Liberating lives: Invisible Australians and biographical networks

Liberating livesInvisible Australians and biographical networks

www.invisibleaustralians.org

Tim Sherratt@wragge

Charlie Allen was born in Sydney in 1896.

His mother was Frances Allen (sometime sweet shop owner and brothel keeper), his father Charlie Gum (a buyer for Wing On company).

Charlie was raised by his mother, but in 1909, at the age of 13, he was taken to China by his father.

His father returned to Sydney, leaving Charlie in China. He lived with relatives in the town of Shekki (inland from Hong Kong) for 6 years.

Charlie was homesick, but had no means of getting back to Australia. His mother attempted to enlist government help but to no avail. Charlie finally returned in 1915.

The following year Charlie enlisted in First AIF (well actually he enlisted three times, and was discharged as medically unfit each time).

Charlie married in Sydney in 1917 and had two daughters soon after. He returned to China in 1922 for 7 months.

Charlie Allen died in 1938 as the result of an industrial accident. He was 41.

How do we know about Charlie Allen?

NAA: ST84/1, 1909/22/41-50

NAA: A1, 1911/13854

NAA: B2455, ALLEN C A

NAA: SP42/1, C1922/4449

NAA: ST84/1, 1909/22/41-50

Between 1901 and 1911, 400 circulars were issued to port officers about immigration restriction.

The confidential manual on immigration restriction grew from one page in 1902 to more than 200 in 1912.

For the years between 1902 and 1948 there remain:

● More than 50,000 CEDTs● 90 shelf metres of records● 15,000 case files

What changes when we examine the world through the collected fragments of knowledge that we can recover about a single person, reorganised as a biographical narrative, rather than as part of an archival system?

– Tim Hitchcock

http://www.invisibleaustralians.org

NAA: ST84/1, 1909/22/41-50

● Crowdsourced data extraction● 50,000+ CEDTs● Other files● Match identities● Eeek!

Pauline Ah Hee, 1906.NAA: ST84/1, 1906/111-120

Pauline Ah Hee, 1906. NAA: ST84/1, 1906/111-120

Choy Hing family including their adopted daughter, Pauline Ah Hee, 1906. NAA: SP244/2, N1950/2/4918

Pauline Ah Hee, 1906. NAA: SP244/2, N1950/2/4918

Pauline Ah Hee, c. 1950. NAA: A659, 1950/1/1954

Pauline Ah Hee

Shadee Khan, 1916. NAA: E752, 1916/8

Shadee Khan, 1921. NAA: E752, 1921/21

Shadee Khan, 1925. NAA: E752, 1925/7

Shadee Khan

Pauline Ah Hee

Shadee Khan

History walldefining.net.au/wall

Use URLs to identify things in the real world

This is me:http://nla.gov.au/nla.party-479364#foaf:Person

Wragge’s identity browserwraggelabs.com/identities

The Flickr Machine Tag Challengewraggelabs.com/fmtc/

● Make links● Give advice● Create tools & examples● Help!

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