available by courtesy of HTANSW, which holds copyright. We need to make Anzac less…
Stephens, David: Peter FitzSimons: poltergeist with two brains
Stephens, David ‘Peter FitzSimons: poltergeist with two brains‘, Inside Story, 25 March 2015 A review of FitzSimons’ Gallipoli which makes some general points about FitzSimons as a ‘storian’ who should unleash his inner historian. The article argues that FitzSimons’ style…
Brendan Nelson denies commemoration fatigue
Ian McPhedran reports that Australian War Memorial director, Brendan Nelson, has denied that ‘commemoration fatigue’ is setting in during the centenary of Anzac. Dr Nelson said it was important that people examined the Gallipoli campaign and other WW1 campaigns in…
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What Kemal (probably, possibly) did: Ataturk’s letter
The Gallipoli 1915: a century on conference last week heard mentions of the famous ‘Atatürk letter’. We have a number of relevant references on the Honest History website, some of them incorporating research that others may not have done. These…
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Anzac last hurrah of white Aussie male?
ANU historian, Professor Joan Beaumont, joint winner of the Prime Minister’s prize for history, says: The Anzac legend has sometimes been seen as the last hurrah of the white Australian male. If you have a foundational national narrative that is…
Stephens, David: Anzackery in the time of Anzac
Stephens, David ‘Anzackery in the time of Anzac‘, Pearls and Irritations, 16 March 2015 On John Menadue’s blog, this short article takes an etymological look at the concept of Anzackery and quotes a couple of prize examples. While ridicule is…
ABC RN Saturday Extra: Military anniversaries
ABC Radio National ‘Military anniversaries‘, Saturday Extra, 14 March 2015 Geraldine Doogue talks with Peter Stanley about anniversaries occurring in 2015. The dates commemorated are 1815, 1915, 1940, 1945 and 1975, as well as one non-military, 1215. An event of…
War songs and being awkward
Carolyn Holbrook, author of Anzac: The Unauthorised Biography and Honest History distinguished supporter, gave a speech the other day in Fremantle for MAPW. In the course of her remarks, Holbrook said this: [W]hy does it matter how Australians remember war? …
Gallipoli episodes 6 and 7 reviewed by Peter Stanley
‘Generations passing away*’, Honest History, 10 March 2015 Peter Stanley** reviews Gallipoli (Channel 9) episodes 6 and 7. Earlier reviews: episode 1, episode 2; episode 3; episode 4 and 5. (Caution: this review contains minor spoilers, notably that the Australians…
Gaita, Raimond: balancing security and liberty
Gaita, Raimond ‘Can Australia ever strike the “proper balance” between security and liberty?‘ Guardian Australia, 28 February 2015 Honest History had collected links to many articles written over the last few months about national security issues, triggered by fears of…
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Featherstone, Don (dir.): The War that Changed Us
Featherstone, Don (dir.) The War that Changed Us, Electric Pictures, 2014 Documentary (four parts) about Australia during World War I, produced by Andrew Ogilvie and scripted by Clare Wright and the director. It follows the stories of six people, who…
McKernan, Michael: WWI: Love & Sorrow
McKernan, Michael ‘WWI: Love & sorrow‘, reCollections (National Museum of Australia), 10, 1, 2015 Review of this exhibition, which is at the Melbourne Museum until November 2018. This is an exhibition [says McKernan] that openly and deliberately works on the…
Gallipoli episodes 4 and 5 reviewed by Peter Stanley
‘Scars breaking out on the Peninsh*’, Honest History, 5 March 2015 Peter Stanley** reviews episodes 4 and 5 of Gallipoli (Channel 9). Reviews of episode 1, episode 2, episode 3, episodes 6 and 7. Channel 9’s decision to ‘raise the…
Stephens, David: Another look at the Australian War Memorial’s WWI galleries
David Stephens ‘Is this “our story”? Another look at the Australian War Memorial’s refurbished World War I galleries’, Honest History, 3 March 2015 Update 20 November 2015: a review from Christina Spittel of UNSW Canberra in the National Museum’s reCollections…
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Is this ‘our story’? AWM’s refurbished WWI galleries
‘Is this “our story”? Another look at the Australian War Memorial’s refurbished World War I galleries’, Honest History, 3 March 2015 David Stephens takes a further look at the new galleries. There are launches and launches. The Australian War Memorial…
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Ivin, Glendyn (dir.): Gallipoli
Ivin, Glendyn (director) Gallipoli, Endemol Australia, 2015 Directed by Glendyn Ivin, based on Les Carlyon’s Gallipoli, in seven episodes. Reviewed for Honest History by Professor Peter Stanley, Honest History President, and military-social historian from the University of New South Wales,…
Gallipoli episode 3 reviewed by Peter Stanley
‘Men alone at the Dardanelles’, Honest History, 24 February 2015 Peter Stanley* reviews episode 3 of Gallipoli (Channel 9), ‘A man alone’. Other episodes reviewed: episode 1; episode 2; episodes 4 and 5; episodes 6 and 7. Episode 3 of…
Gallipoli episode 2 reviewed by Peter Stanley
‘Settling in for the long haul at Gallipoli’, Honest History, 22 February 2015 Peter Stanley* reviews episode 2 of Gallipoli (Channel 9), ‘My friend, the enemy’. Episode 1 reviewed. Episode 3. Episodes 4 and 5. Episodes 6 and 7. The…
Gallipoli episode 1 reviewed by Peter Stanley
‘Good in parts at Gallipoli’, Honest History, 12 February 2015 Peter Stanley* reviews Gallipoli (Channel 9), Episode 1, ‘The First Day’. Episode 2 reviewed. Episode 3. Episodes 4 and 5. Episodes 6 and 7. Channel 9’s mini-series Gallipoli is trumpeted…
Stephens, David: Two views of World War I: War Memorial and National Library
David Stephens ‘Two views of World War I: sight-bites and Keepsakes‘, Honest History, 3 February 2015 The article is a review of the refurbished World War I galleries of the Australian War Memorial and the temporary Keepsakes exhibition at the…
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Two views of World War I: War Memorial and National Library
‘Two views of World War I: sight-bites and Keepsakes‘, Honest History, 3 February 2015 David Stephens reviews the refurbished World War I galleries at the Australian War Memorial and the Keepsakes exhibition at the National Library of Australia. (A further…
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Holbrook, Carolyn: Speech to History Teachers’ Summer School
Carolyn Holbrook ‘Speech to UNSW History Teachers’ Summer School, National Press Club, Canberra, 22 January 2015′, Honest History, 3 February 2015 Thank you. I am very grateful for the opportunity to speak to an audience that includes secondary school historians…
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Reid, David: Anzackery: a personal view
Reid, David ‘Anzackery: a personal view‘, Honest History, 3 February 2015 A former soldier, whose father served in the RAAF and the peace-time army, reflects on the concept of Anzackery and its implications for future generations. Anzackery is a theme…
Fisk, Robert: Gallipoli centenary conceals Armenian genocide
Fisk, Robert ‘The Gallipoli centenary is a shameful attempt to hide the Armenian Holocaust‘, The Independent, 19 January 2015 Fisk says ‘Turkey is planning to use the 100th anniversary of the Allied attempt to invade Turkey in 1915 to smother…
A fundamentally silly film: another perspective on The Water Diviner
‘A fundamentally silly film: another perspective on The Water Diviner’, Honest History, 13 January 2015 Honest History President, Peter Stanley, reviews Russell Crowe’s film, The Water Diviner. Other material on the film, including links to other reviews. See also our…
Allan, Susan: Governments and history: David Stephens interview
Allan, Susan ‘”Governments want a history that reflects their agenda“‘, World Socialist Web Site, 8 January 2015 Long interview with Honest History secretary, David Stephens, speaking in a personal capacity. The interview covers the politicisation of the Great War centenary…
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Daley, Paul: Anzackery, crowdsourcing and nationalism
Daley, Paul ‘Crowdsourcing is our latest weapon against nationalism and “Anzackery”‘, Guardian Australia, 29 December 2014 Daley quotes the coiner of the term ‘Anzackery’, Geoffrey Serle, writing in 1967, and goes on: Anzackery. What a word … Anzackery. Is there…
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Crowe, Russell (dir.): The Water Diviner
Crowe, Russell (director) The Water Diviner, Fear of God Films and other production companies, Australia, 2014 Alison Broinowski briefly reviews the film for Honest History. A further review from Peter Stanley, including a link to an interview with the writers…
Back to Gelibolu: The Water Diviner reviewed
‘Back to Gelibolu’, Honest History, 22 December 2014 Honest History committee member Alison Broinowski reviews The Water Diviner, opening in theatres on Boxing Day ‘Gallipoli!’ demands Joshua Connor of a Turkish immigration clerk. ‘I want to go to Gallipoli!’ It…
Anzac Public Fund Board to be abolished
The Anzac Centenary Public Fund Board will be abolished. This will be announced on Monday but the government’s intention to abolish 175 bodies has been well-leaked. Also here with a full list. This action in relation to the Board should…
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Honest History on Australian War Memorial WWI galleries
The Canberra Times (scroll down to ‘How Australians respond to history’) has published a letter from David Stephens for Honest History commenting on remarks by Australian War Memorial Director, Brendan Nelson, about the refurbished World War I galleries at the…
Bates, Sonja: Anzac Day legend
Bates, Sonja ‘The Anzac Day legend: its origins, meaning, power and impact on shaping Australia’s identity (Master’s of Peace and Conflict Studies dissertation, Centre for Peace and Conflict Studies, University of Sydney, 2013)‘ The Anzac legend lies at the centre…
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Anzac Day media style guide: Honest History Factsheet
All public occasions develop their own style and pitch (and Anzac Day is no exception) but perhaps we had not thought that Anzac Day needed a guide to how it should be presented. Such a guide exists and it is…
Wounded and damaged soldiers then and now: Honest History Factsheet
This small collection highlights the trauma that is associated with all wars in all eras in all countries. It was provoked by an article in The Independent highlighting the photographs made by Bryan Adams of wounded British soldiers from Afghanistan.…
Socialist Alternative: War! What For?
Socialist Alternative War? What For? an Anti-War Centenary Newspaper, Socialist Alternative, Carlton South, Vic., 2014 The presentation and use of history during the centenary of the Great War should involve the exposure of conflicting, evidence-based interpretations. This publication from Socialist…
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Anzac Centenary Local Grants Program: Honest History Factsheet No. 4
Minister Ronaldson’s media release of 24 October (as revised) included these key points: $2.46 million in new funding relating to 275 approved applications; total of 606 applications from 123 electorates approved so far; $5.8 million ‘made available to date’. Analysis…
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Ever thus?
The young reporter in The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance (1962; directed by John Ford, screenplay by James Warner Bellah and Willis Goldbeck) hears the truth about the death of the outlaw Liberty Valance. Nevertheless, the reporter decides to destroy…
Anzac Centenary Local Grants Program: Honest History Factsheet No. 3
Minister Ronaldson’s media release of 1 September included these key points: $975 000 in new funding approved; total of 331 applications from 72 electorates approved so far, worth $3.34 million; more than 1700 applications received. Speaking in the Senate the…
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Great War Centenary in the United Kingdom
‘The Great War centenary in the United Kingdom’, Honest History, 5 November 2013 and updated [Links checked and present, 26 October 2017. HH] Update 8 August 2014: There is British material in our ‘Review note‘ of events and articles during…
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Anzac Centenary Local Grants Program: Honest History Factsheet No. 2
Minister Ronaldson’s media release of 19 June included these key points: $2 369 023 million in funding approved; 212 projects from 52 electorates approved so far; more than 1650 applications received, some from each of the 150 electorates. The Minister’s…
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Stephens, David: Conservative commemoration
Stephens, David ‘Anzac Centenary Local Grants: conservative commemoration’, Honest History, 30 June 2014 This note comments on the statistics set out in Honest History Factsheet No. 2 on the Anzac Centenary Local Grants Program. Ken Inglis says in his book…
Anzac Centenary Local Grants Program: Honest History Factsheet No. 1
Honest History has been interested in the Anzac Centenary Local Grants Program (ACLGP) since it commenced. We will update this Factsheet as often as we can. Program The ACLGP provides up to $125 000 for approved projects in each of…
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Review note: Battle of Indigenous warriors
‘Review note: the Battle of the Indigenous warriors’, Honest History, 24 May 2014 and updated A notable element of the Anzac centenary is the attention being paid to the stories of Indigenous soldiers wearing the King’s uniform in the two…
Gardiner, Eric: Headless pines (war Penguins)
Gardiner, Eric ‘Headless pines‘, Meanjin, 73, 2, June 2014 Review by a Meanjin intern of the ‘War Popular Penguins‘ (Patsy Adam-Smith, The Anzacs; Ernst Jünger, Storm of Steel; George Walter, The Penguin Book of First World War Poetry; Frederic Manning, The Middle Parts of…
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Diamadis, Panayiotis: Gallipoli before and beyond Anzac
Diamadis, Panayiotis ‘Gallipoli before and beyond Anzac’, Honest History, 22 May 2014 311 Gallipoli Before and Beyond Anzac Parts I-II This article originally appeared in To Vema, September-October 2013. To Vema is Australia’s largest circulation bilingual Hellenic-English newspaper. The article…
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Abbott, Tony: Anzac Day 2014
Tony Abbott Address to the Anzac Day national ceremony, Canberra, Friday, 25 April 2014 As someone who has never served in the armed forces, never faced a shot fired in anger, and never lost close family members in war, I…
Rose, James: Who profits from the Anzac brand?
Rose, James ‘Who profits from the Anzac brand?‘ The Saturday Paper, 19 April 2014 The Anzac legend is being further elevated as the nation gathers itself for the start of a year-long commemoration to mark 100 years since the doomed…
Pyne, Christopher: Crucible of nationhood
Pyne, Christopher ‘Crucible of nationhood‘, Pyne Online (originally published Australian Financial Review, 24-27 April 2014) The author is the Coalition’s Minister for Education. We should … remember how through this forge of war our infant nation reached out and grasped…
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Burnside, Sarah: Alternatives to Anzac Day
Burnside, Sarah ‘What would alternatives to Anzac day look like?‘ Guardian Australia, 23 April 2014 Discusses an ‘alternative national story’ derived from social democratic reforms prior to the Great War, which were interrupted by the destruction and disruption of the…
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Duffy, Conor: Anzac-themed cocktails
Duffy, Conor ‘Anzac-themed cocktails, plastic surgery shows sacred day is “for sale”, says veteran‘, ABC News, 24 April 2014 ABC report on wide range of uses of the Anzac ‘brand’ with reactions from RSL, commentators and commercial interests. Transcript.
Brissenden, Michael: Anzac centenary corporate fund lagging
Brissenden, Michael ‘Anzac Centenary public fund for 2015 celebrations falling millions of dollars short‘, ABC News, 22 April 2014 ‘A corporate fundraising drive to raise $170 million for the Anzac Centenary celebrations is running well short of its target. The…
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Bongiorno, Frank: CS Ryan Gallipoli photographs
Bongiorno, Frank ‘Gallipoli: an exhibition of photographs by Charles Snodgrass Ryan: Manning Clark House, launch speech, 4 p.m., 6 April 2014’, Honest History, 30 April 2014 Associate Professor Bongiorno addresses aspects of the commemoration of World War I, including the…
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Stephens, David: Memorial connects children with 62 000 dead
Stephens, David ‘Australian War Memorial offers opportunity for primary school children to connect with 62 000 Great War dead’, Honest History, 31 March 2014 The article describes the Australian War Memorial’s Roll of Honour Soundscape project in which primary school…
Daley, Paul: Australia’s forgotten soldiers
Daley, Paul ‘In the Anzac centenary, it’s time to honour Australia’s forgotten soldiers‘, Guardian Australia, 15 March 2014 The author notes the centenary expenditure of $8 million on refurbishing war graves and memorials in Australia and overseas. He refers to…
Watson, Don: Over the top
Watson, Don ‘Lest we go over the top‘, The Monthly, February 2014 ‘The experience of war very much depends’, the author says, ‘on where one happens to be standing at the time.’ Front line soldiers, generals, writers and politicians all…
Stanley, Peter: Anzac’s Long Shadow highlights a national obsession
Stanley, Peter ‘Anzac’s Long Shadow highlights a national obsession’ Honest History President, Professor Peter Stanley, reviews James Brown’s book (published 11 February 2014) and finds parallels with the attitudes of Honest History to the way in which Australia is approaching…
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Stephens, David: Should we softpedal on Gallipoli?
David Stephens ‘Should we softpedal on Gallipoli?’ Honest History, 4 February 2014 Andrew Nikolic is the Liberal member for Bass, Tasmania, and a former Brigadier. He commented on his website on remarks by our President, Professor Peter Stanley, about the…
Hawkins, Jo: Brand Anzac
Hawkins, Jo ‘Brand Anzac™ – a historic past or mythic present?‘ The Conversation, 11 November 2013 Considers the logoes being developed by different countries to mark the World War I centenary, the Australian one being notable for its maleness and…
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Samuel, Henry: Hollande unites France and Germany
Samuel, Henry ‘Hollande unites Allies and Germany in First World War commemorations‘, The Telegraph (London), 7 November 2013 President Hollande of France invites all 72 countries involved in the Great War (on both sides) to take part in the Bastille…
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Waterford, Jack: Gallipoli souvenirs: but wait, there’s more…
Jack Waterford ‘AWM and Gallipoli Souvenirs Inc‘, Canberra Times, 7 July 2013 Criticism of commercialised war commemoration.
Anzac Centenary Local Grants
It is not too late to try to influence the mechanisms by which $100 000 is being allocated to each Federal electorate to commemorate the centenary of Anzac. The Department of Veterans’ Affairs advises that, while some MPs have already…
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