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

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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

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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

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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

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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

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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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Daley, Paul: A $500m expansion of the war memorial is a reckless waste of money

Paul Daley ‘A $500m expansion of the war memorial is a reckless waste of money‘, Guardian Australia, 9 April 2018 Picks up the issue also canvassed by David Stephens of Honest History. Having spent more than half a billion dollars

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Khaki reshuffle follows Joycean kerfuffle: Chester becomes Veterans’ Affairs Minister

One Nat minister jumped right over another Nat minister’s back … * Victorian MP Darren Chester is to become Minister for Veterans’ Affairs in a small reshuffle announced this evening. In Guardian Australia, another report says Mr Chester will also

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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

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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

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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

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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

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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

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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

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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

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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

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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

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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

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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.

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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

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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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Stephens, David: Here we go again with another lost commemorative opportunity: the Armistice Centenary Grants Program

David Stephens ‘Here we go again with another lost commemorative opportunity: the Armistice Centenary Grants Program’, Honest History, 20 September 2017 Minister Tehan has announced the Armistice Centenary Grants Program (Armistice Grants) a program of grants to commemorate the centenary

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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

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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

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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],

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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

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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

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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,

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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

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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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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

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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

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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.

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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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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 Showing at the moment in the National Gallery of Australia in Canberra is an exhibition of work by the renowned World War

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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

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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 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

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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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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 Running for fun and Anzac I am an historian of Australia at war, a frequent commentator on the way Australia commemorates

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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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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 ‘There has always been an element of myth-making and myth-peddling in the Memorial’s work; it should not extend to its

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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

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New views from a little way beyond Gallipoli (review of Scates & Frances ed., Beyond Gallipoli)

‘New views from a little way beyond Gallipoli’, Honest History, 21 November 2016 David Stephens reviews Beyond Gallipoli: New Perspectives on Anzac, edited by Raelene Frances and Bruce Scates This book is a collection of 15 papers (plus introduction) from

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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

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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

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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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Moore, Bruce: Anzackery and other Australianisms: Australian National Dictionary second edition

Bruce Moore ‘Anzackery and other Australianisms: Australian National Dictionary second edition’, Honest History, 30 August 2016 The first edition of this dictionary came out in 1988 in one volume. Now there is a two volume second edition. Chief Editor Bruce

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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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Anzackery and other Australianisms: Australian National Dictionary second edition

Bruce Moore ‘Anzackery and other Australianisms: Australian National Dictionary second edition’, Honest History, 30 August 2016 The new edition of the Australian National Dictionary has been published. The first edition, published in 1988, was a one-volume work of 814 pages.

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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,

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Memories of war: A film and research project in Ballarat

Lucinda Horrocks ‘Memories of war: A film and research project in Ballarat’, Honest History, 8 August 2016 In 2014 I embarked on a collaborative film and research project to explore the history and impact of World War I in the

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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

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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

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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

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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

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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

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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.

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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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War Memorial responds to Honest History questions about poppies

The Australian War Memorial has responded to questions from Honest History about the practice of placing red artificial poppies on exhibits at the Memorial. The response has been published unamended in our Centenary Watch column ahead of the original item

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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

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Commonwealth Budget 2016 and the size and direction of government

‘Commonwealth Budget 2016 and the size and direction of government’, Honest History, 5 May 2016 updated There has been lots of Budget analysis. Honest History wishes only to note the specifically commemorative elements and pick out some other aspects that

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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.

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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

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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

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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

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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

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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

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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

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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

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Kaching! Another $5 million from corporates to the Anzac spend

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 largest financial services companies. The money will go towards refurbishing

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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

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Is Australia spending too much on the “Anzac centenary”? A comparison with France

Romain Fathi ‘Is Australia spending too much on the “Anzac centenary”? A comparison with France’, Honest History, 14 April 2016 How much exactly does the commemoration of the ‘Anzac centenary’ cost the Australian taxpayer? The group Honest History documents that,

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Holbrook, Carolyn: Anzac centenary and memorialisation: speech to PHA (Vic)

Carolyn Holbrook ‘Professional Historians Association Historically Speaking: Reflecting on the Anzac centenary and memorialisation (Emerald Hill Library and Heritage Centre, South Melbourne, 5 April 2016)’, Honest History, 13 April 2016 My work has centred on the history of how Australians

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Tout-Smith, Deborah: Anzac centenary and memorialisation: speech to PHA (Vic)

Deborah Tout-Smith ‘Professional Historians Association Historically Speaking series, 5 April 2016: Reflecting on the Anzac centenary and memorialisation’, Honest History, 13 April 2016 I’d like to begin my reflections by acknowledging the size of the audience for the World War

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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

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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

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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

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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

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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

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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,

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After the Fall: Singapore conference on World War I (review of Walsh and Varnava)

‘After the Fall: Singapore conference on World War I’, Honest History, 15 March 2016 updated David Stephens reviews Australia and the Great War: Identity, Memory and Mythology, edited by Michael JK Walsh and Andrekos Varnava Conference papers that wait too

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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

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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)

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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

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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

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‘The Australian War Memorial is happy to let your opinion stand as it is’: AWM response to recent Honest History posts

David Stephens ‘“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 Honest History readers will recall our articles remarking

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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

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‘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: ‘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

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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:

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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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A century since we stole quietly away

David Stephens ‘A century since we stole quietly away’, Honest History, 23 December 2015 To judge from Trove (the National Library’s newspaper database) the first news of the successful evacuation from Gallipoli arrived in time for the evening editions of

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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)

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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

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Will the new Anzac centenary minister be too busy to bother?

David Stephens ‘Will the new Anzac centenary minister be too busy to bother?’ Honest History, 1 December 2015 updated [Note: earlier, edited versions of this article appear in the Public Servant Informant supplement of the Canberra Times for 1 December 2015,

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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

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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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Anzac, Lest We Forget feature in Reclaim Australia rallies

Small Reclaim Australia rallies in a number of centres at the weekend were notable for featuring Anzac-related slogans and flags. At Melton, near Melbourne, Reclaim Australia demonstrators carried a banner bearing poppies, silhouettes of marching troops and the words ‘Lest

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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

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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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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

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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

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Trans-Tasman youth production asks important questions about Anzac

‘Trans-Tasman youth production asks important questions about Anzac’, Honest History, 15 October 2015 David Stephens reviews Dead Men’s Wars by Ralph McCubbin Howell, presented by Canberra Youth Theatre (Australia) and Long Cloud Youth Theatre (New Zealand)  Like another co-production a

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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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Flitton, Daniel: ANZAC centenary’s costly history lessons

Flitton, Daniel ‘ANZAC centenary: the costly price of history lessons‘, The Age, 10 October 2015 Discusses the politics of the Monash interpretive centre at Villers-Bretonneux, quoting historians Joan Beaumont, Bruce Scates and Peter Stanley with criticisms. The Department of Veterans’

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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

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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

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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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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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Freedom and the Australian War Memorial: is Honest History not a force for good?

David Stephens ‘Freedom and the Australian War Memorial: is Honest History not a force for good?’, Honest History, 1 September 2015 Communication has always been central to warfare. Carrier pigeons, flags, field telephones, Mel Gibson rushing through the trenches in

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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

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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

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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

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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

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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’

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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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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

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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*,

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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

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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

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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

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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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Mascall-Dare, Sharon: Ethical journalism during the Anzac centenary

Mascall-Dare, Sharon ‘All is not lost: ethical journalism during the Anzac centenary‘, Honest History, 18 June 2015 A journalist and journalism educator looks at the possibilities for ethnographic journalism to replace the formulaic, cut-and-paste methods that have been typical of

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Duelling Aussie museums at Villers-Bretonneux

We have tracked (particularly here under the heading Update 12 May) the government’s commitment to the wizzo new Sir John Monash Interpretive Centre (high tech museum) at Villers-Bretonneux. This project will cost nearly $A100 million, mostly from the coffers of

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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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Ataturk in the City of Hume, Victoria: Honest History Factsheet

‘Ataturk in the City of Hume, Victoria: Honest History Factsheet’, Honest History, 9 June 2015 Update 19 June 2015: media coverage in Hume Leader. _______________ Honest History’s research on the ‘Ataturk words’ of 1934 is here, summarised in a media

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Djubal, Clay et al, ed.: World War I in Australian literary culture

Djubal, Clay, Catriona Mills, Robert Thomson & Kerry Kilner, ed. ‘World War I in Australian literary culture: from the first shot to the centenary‘, AustLit This is a major research project on the way World War I has featured in

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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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Militarism, fascism, Anzacism: Australian progress report 2015

David Stephens ‘Militarism, fascism, Anzacism: an Australian progress report 2015: speech to Solidarity Forum, University of Technology, Sydney, 9 May 2015’, Honest History, 23 May 2015 (For an associated speech.) I acknowledge the Gadigal People of the Eora Nation, the

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Anzac and the militarisation of Australian society

David Stephens ‘Anzac and the militarisation of Australian society: Politics in the Pub, Glebe, 9 April 2015’, Honest History, 23 May 2015 (A video of the speech is on the Politics in the Pub website. Q&A. An associated speech.) I

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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

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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

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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

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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

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Gray, Don: Australian military and Anzac

Gray, Don ‘The Australian military and Anzac‘, Honest History, 17 May 2015 Former soldier, Don Gray, makes some points about commercialisation of Anzac, Anzac Day sport, the reasons soldiers serve and the entitlements they should expect. The next area I

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Australian military and Anzac

Don Gray* ‘The Australian military and Anzac’, Honest History, 17 May 2015 This article is intended as a supplement to the recent article by David Stephens, ‘Rebooting Anzac for the next century’. That timely article questions the hyperbole and jingoism

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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

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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

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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

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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,

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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

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Anzac-ed out 2015

Willy Bach ‘Anzac-ed out 2015’, Honest History, 5 May 2015 As we know…. They shall grow not old, Lives cut short Terminated Denied parenthood Pleasure, creativity Reflection Grandchildren as we that are left grow old: Lamely, sullenly Prematurely Age shall

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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

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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,

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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

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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

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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

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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

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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

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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

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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

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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

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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

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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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Then and now: two sad affairs

Then and now: two sad affairs, Honest History, 15 April 2015 Alison Broinowski reviews the Four Corners episode, ‘Anzac to Afghanistan‘ Fran Kelly is off to join the re-invasion at Gallipoli next week. So the count-down begins and pent-up excitement

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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

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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

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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

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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

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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

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Parsimony in Anzac donation

The Commonwealth Bank has donated $2 million to the Anzac Centenary Public Fund. This is 0.02 per cent of the bank’s 2014 profit.

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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

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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

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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

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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

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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

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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? 

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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

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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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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

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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,

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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

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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

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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

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‘Anzac porn’ in Canberra Times

Veteran Canberra Times columnist, Ian Warden, yesterday mentioned the speech by Carolyn Holbrook to the recent UNSW Canberra Summer School for Secondary History Teachers. Warden, whose column ‘Gang Gang’ has informed and entertained Canberrans for 40 years, was particularly taken

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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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Anzackery: a personal view

David Reid* ‘Anzackery: a personal view’, Honest History, 3 February 2015 The author came to Honest History’s attention when he wrote on Twitter that Anzackery ‘filled today’s military platoons’. We asked him to write for us at greater length. HH

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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

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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

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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

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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

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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

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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

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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

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Miscellany: militarisation still marching?

Honest History continually collects resources to add to our growing database on the theme of ‘not only Anzac but also (lots of other strands of Australian history)’. Of course, our interest – and the times – being what they are

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Bishop remembered

He was “disturbed” by what he called the Anzac myth, “revitalised with a new and wrong emphasis, and at a time when successive Australian Governments have felt a need to rekindle a commitment to war as a means of responding

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Honest History list: Remembrance Day analysed

These articles, some new, some already on our website, raise some important aspects of Remembrance Day, once Armistice Day, always ‘the eleventh day of the eleventh month – and at the eleventh hour’, one of the earliest mantras many of

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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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Thistleton, John: A place of healing (and a better way?)

Thistleton, John ‘How Robbie Poate’s parents returned to a place of painful memories and turned it into a place of healing‘, Canberra Times, 2 November 2014 Story about the memorial garden created outside of Canberra by the parents of Robbie

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Stanley, Peter: Honest History: possible, desirable, necessary?

Stanley, Peter ‘Honest History: possible, desirable, necessary? Eldershaw Memorial Lecture to Tasmanian Historical Research Association, Hobart, 12 August 2014′, Honest History, 4 November 2014 Professor Stanley, president of Honest History, outlines the history of Honest History, while interweaving elements of

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Honest History: possible, desirable, necessary?

Peter Stanley ‘Honest History: possible, desirable, necessary? Eldershaw Memorial Lecture to Tasmanian Historical Research Association, Hobart, 12 August 2014’, Honest History, 4 November 2014 Good evening ladies and gentlemen, colleagues, friends, and especially members of Peter Eldershaw’s family. I thank

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Beautiful the next

The support we receive from the school community is most rewarding and plays a vital role in our mission to ensure that the youth of today are aware of and appreciate the importance of our military history to our Australian

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Stanley, Peter: Gallipoli burning?

Stanley, Peter ‘Is Gallipoli burning‘, Honest History, 2 October 2014 and updated Thousands of Australians and New Zealanders are expected at Gallipoli for next year’s Anzac commemoration. Professor Peter Stanley recently visited Gallipoli on a research trip. He was shocked.

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Is Gallipoli burning?

Stanley, Peter ‘Is Gallipoli burning?’ Honest History, 2 October 2014 Late in the Turkish summer of 1915 Lieutenant Humphrey Gell of the 89th Punjabis, the signals officer with 29th Indian Infantry Brigade headquarters, was told to destroy some used message

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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

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Anzac centenary sensitivity

Sometimes news items pass you by then return with renewed vigour. Such was the case for Honest History with the Battle of Bita Paka in September 1914, recently commemorated. Bita Paka, in the then German New Guinea, was ‘little more

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Holbrook, Carolyn: Launch of Anzac unauthorised biography

Carolyn Holbrook ‘Launch of Anzac, the Unauthorised Biography, Carlton, Vic.’, Honest History, 15 September 2014 Carolyn Holbrook delivered this speech at the Melbourne launch of her book at Readings, Carlton, 2 September 2014. Stuart Macintyre also spoke. The book is

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Holbrook, Carolyn: Anzac: the unauthorised biography

Holbrook, Carolyn Anzac: the Unauthorised Biography, NewSouth, Sydney, 2014 Anzac, the Unauthorised Biography … traces how, since 1915, Australia’s memory of the Great War has declined and surged, reflecting the varied and complex history of the Australian nation itself. Most

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Anzac’s unauthorised biography reviewed

‘The unauthorised biography of a legend’, Honest History, 15 September 2014 Frank Bongiorno reviews Carolyn Holbrook, Anzac, the Unauthorised Biography, NewSouth, Sydney, 2014. See also speeches by Stuart Macintyre and the author at the Melbourne launch of the book. _________________

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Sydney Great War exhibition looks at both sides

State Records of New South Wales has announced a number of initiatives which promise to give a reasonably balanced view of the state during the years 1914-18. The New South Wales Anzac Centenary website is in three parts: In Service –

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Going home: The War that Changed Us, ep. 4

‘Going Home’, the final episode of The War that Changed Us, mostly covers 1918 and the first year of peace but otherwise continues the approach of earlier episodes, interweaving the experiences of its six lead characters in Europe and Australia.

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Review note: more Great War miscellany

‘Review note: more Great War miscellany’, Honest History, 7 September 2014 This is a further round-up of recent (and recently discovered) writing on Anzac and World War I. Earlier ones are accessible here. We are trying to do no more

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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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BBC on Anzac centenary in Australia

BBC World Service journalist Judith Crosbie reports on Anzac centenary commemoration in Australia. The first part of the ten minute audio is another BBC journalist talking about our attitudes to asylum seekers. The tone of both segments is one of

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Gallipoli Children’s Book Project

Remembering and Healing, an innovative community-based peace group in Lismore, NSW, is about to invite authors and budding authors to take part in a literary competition for books on the theme of Anzac but with a message of peace and

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Things come apart: The War that Changed Us, ep. 3

By episode 3 of The War that Changed Us, we’ve fully adjusted to its dramatised documentary approach, its repeated home front-front line segues, its six main actors’ role types, the expert commentators, colourised footage and stills, narrating voice-over hinting at

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Atkins, Jon: Gallipoli Centenary Peace Campaign

Atkins, Jon ‘Gallipoli Centenary Peace Campaign: its genesis and objectives’, Honest History, 1 September 2014 This article describes one example of community activity which is questioning the received, official view of Anzac, as set out in, for example, the Australian

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The War that Changed Us (Ep. 2): euphoria becomes hard slog

We were a bit late catching up with this week’s episode but this is what we thought. Episode 2 of The War that Changed Us grasps how quickly the mood changed in World War I, both among the men who

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Wellings, Ben: Commemoration Britain and Australia

Wellings, Ben ‘Great War commemoration in Australia and Britain’, Honest History, 1 September 2014 In Britain they are commemorating the centenary of the First World War. I know this because it says so on my commemorative key chain that I

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AWM travelling exhibition cutbacks

Australian War Memorial Director, Brendan Nelson, has announced cutbacks in the Memorial’s travelling exhibitions, including shows being specially set up for the Anzac centenary under the command of a retired Major General. More. The trigger seems to have been a

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World Socialist multiple authors: Australia’s Anzac Day

World Socialist multiple authors ‘Australia’s Anzac Day – the gap between official rhetoric and popular sentiments‘, World Socialist Web Site, 26 April 2014 Describes Anzac Day as traditionally ‘an official occasion for the promotion of militarism’. This year there has

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The War that Changed Us not rose-tinted

There is lots of Anzac nostalgia television in the offing, with Anzac Girls notably underway already, leaving a somewhat frothy impression, though it is apparently based on diaries at the time. The nurses seem awfully young and fetching, the soldiers

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Commemoration, celebration and contrition

Chris Sheedy in Fairfax Media talks to Bishop Tom Frame and Dr Craig Stockings about aspects of how we commemorate death in war. Stockings refers to ‘the tendency within Australia to selectively package and promote specific elements of the war

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Victorian schoolchildren stand up like soldiers

Victorian Minister for Veterans’ Affairs, Damian Drum, tweeted a picture of school children standing up in an assembly. The caption read: ‘@Anzac100Vic roadshow at Bendigo South East College, those standing would likely have enlisted during ww1’. The roadshow is an

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Paul Daley on our failure to learn about war

Paul Daley writes in the Guardian Australia about the impending commemorative jamboree, our liking for euphemism about war (‘the fallen’, ‘sacrifice’), our continuing obsession with monuments and memorials, and our failure to learn lessons. The article links to material on

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PM Abbott joins the roll of Anzac PMs

The Prime Minister gave a speech to Legacy. Much of the publicity was about his proposal for an Arlington-style national cemetery in Canberra ‘in which significant ex-soldiers could be interred’. What this might mean was left for later consideration, particularly

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The small print on Veterans’ Affairs

Administrative history throws up interesting stories. Here’s one. The Department of Veterans’ Affairs has been involved in commemorations since 1990, implementing such notable enterprises as Australia Remembers in 1995, Saluting their Service after that, and now the Anzac Centenary Local

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Review note: August guns

‘Review note: August guns’, Honest History, 8 August 2014 In the week that marked the centenary of the beginning of the Great War (as well as the 70th anniversary of the Cowra Breakout and the 69th anniversary of Hiroshima) it

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Smith, Tony: Dubious celebrations

Smith, Tony ‘Dubious celebrations of war‘, Pearls and Irritations, 25 July 2014 Makes some important points on television programs about war which seek ‘sentimental responses in admiration of those who enlisted’, the wariness felt by war doubters once war is

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Review note: Great War miscellany

‘Review note: Great War miscellany’, Honest History, 18 July 2014 This is our third roundup of the embarrassment of riches coming to our attention in the World War I centenary period. It is a bit broader in sweep than our

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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

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Review note: centenary war and peace stories for children

‘Review note: centenary war and peace stories for children’, Honest History, 24 June 2014 updated He had killed a man not six hours before. He had killed six men during the past month – or was it a year? –

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World War I contentious questions on ABC RN

ABC Radio National is broadcasting World War One: Memory, Perception and 10 Contested Questions on Saturday 28 and Sunday 29 June 2014 from 12 to 5pm. Crucially, the programs will look at why the war began, as well as other often

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Peacebus: Frontier Wars 2014

Peacebus ‘Lest we forget the Frontier Wars 2014: report of the fourth annual “Lest we forget the Frontier Wars” March @ the Australian War Memorial, 25 April 2014‘, Peacebus, 1 June 2014 Describes and illustrates demonstration held to commemorate the

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Sheedy, Chris & Steve Offner: Anzac myth busting

Sheedy, Chris & Steve Offner ‘Cover story – busting the Anzac myth‘, Uniken (University of New South Wales), 12 June 2014 Reports remarks at a conference from Jeffrey Grey, Craig Stockings and Peter Stanley, all of UNSW/ADFA on the blowing

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Stanley, Peter: Patriotic teachers?

Stanley, Peter Do teachers have ‘patriotic’ obligations? Address to ACT-NSW History Teachers’ Associations conference, University of Canberra, 9 May 2014 Good morning and thank you for your kind invitation to speak to you today; and in greeting you I acknowledge

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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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Frenette, Yves: Conscripting Canada’s past

Frenette, Yves ‘Conscripting Canada’s past: the Harper Government and the politics of memory’, Canadian Journal of History, 49, Spring-Summer, 2014, pp. 49-65 The author argues that the conservative Canadian government is reconstructing Canada’s past to serve a broader project of

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Review note: more Anzac miscellany 2014

‘Review note: more Anzac miscellany 2014’, Honest History, 24 May 2014 Honest History’s David Stephens has an article on Australian Independent Media Network, ‘Five arguments for downsizing Anzac‘, which reworks his speeches at the Canberra Peace Convergence and at a

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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

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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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Stephens, David: ANZAC Day Anzackery

Stephens, David ‘ANZAC Day Anzackery‘, Independent Australia, 25 April 2014 Anzackery today is a form of patriotic mysticism trotted out by prime ministers and old military buffers. But why is it so popular? Well, it’s partly because it simplifies complex

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Jacobs, Genevieve: Anzac Day at Wallendbeen

Genevieve Jacobs ‘Anzac Day at Wallendbeen’, Honest History, 22 May 2014 Genevieve Jacobs gave the 2014 Anzac Day address at Wallendbeen, NSW (population 316). She is a presenter with ABC Local Radio, Canberra. 310 Jacobs Wallendbeen The speech questions high

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Review note: Anzac miscellany 2014

‘Review note: Anzac miscellany 2014’, Honest History, 30 April 2014 Anzac Day and the period surrounding it always produces reflective pieces, as well as colour supplements and, increasingly, promotional links to football games. In 2014, 99 years on, the number

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ABC: Moral Compass on war and peace

ABC The Moral Compass, 27 April 2014 Geraldine Doogue talks with James Brown, author and former soldier, Leslie Cannold, ethicist, Ken Doolan, National President of the RSL, and Peter Stanley, social-military historian and President, Honest History, on issues to do

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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

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Anzac, Bolt and Cater boost Honest History visits

Nick Cater in The Australian gave Anzac-questioning historians a serve and characterised Honest History (incorrectly) as their house organ. Cater’s commenters were reasonably evenly balanced. Andrew Bolt in the Herald-Sun and the Daily Telegraph quoted a slab of Mr Cater’s

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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

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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.

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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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Teaching children about war

Update 9 June 2015: Simpson Prize and Audacity The Simpson Prize question for 2016 continues the welcome recent trend to ask proper history questions of Year 9 and 10 students but the nomination of the war-sanitising Audacity for a Children’s

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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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Sluga, Glenda: Historians’ war

Sluga, Glenda ‘Historians’ war’, Honest History, 30 March 2014 256 Sluga Historians War Christopher Clark, expatriate Australian historian based at Cambridge, has aroused great interest in Europe with his new book, The Sleepwalkers, tracing how the nations of Europe moved

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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

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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

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Brown, James: Anzac’s Long Shadow

Brown, James Anzac’s Long Shadow: The Cost of Our National Obsession, Black Inc, Melbourne, 2014; also available electronically “A century ago we got it wrong. We sent thousands of young Australians on a military operation that was barely more than

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Stanley, Peter: Anzac’s Long Shadow highlights a national obsession

Stanley, Peter Honest History’s President, Professor Peter Stanley, reviews and reflects on James Brown’s new book, Anzac’s Long Shadow. James Brown, Anzac’s Long Shadow: The Cost of Our National Obsession, Black Inc, Melbourne, 2014, $19.99; also available electronically James Brown,

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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

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Scates, Bruce: Horrors of aftermath

Scates, Bruce ‘Horrors of Anzac aftermath laid bare‘, The Age, 7 November 2013 Digitising a sample of World War I repatriation files is set to change the way the Great War is remembered. We will see no more important initiative

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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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War fires should be left to smoulder: Eureka Street

Eureka Street (Vol 23, No 22, 10 November 2013) carries an article by Honest History’s David Stephens asking why Australians have been giving so much emphasis to Remembrance Day, and attributing values to war commemorations that are out of proportion

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Daley, Paul: Sparing no expense on Anzackery

Daley, Paul ‘Australia spares no expense as the Anzac legend nears its century‘, The Guardian Australia, 15 October 2013 Notes the mystical place of Gallipoli in Australian history and how this is reflected in ever-increasing expenditure on the Anzac centenary.

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Abbott, Tony: Legacy address 2013

Tony Abbott Address to Legacy Clubs of Australia 2013 National Conference, Brisbane, 18 October 2013 The new prime minister spoke about the Anzac tradition. Yes, as all of us know, Gallipoli was in a sense, the cauldron that helped to

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Jones, Gemma & Paul Tatnell: Branding

Jones, Gemma & Paul Tatnell ‘Furore over image branding of Anzac centenary‘, Herald-Sun, 6 January 2012 Some public concern reported over plans by the Anzac Centenary Advisory Board to market research an appropriate logo for the Anzac centenary. The successful

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Grey, Jeffrey: Commemoration

Grey, Jeffrey ‘The big idea: we are making a mess of commemorating WWI‘, Australian, 24 April 2013 The author says Australia historically is not very good at centenaries. ‘If Australia’s centenary observance is little more than a four year long

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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.

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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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Waterford, Jack: Gallipoli souvenirs , exploits or exploitation

‘But wait there’s more’, Honest History e-Newsletter No. 3, August 2013 Jack Waterford has written trenchantly in the Canberra Times about the growth in the Gallipoli souvenir industry, everything from shavings of the Lone Pine to ‘the Legend of Gallipoli

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