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Margaret Wood Immigration & Shipping Collection
Image: Baggage Label - P&O, Shipping Destination, Melbourne, circa 1950s
Source: Museum Victoria
This collection provides a rare insight into the working life of a young female Immigration Officer. It represents the processing and ongoing management of migrants during one of the great Australian migration booms; the development of policy during this period and the way it was presented to the Australian public; the management of immediate arrival and dispersal of migrants at Station Pier; the parallel operations of immigration officers, customs officers, baggage agents, and aid workers during those hectic first hours upon arrival; and the types and varieties of ships which carried migrants to Australia.
Margaret Wood's collection reveals the context surrounding her work as an immigration officer; the bureaucracy, represented by the forms, form letters, notes, instructions, and reports; the need to comprehend the continuing formulation of migration policy, through the ministerial addresses and policy booklets; the shipboard contact, through the souvenirs and menus; dockside sorting and handling, through the baggage labels, customs tickets, claim tags and receipts; the personal contact, through the handwritten luggage contents list and identified baggage tags.
Her constant contact with the excitement of arrival, departure and sea travel must have influenced her own desire to travel, as well as her connections with such a variety of ships, revealed through her own souveniring of ship line stationery, and the shipping promotional material. Margaret's own story accompanying the collection brings this incredible time to life - the sheer numbers of people from all over the UK and Europe and the challenges in trying to maintain organisational order.
Items per page: 10 50 (showing 241 - 249) 249 items
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Form - Application for Assisted Passage of Relative, Department of Immigration, 1950s
Department of Immigration form which allowed Italian Agreement migrants to apply for assisted passage for a relative or fiancee. Italian Agreement migrants were those who migrated under ...
From: Melbourne, Australia Images: 4 -
Form - Repayment of Accommodation for Dependents, English & Italian, Department of Immigra ...
Form issued by the Department of Immigration to migrants and their dependents staying in Department of Immigration Accommodation. The signatory agrees to repay the costs of accommodatio ...
From: Melbourne, Australia Images: 4 -
Letter - Accommodation & Employment, Greek Translation, Department of Immigration, 1950s
Unused form letter issued by the Department of Immigration to assisted migrants, with handwritten text in Greek providing a translation of each paragraph. The letter grants permission t ...
From: Melbourne, Australia Images: 2 -
Form - General Assisted Passage Scheme Undertaking, Department of Immigration, 1950s
Form issued to migrants arriving under the General Assisted Passage Scheme, issued by the Department of Immigration. The form states that the signatory agrees to repay the cost of thei ...
From: Melbourne, Australia Images: 2 -
Letter - Migrant Nomination, Department of Immigration, 1950s
Unused form letter issued by the Department of Immigration in response to nomination enquiry, referring to an enclosed nomination form. It includes a questionnaire for applicant to comp ...
From: Melbourne, Australia Images: 2 -
Newsletter - Migratious, Vol 1, No 6, Dec 1950
Newsletter 'Migratious' published for the Department of Immigration and Social Welfare Club, December 1950. It includes staff gossip, social commentaries, description of the children's ...
From: Melbourne, Australia Images: 2 -
Report - Harold Holt, 'What Immigration Means to Australia', Commonwealth of Australia, 30 ...
Parliamentary report by Harold Holt, Minister for Immigration, titled 'What Immigration Means to Australia', dated 30 August 1956. The report outlines the effects of immigration on Aust ...
From: Canberra, Australia Images: 4 -
Booklet - Harold Holt, 'Immigration is Building a Nation', FH Johnston, 1952
Booklet 'Immigration is Building a Nation', by Harold Holt, then Minister for Immigration, published by F.H. Johnston, 1952. It is a collection of addresses by Harold Holt, Minister for ...
From: Canberra, Australia Images: 6 -
Ashtray - Flotta Lauro Napoli, circa 1950s
Pressed metal ashtray used by the Flotta Lauro Line circa 1950s. It is part of a collection of shipboard souvenirs collected by Margaret Wood an officer in the Department of Immigration ...
Images: 2
