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Boys’ Farm School, Dookie

The Boys’ Farm School, Dookie opened in 1881. It provided training for boys from Victorian industrial schools and boarding out placements in farming. It closed in 1886 when a government agricultural college opened on the site. The 4800 acre property was in north-eastern Victoria, with “a short frontage to the Broken River on the south,…

Royal Commission on Penal and Prison Discipline, Victoria

The Royal Commission on Penal and Prison Discipline was appointed on 8 August 1870 to inquire into and report upon the condition of the penal and prison establishments and penal discipline within the Colony of Victoria. It was also tasked with inquiring into the working of the Neglected and Criminal Children’s Act 1864 and Victoria’s…

Warrawong Kindergarten for Emergency Care

The Warrawong Kindergarten for Emergency Care in Ringwood East began to provide temporary emergency care in the 1960s. Run by the Graduates Association of the Melbourne Kindergarten Teachers College, it started off as a holiday home for children attending kindergartens affiliated with the Free Kindergarten Union. Opening in 1937, it was a “sister” institution to…

Melbourne Kindergarten Teachers College, Graduates Association

The Kindergarten Training College was established in 1922. Previously, kindergarten teachers were trained by the Free Kindergarten Union, established in 1908. In 1964, the Kindergarten Teachers College became a separate entity from the Free Kindergarten Union. In 1973 it became the Institute of Early Childhood Development. Graduates of the Melbourne Kindergarten Teachers College ran two holiday…

Royal Women’s Hospital – Contact Details

Please contact the Freedom of Information Department, Health Information Services, The Royal Women’s Hospital: Postal address: Locked Bag 300, Parkville VIC 3052 Phone: 03 8345 2610 Email: foi@thewomens.org.au Website: https://www.thewomens.org.au/patients-visitors/patient-record-requests

Royal Women’s Hospital records

The Royal Women’s Hospital holds patient records which can be accessed by a request using the Freedom of Information Act 1982. Records relating to adoptions of babies born at the Hospital were transferred to the Victorian government in 1987, when the Women’s ceased to be an approved adoption agency. Contact Adoption Services to apply for…

Model legislation

Model legislation to harmonise adoption laws in all Australian jurisdictions was an initiative of the Australian Commonwealth in the 1960s. One pressing issue behind this move towards uniformity in adoption legislation in Australia was the lack of recognition of interstate adoption legislation. Jurisdictions all took different approaches to maternal consent and to processes such as…

Royal Women’s Hospital

The Royal Women’s Hospital was established in 1856. Its first location was a two-storey house in East Melbourne, then in 1858 it moved to a site in Madeline St (now Swanston St) in the inner-Melbourne suburb of Carlton. Originally called the Melbourne Lying-In Hospital and Infirmary for Diseases of Women and Children, its name was…

Meli

Meli is an organisation created in April 2023, following a merger of Bethany and Barwon Child Youth & Family (BCYF). Meli’s office in Hamlyn Heights (Geelong) is on the former site of the Geelong Female Refuge, established in 1868, and Bethany Babies’ Home (1928-1977). BCYF’s originated with the Geelong Orphan Asylum (established 1854), later known…

Leawarra Hostel, Winlaton

This is a photograph of the exterior of Leawarra Hostel, Winlaton.