Our Most Popular Online Content in 2022

With 2022 done and dusted, we've dived into our online statistics for the year. We were delighted to have welcomed 48,655 people to our website 63,718 times! If you're counted in that number, thanks for stopping by!

Below are the top ten most popular pages on our website in the year that was 2022, which is a nice blend of state-wide and local history content.

1. Index of Western Australian Teachers
Topping the list was our index of state school teachers in Western Australia from 1900 to 1980, which was compiled from historic editions of The Education Circular.

2. Biographical Dictionary
Our continually expanding Biographical Dictionary of Coorow, Carnamah and Three Springs comes in at number two. We've listed the most popular biographies in a supplementary list further below.

3. Index of Western Australian License Plates
Number three is our index of early Western Australian motor vehicle registrations, which spans the years 1915 to 1928. This great index was compiled from the RAC's Year Book & Road Guides which listed every registered vehicle in the state!

4. Virtual Museum
Our virtual museum of 14 online exhibitions continues to be a crowd-pleaser. Its exhibitions showcase objects, images and stories from our collection.

5. Midland Railway
Speaking of our virtual museum, its exhibition on the Midland Railway is yet again one of our most popular pages.

6. Cemeteries
Our cemetery index spanning the Mingenew Moora, Perenjori, Three Springs and Winchester cemeteries comes in at number six.

7. Schools
Our online exhibition on schools across Carnamah, Coorow and Three Springs is a surprise appearance in the year's top ten.

8. Macpherson Homestead
Our eighth most popular page was our visitor info for the historic Macpherson Homestead, located just one kilometre east of the Carnamah townsite on the Bunjil-Carnamah Road.

9. Three Springs History
As with previous years, our early history of Three Springs continues to be one of our most well-read pages.

10. Before Electricity
Our online exhibition on life prior to electricity comes in at number ten, which is no surprise as it is widely used in classrooms across WA and further afield.

Our Biographical Dictionary contains information on thousands of people with connections to Carnamah, Coorow, Three Springs and other nearby places. Below were the most viewed entries in the dictionary during 2022.

1. Local bushranger Frank Thomas

2. Bishop Rosendo Salvado of the Benedictine Monastery in New Norcia

3. Shepherd and farmhand Joachim Dido of Carnamah

4. Granny Latham of Coorow (Mary Oliver / Latham)

6. Sarah Campbell of Arrino

7. Renowned building contractor and later the world's largest individual farmer Gus Liebe of Waddy Forest

8. Scottish born Duncan Macpherson who established the pastoral station 'Carnamah' in the 1860s

9. Albert Nebrong, the son of Aboriginal woman Mary Wirbina and a member of the Macpherson family

10. Carnamah farmhand, shearer and farm manager Teddy Edwards

Now online - 10863 Bushranger presented by Act-Belong-Commit

In 2017 the North Midlands Project and The Bank Gallery Space in Carnamah hosted Di Taylor as their inaugural artist-in-residence. One of the outcomes of Di's residency was a series of artworks exploring the life and stories of our local bushranger Frank Thomas.

The artworks created by Di Taylor culminated in the exhibition 10863 Bushranger presented by Act-Belong-Commit. The exhibition was launched at The Bank Gallery Space in Carnamah and toured to both the Sunshine Festival in Geraldton and to the historic Fremantle Prison in Perth.

Incredibly, the exhibition about this largely unknown bushranger reached over 23,000 people within its first four months! We're delighted to announce that we recently played a role in bringing the exhibition to even more people by reproducing it within the Virtual Museum on our website. You can now check it out online via the below link...

10863 Bushranger presented by Act-Belong-Commit

Carnamah-Perenjori meets Andy Warhol

Pop Art artist Andy Warhol once said 'Art is anything you can get away with.'

Items in our Virtual Museum recently received some Pop Art treatment by the Room One students at Perenjori Primary School. As part of their art studies, students selected images from our virtual exhibitions and gave them a whole new look by modifying them with the Photo Funia app.   

To quote their teacher Miss Herbert: "Your virtual exhibitions are just like an online gallery space, so the kids selected the image that caught their eye the most, like what occurs when visiting a physical museum, and then they changed the image to become a work of Pop Art. The class will be repeating the process later in the year when they visit the local museum in Perenjori and digitally photograph items on display that catch their eye."

Below are the students' creations along with a short line on why they chose that particular image. Big thanks to the students at Perenjori for sharing their creations and to Alex White who helped get them to us by email.

"I chose this virtual exhibition image because I want to know how it works and what it was used for" - Tyler, from the Before Electricity exhibition.

"I chose this virtual exhibition image because it has the signatures and is very interesting" - Justice, from the Schools exhibition.

"I chose this virtual exhibition image because the picture is in Egypt and because it has the Sphinx and a pyramid" - Lachlan, from the First World War exhibition.

"I chose this image because we have been learning about Frank Thomas and because it looks very interesting" - Georgia, from the Bushranger page.

"I chose this virtual exhibition image because all the other things I didn't really like. I also like it because I think the colours go well together" - Aimee, from the Business Houses exhibition.

"I chose this virtual exhibition image because it looks fascinating and it was how diaries were in the olden days" - Chloe, from the Books exhibition.

"I chose this virtual exhibition image because it has cool patterns. It also has a height difference which makes it look like mixed marbles" - Hiraani. This image comes from the TOYS! exhibition.

"I chose this virtual exhibition image because Andy Warhol painted soup cans and she looks like she is making soup. I like the fancy colours that the picture has provided and how they are so POPish" - Ariel, from the Books exhibition.

"I chose this virtual exhibition image because it's dark, mysterious and creepy like the doll. There are different images that show cool different patterns" - Lehyia, from the TOYS! exhibition.

"I chose this virtual exhibition image because it looks like the rabbit proof fence and its colours are pretty awesome" - Sarai, from the Ready-Made Farms exhibition.

"I chose this virtual exhibition image because Frank Thomas was really interesting to learn about and I loved the colours that this pop art treatment used" - Tahlia, from the Midland Railway exhibition.

"I chose this virtual exhibition image because of the collaborative art piece we did of The Bank. I also like the old double doors and the stone carving above the doors" - Alex, from the Business Houses exhibition.

"I chose this virtual exhibition image because I like woodwork and I want to know how it works" - Jake, from the TOYS! exhibition.

"I chose this virtual exhibition image because I like the plants and I also like the colours" - Orlanda, from the Post Office exhibition.

"I just love the thought of a tiny little train ticket being displayed in a much grander fashion in a gallery" - Miss Herbert, from the MRWA Stations & Sidings page of the Midland Railway exhibition.

You can see all of the original images online at Virtual Museum: to be known and distinguished as Carnamah.

Virtual Museum: Before Electricity

Electricity runs the world but this hasn't always been the case. Our latest online exhibition takes a look at a collection of items used on a regular basis in the days before electricity...

www.carnamah.com.au/before-electricity

Back in 2014 we undertook a public poll of 25 potential online exhibitions that could be added to our Virtual Museum: to be known and distinguished as Carnamah. We've kept the results a secret as we always intended to develop both the top voted themes but also those that received the least votes!

Before Electricity and Books & Publications are the first of our new exhibitions.

Virtual Musuem: Books & Publications

Back in 2014 we undertook a public poll of 25 potential online exhibitions that could be added to our Virtual Museum: to be known and distinguished as Carnamah. We've kept the results a secret as we always intended to develop both the top voted themes but also those that received the least votes!

The rationale of this was to give the majority of people what they wanted but to also challenge ourselves to create an engaging exhibition that people voted not to see! Which will prove most popular in the end? We'll have to wait and see!

We'd like to draw your attention to the first of our four new online exhibitions on Books & Publications, which takes a lighthearted look at some of the books and other publications that can be found on the shelves at our museum. We've got nursery rhymes, awful recipes, wearable books and much more!

www.carnamah.com.au/books

We'd like to thank the Department of Culture and the Arts (DCA) for supporting this project to share and promote more of our museum collection with the broader community. Before we go, we'll share one of the images that didn't quite make the final cut. It shows the fashions of 1979 and is a cover of the Australian Woman's World magazine.

The Anzac Centenary in Carnamah

Amid a fresh east wind and before a crowd of a few hundred, Carnamah continued its annual tradition of holding an Anzac Day dawn service at the Carnamah War Memorial. We were honoured to provide the address, of which a summery is below.

Each Anzac day large numbers of Australians gather at war memorials and other sacred sites to pay tribute and utter the words Lest We Forget. But... have we forgotten? Who are we remembering? Acknowledging sacrifice, although a worthy endeavour, isn't quite the same thing as remembering individuals. Those who died during the First World War were sons, fathers, husbands, brothers, nephews, cousins and/or friends. They had names, jobs, interests and aspirations. Despite changes in the world over the past 100 years, their lives weren't really that different to our own.

Let’s pause on that for a moment though, and jump back to 1914…

When the First World War broke out, Carnamah was a much smaller place than it is today. The Macpherson family had been here for over 45 years, a few others families for about a decade and the first settlers to take up Ready-Made Farms had just arrived.

Carnamah had a small one-teacher school which was under the management of 25 year old Alick McLean who, like many in Carnamah, was a Scottish immigrant. An Education Department inspector described him as "Inexperienced but eager to improve. A Good Teacher." He was granted leave from teaching towards the end of 1914 to allow him to enlist in the Australian Imperial Force, or A.I.F. He was 6 feet ¾ inches tall, weighed 164 pounds (which is 74 kilograms) and had blue-grey eyes, light brown hair and a fair complexion.

After less than a month of training at Blackboy Hill, on the outskirts of Perth, Alick departed from Fremantle on 2 November 1914. After further training in Egypt he was part of the infamous landing at the Gallipoli Peninsula in Turkey - on this day 100 years ago. His battalion landed while it was still dark. One of his comrades thought he had been shot, possibly in the arm and headed for the beach. Whatever did happen, he died and was never seen again.

Coorow farmhand George Bell also took part in the landing at Gallipoli and was shot in the thigh. He was bandaged by his comrades but had to be left behind when they were forced to retreat. He was listed as missing in action and it was hoped he'd been taken a prisoner of war. This was hoped as it meant he might still be alive. His aunt Mrs Janet McGill, who also lived in Coorow, appealed to his comrades for any information but sadly it was in vein. Four years later his body was found and it was ruled that he too had been killed in action at Gallipoli on 25 April 1915. 

Carnamah labourer John Davern served at Gallipoli after the landings but only for six days. He was shot in the thigh and on retiring his lieutenant said they'd send stretcher bearers for him. Unfortunately none came and he laid there until the afternoon when he was captured by Turkish forces. He was a prisoner for the remainder of the war and kept variously in hospitals, prisons and churches across Turkey. At one hospital his wounds were never dressed and they turned black. At another the treatment was exceptional and after five months his wounds finally began to heal. At the end of the war he was repatriated to England and later returned to Australia.

Left: Bill Laundy of the Carnamah Lions Club
Right: Andrew Bowman-Bright of the Carnamah Historical Society & Museum

It’s also worth remembering that Anzac Day isn't just about Gallipoli or the First World War. It is a day to acknowledge and remember the service and sacrifice of all men and women in all conflicts. On the war memorial in Carnamah are 17 names.

We remember Carnamah railway fettler Aeneas Murray, labourers Sydney Brooks, James Keenan and Edward Statham, and two men whose full names have been lost to the passages of time and which no one can positively identify – E. Kennedy and W. Regan. We also remember three men whose names were omitted from the memorial, either unintentionally or because at the time Winchester was seen as a district of its own. They are Winchester farmer Major Christopher Hoskyns-Abrahall, Winchester farmhand Charles Vernede and clearing contractor Herbert Larkin.

From the Second World War we remember Carnamah bank teller Bernie O’Hara, Coorow farmhand Spanner Spencer, former Carnamah policeman Maurie Plunkett, Carnamah farmhands George McGowan and James Murphy, Waddy Forest farmers Jim Morcombe and Keith Morcombe, and Carnamah mechanics Bill Clark and Ivan Johnson.

The Carnamah Historical Society & Museum, with support from Lotterywest, is a partner in the WA Museum’s Remembering Them project, which is to stage small exhibitions on the First World War across regional Western Australia. The exhibition was on show at the community breakfast at the Carnamah Bowling Club and will continue at our museum.

We have also created a virtual exhibition on the First World War, which can be seen at www.carnamah.com.au/anzac. This was made possible thanks to the Anzac Centenary Local Grants Program, Bankwest and the North Midlands Project. Special thanks are also due to Reg Ellery for his photo-editing contributions.

37 men from Carnamah and Winchester served during the First World War with ten never returning home.

Lest We Forget.

Suite of Australian Curriculum Education Resources

In partnership with Ignite Your Audience we have developed a suite of nine freely downloadable Australian Curriculum education resources. However, they're museum resources with a difference! They can be used with school visits to our physical museum but can also be utilised from classrooms anywhere in Australia with our award-winning virtual museum.

If you're a primary school teacher then we have something for you! Resources from Foundation to Year 6 include an overview for teachers, worksheets, activities, extension ideas and their connections to the Australian Curriculum.

www.carnamah.com.au/education

www.carnamah.com.au/education

We'd like to thank the Western Australian History Foundation and the Government of Western Australia Department of Culture and the Arts for their invaluable support of this project. Special thanks are due to Maree Whiteley for her encouragement, Shiona Herbert for her inspirational skill and Salleigh Walters for her worthy contributions.

We'd also like to thank Museums Australia WA, the History Teachers' Association of WA and TeachMeetWA (lots of WA in there!) for allowing us to share and promote our project and its outcomes at conferences, workshops and presentations. If you're a teacher and attending the 2015 HTAWA Conference in Mount Lawley on 28 March, we are taking part in the Show & Tell session at 1:45pm!

Help choose our future online exhibitions!

In 2011 we began a small virtual museum with three online exhibitions - Macpherson Family, Ready Made Farms and Milk, Cream and Butter. In 2013, with thanks to support from the Department of Culture and the Arts, we expanded with another six covering the Midland Railway, Roads to Government, Post Office, Business Houses, 10 Macpherson Street and Toys.

We'd like to open up the future direction to you - our online patrons! We've come up with a list of potential virtual exhibitions but want to know which ones you'd like to see most. Check out the options and cast your vote at www.carnamah.com.au/vote 

We've come home with a Museums & Galleries National Award

The Museums & Galleries National Awards (MAGNA) are held each year during the annual conference of Museums Australia. The 2014 conference was in Launceston, Tasmania and we had a very exciting reason to attend.

In early May our Virtual Museum: to be known and distinguished as Carnamah was short-listed for the Permanent Exhibition or Gallery Fitout section of the awards. We were in exceptionally fine company with most of the other finalists being state and national institutions.

At a ceremony in Launceston on 17 May, following a few failed attempts at pronouncing Carnamah, we were announced the Level 1 winner!

"A small society with an innovative solution to extending their audience and sharing a larger proportion of their collection with the community. The website is very creative with excellent production values and interpretative images and narratives." - MAGNA 2014

Our virtual museum began with three online exhibitions in 2011 but tripled in size during 2013. In order of their popularity, starting with the most popular, they are Midland Railway, Toys, Milk Cream & Butter, Macpherson Family, Business Houses, Ready Made Farms, Post Office, 10 Macpherson Street, Town and Roads to Government.

"The Museums & Galleries National Awards program encourages excellence and recognises the significant positive impact of our highest achievers in contributing to the sector by establishing benchmark excellence in Exhibitions, Public Programs, Indigenous projects, and projects and developments that promote ethical and sustainable practices." - Museums Australia




We'd like to thank:

• The Department of Culture and the Arts for supporting the 2013 expansion of our virtual museum
• ABC Mid West and Wheatbelt for spreading our good news on the airwaves when we were short-listed (listen above) and again when we won
• The many individuals and organisations who have expressed their support and congratulations in person, by e-mail, telephone and on Facebook and Twitter
• Museums Australia for the wonderful award

We're shortlisted for the Museums & Galleries National Awards!

The time difference between Western Australia and the Eastern States isn't always a bad thing! We got up this morning to the exciting news that we'd been shortlisted for the Museums & Galleries National Awards, otherwise known as the MAGNAs.

Our shortlisting is in the permanent exhibition category and is for our Virtual Museum: to be known and distinguished as Carnamah. The winners of each category will be announced at a function during the national conference of Museums Australia, which is being held later this month in Launceston, Tasmania.

Our virtual museum is our simple but effective way of sharing some of our collection and history with online audiences who are beyond the physical reaches of Carnamah. It was made possible thanks to financial support from the Department of Culture and the Arts. It can be viewed online at: www.virtualmuseum.com.au

2013: The Year in Review

In 2013 we were kept on the go running our museum and looking after the historic Macpherson Homestead. Like its predecessor, it's been another very busy year!

Virtual Museum

Early 2013 saw the launch of the expanded Virtual Museum on our website. Exhibits on the Midland Railway, Roads to Government, Business Houses, 10 Macpherson Street, the Carnamah Post Office and Toys made their way online while our existing exhibits on the Macpherson Family and Milk, Cream and Butter were revamped and expanded.

Townsite Centenary

The townsite of Carnamah quietly turned 100 on ANZAC Day in 2013. Its celebration was saved for September when locals, both past and present, came together for the North Midlands Show and centenary celebrations. Our secretary Jill Tilly worked hard over many months to provide a truly incredible exhibition of photographs and advertisements from the past century.


The milestone was also marked with the placement of historic photographs in eight shop-front windows, new interpretative plaques along Macpherson Street and a community-created mosaic table for Henry Parkin Gardens, pictured below.

Education Resources

We crossed new ground in 2013 with a break into the realm of education. The first of our Australian Curriculum education resources were developed to be usable from classrooms with our Virtual Museum or with physical visits to our museum.

The first three resources, created with Ignite Your Audience, can be freely viewed or saved from the Education Resources page of our website.

Virtual Volunteering

In April 2013 we embarked on our project to research, develop, trial, refine and share our concept of virtual volunteering. The project, which is ongoing, has resulted in a new Virtual Volunteering website. This is hosting some of our online volunteering projects and will very shortly host the transcription of the WA Biographical Index cards for the State Library of Western Australia.

We'd like to extend a very special thank you to the people who've given us a helping hand as online volunteers. If that's not you, it could be! It's as simple as heading over to www.virtualvolunteering.com.au, transcribing some text and hitting save!


In the Press!

Early in 2013 the National Museum of Australia released the book Landmarks: A History of Australia in 33 Places. It is based on their Landmarks exhibition in Canberra, and like the exhibition includes a section on Carnamah and its First World War soldier settlement.

One of our images graced the cover of Inside History magazine for its July-August 2013 edition. The illustration comes from the cover of a 1920s promotional notepad for N. W. Reynolds' general store in Carnamah. It can be seen in its original format in our Business Houses virtual exhibit and at our museum.

We were delighted to provide CBH Group with two photographs for the cover of their 2014 calendar. Both images were taken in Carnamah. The newer of the two was the arrival of the first CBH-owned train to stop in Carnamah in 2012. More on the images and this subject matter can be found in our blog post The Story of Bulk Wheat Handling and our virtual exhibit on the Midland Railway.




Sharing is caring...

In 2013 we continued providing assistance to our fellow heritage organisations with our president George Fowler serving as chair of the Mid West chapter of Museums Australia WA. Further afield we shared our knowledge and ideas with presentations at conferences, seminars and meetings down in Perth and as far north as Karratha in the Pilbara of WA.

Andrew S. Bowman went into battle for us at the so-called great debate 'digitisation is the death of history' at Curtin University. Along with David Fricker of the National Archives of Australia, we argued against the motion. Our narrow loss was hotly contested by many of the attendees which is a sure sign that it was indeed a great debate!

Recaps of two of our presentations can be read online:

• So what does digitisation mean for history?
• eHeritage: Attitude, Ethos, Culture + Creativity

We'd like to thank the following for their greatly appreciated support during 2013:

• Government of Western Australia's Social Innovation Grants Program for supporting our Virtual Volunteering project (in progress)
• Shire of Carnamah for their ongoing in-kind support
• Government of Western Australia's Department of Culture and the Arts for supporting the expansion of our Virtual Museum
• The Western Australian History Foundation for supporting our initial Education Resources
• Australian Government's Department of Sustainability, Environment, Water, Population and Communities for supporting our project to gather and share local heritage stories (in progress)
• DIY History at the University of Iowa Libraries and Webgrow Website Maintenance for their technical help and assistance
• Ignite Your Audience for their educational wonder :)

Last, but certainly not least, we'd like to thank YOU for stopping by. We appreciate your patronage, whether it be on the ground in Carnamah or virtually via our website, blog, Facebook, Twitter or other social media.

Here's to local history and a productive 2014!

Inside History magazine with a Carnamah cover!

We're honoured to reveal that there's a Carnamah cover on the Jul-Aug 2013 edition of Inside History magazine! The cover's illustration comes from one of the many items digitised to be part of our recently expanded Virtual Museum on our website.

Check out our online Business Houses exhibition to discover the image in its original format.

This is an indirect and exciting outcome of a project funded by the Department of Culture and the Arts aimed at sharing and promoting more of our collection to broader audiences. The project included the creation of six new virtual museum exhibitions on our website:

Midland Railway  ●  Roads to Government  ●  Business Houses

Carnamah Post Office  ●  10 Macpherson Street  ●  Toys

Virtual Museum: Roads to Government

The first form of local government in regional Western Australia was introduced with the passing of the Road Districts Act in 1871. It resulted in the formation of road boards who were then responsible for overseeing the maintenance and development of local roads. Over the years enormous road boards gradually got smaller in size and took on responsibility for a lot more than roads. Our virtual museum was recently expanded to look at the simple beginnings and vast evolution of local government. It can be visited online via the below link...

Roads to Government

Signatures of the members and secretary of the Carnamah District Road Board
at the opening of the Carnamah Post Office in 1932

Our objects and images for this virtual exhibit were enriched thanks to images from:

State Records Office of Western Australia
www.sro.wa.gov.au
Upper Irwin Road Board - Roads Boards Minute Book 1903-1906
Series 2558, Consignment 6530, Item No. 01

Shire of Carnamah
www.carnamah.wa.gov.au
Photographs of Road Board chairmen and Shire Council presidents
Photograph of Carnamah District Road Board in 1933
Photograph of New Ford Trucks in 1966
Permission to photograph Road Board chair and clock

Red Nomad Oz / Amazing Australian Adventures
www.rednomadoz.blogspot.com
Photograph of Rowland Road in Winchester, South Carnamah

Roads to Government was part of a project funded by the Department of Culture and the Arts aimed at sharing and promoting more of our collection to broader audiences. The project included the creation of six new virtual museum exhibits on our website:

Midland Railway  ●  Roads to Government  ●  Business Houses

Carnamah Post Office  ●  10 Macpherson Street  ●  Toys