07/12/2018
In recent blog posting, David revealed the memories of Carrolup artist Revel Cooper about life on Carrolup in the first half of 1940s, when the children were ‘running wild’. In his most recent posting, he described Revel’s memories of the time when Mrs Elliot was teacher between 1945 […]
05/12/2018
In my last blog, I wrote how Michael Liu and I found a ‘letter’ written by Carrolup artist Revel Cooper in 1960, which described how the children were ‘running wild’ at Carrolup Native Settlement during the first half of the 1940s. Revel went on to say: After the […]
03/12/2018
![First page of a description of life at Carrolup Native Settlement written by Carrolup artist Revel Cooper in 1960. Doreen Trainor Collection, J. S. Battye Library of West Australian History. [Click the image to see the full page. The letter continued, '... were of the very lowest standards' on the second page.]](https://www.carrolup.info/wp-content/uploads/2018/12/IMG_1533-960x720.jpeg)
When close friend and filmmaker Michael Liu and I were researching the life of Carrolup artist Revel Cooper, we came across an important ‘letter’ he wrote that was in the Doreen Trainor Collection at Battye Library. Revel wrote his memories of Carrolup Native Settlement from the time he […]
02/12/2018
We’ve been thrilled with the response we’ve had from community members about The Carrolup Story website, and their delight in looking again at a selection of the Carrolup children’s art we have shown. However, we’ve just realised that we haven’t let everybody know that a number of works […]
30/11/2018
Good morning. Today, John and I head back to Perth this morning after a very enjoyable week staying with Tony Davis in Albany. We’ll drop into The Kodja Place in Kojunup to meet John Benn, who as a youngster was taken to Carrolup by his mother, a local teacher. […]
29/11/2018
On Monday, John and I travelled down to Albany to stay with my good friend Tony Davis. We stopped at The Woolshed in Williams, where John ate a tasty savoury muffin and I gorged on a lamb and rosemary pie. John reflected on how he had stopped at […]
28/11/2018
Before I moved to Australia at the end of 2008, I lived in a beautiful area of South Wales (UK) for 16 years. In Wales, the most common surname is Jones. I didn’t know any Jones’s! Since starting to investigate the Carrolup Story, Jones’s have started ‘appearing’ in […]
27/11/2018
Athol Farmer comes from Gnowangerup, where there was a Mission up until the 1980s. It is now an Education Centre. Athol travelled to Colgate University with Ezzard Flowers and myself back in ’05, to inspect the newly rediscovered collection of Noongar child art from the late 1940s and […]
25/11/2018
![Leaning tree by Milton Jackson, pastel on paper, 41 x 33cm, c.1949. Noel & Lily White Collection, Berndt Museum of Anthropology. [WU7568]](https://www.carrolup.info/wp-content/uploads/2018/10/IMG_6158-1-960x720.jpg)
I’ve just got back from a couple of days chilling out in the bush, with no internet or phone. It was very restful. It has been 15 days since we officially launched The Carrolup Story website, so I thought I’d write a little about the launch. We decided […]
23/11/2018
Aboriginal school children from Katanning played a vital role in the Official Opening at the Perth International Arts Festival exhibition, ‘Koorah Coolingah: Children Long Ago’. They had been practising their dances for weeks: a group of older girls, then the older boys, followed by the little kids all […]
21/11/2018
The Official Opening at Katanning of the exhibition ‘Koorah Coolingah: Children Long Ago’ on 24th February, 2006, was the culmination of more than a year of careful planning. It was the third component of a four year showcase of Aboriginal arts of the Kimberley, Western Desert, South-West and Perth. […]
19/11/2018
We launched The Carrolup Story on the 10th November 2018, the 85th birthday of Noelene White. Noelene is the daughter of Carrolup schoolteachers Noel and Lily White. I have known Noelene for two years, a far shorter time than the 30-plus years that John and Noelene have been […]
16/11/2018
Aboriginal boys at Carrolup Native Settlement weren’t just wonderful artists, they also had a fantastic football team. They played local schools and won very easily. For example, in 1949 they beat Katanning School by 21.19 to 1.2 and Wagin School by 18.7 to 0.3. In September that year, they were […]
15/11/2018
Key to photo: (1) Edith Smith, (2) Johnny Smith, (3) Emily Bennett, (4) Revel Cooper, (5) Reynold Hart, (6) unknown, (7) Mervyn Smith, (8) Vera Wallam, (9) Parnell Dempster, (10) Ross Jones, (11) Tilly Wallam, (12) Janine Bennell, (13) Keith Indich, (14) Marlene Mead, (15) Philip Jackson, (16) […]
14/11/2018
This must be the tenth website I’ve developed for my work over the past 18 years, most of which have been done with web developer Ash Whitney, a close friend from Neath in South Wales (UK). I’m often asked how long does it take to build a website? […]