The Eucla Recorder (1898 – 1900) community journalism on a remote telegraph station
Main Article Content
Keywords
Telecommunications, History, Telegraph Stations, Newspapers, Eucla
Abstract
The rise of Eucla in the late nineteenth-century as a border telegraph station, located on the southern maritime border with South Australia, has been celebrated by Moyal (1984) for the cohesion and resilience of its skilled workforce. This article further explores the Eucla story, offering a vivid snapshot of the community’s preoccupations and challenges at the end of the 19th century through the pages of its monthly newspaper, the Eucla Recorder (1898–1900). Little if any attention has been paid to its community journalism, despite the Eucla Recorder’s unusual setting and distinctive mode of production. The following case study documents the life of the Eucla Recorder, extending its scope to the social and political attitudes of the telegraph staff which produced it.
Downloads
References
Australian Electoral Commission. (2018). ‘Women and the right to vote in Australia.’ 22 June 2018. Retrieved from https://www.aec.gov.au
Blainey, G. (1993). The Golden Mile, Sydney: Allen and Unwin.
Bursil, H. O. (1898). Souvenir of the postal, telegraph and telephone departments of Western Australia, Perth: General Post Office.
Commonwealth of Australia. (2013). ‘Eyre Highway’. 24 January 2019. Retrieved from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eyre_Highway
Cryle, D. (1987). The Press in Colonial Queensland. A social and political history, St Lucia: University of Queensland Press.
Cryle, D. (2017). Behind the Legend: the Many Worlds of Charles Todd, Melbourne: Australian Scholarly Publishing.
Eucla Recorder. (1898). Eucla Station. October 15, 1898 – September 15, 1900.
Eucla photographic collection (1905). 1902–1905. Adelaide: State Library of South Australia.
Fuller, B. (1971). The Nullarbor Story, London: Robert Hale and Company.
Institution of Engineers. Australia, (2001). Nomination of the East-West Telegraph for a national engineering landmark, IEA: South Australia and Western Australia divisions, 2 June.
Kirkpatrick, R. (1984). Sworn to No Master. a history of the provincial press in Queensland to 1930, Toowoomba: DDIAE Press.
Manion, James. (1982). Paper Power in North Queensland, Townsville: North Queensland Newspaper Company Ltd.
Moyal, Ann. (1987). ‘The most perfect invention’: the arrival of the telegraph in Australia. Australian Heritage. pp. 76–81.
Moyal, Ann. (1984). Clear across Australia: a history of telecommunications, Melbourne: Nelson.
Munday, Bruce. (2017). Those Wild Rabbits, Adelaide: Wakefield Press.
Saunders, B.A. (2005). Spirit of the Desert: the story of Eucla after the east – west telegraph era, Kalgoorlie, Western Australia: Eucla history project.
Article Sidebar
Article Details
Copyright Telecommunications Association Inc.
Denis Cryle, Central Queensland University
Denis Cryle has published widely in the fields of Australian colonial history and biography, as well as on Commonwealth communications, telegraphy and the newspaper press. His books and edited collections include: Murdoch's Flagship(2008), Consent and Consensus (2005), Disreputable Profession (1997) and The Petrie Family (1992). He is an Emeritus Professor at Central Queensland University.
