Newcastle Museum


Above: Newcastle Museum

The Newcastle Museum and the NSW Migration Heritage Centre are collaborating on a project entitled Object Stories and the Migration Heritage of the Hunter Chapter, with a particular focus on post-Second World War migrants who settled in the region from 1946 until 1973.  These families and individuals have made an important contribution to the prosperity and development of the Hunter region, and as they are ageing. We would like to work with them to record their memories, with a focus on significant objects and places.

Some excellent work has already been done in this area.  There has been extensive work on BHP. Lake Macquarie City Art Gallery participated in the NSW Migration Heritage Centre’s Belongings project and web exhibition which has recorded over 100 Post-Second World War migration and settlement stories and documented family and personal owned collections. The Orange City Council’s Objects Stories project and the resulting Belongings oral histories publication Half A World Away by Elisabeth Edwards is an excellent model for this Museums Australia Hunter Chapter study.

Adamstown, Greta, Mayfield, Nelson Bay, Port Stephens are known locations of the Federal Government’s post-Second World War Two migration accommodation centres which settled migrants while they worked in local industries located in the Hunter Chapter area.

The partnership will produce the following research for future Newcastle Museum exhibitions, publications and online projects:

  • An Illustrated history suitable to contextualise post-Second World War migration and settlement history and collections for the MHC andNewcastleMuseum, drawing from primary and secondary sources and some oral histories to understand key places.
  • Permission of the participants to feature their stories and photos on theNewcastleMuseumand or the MHC web site, and any future exhibitions and publications with appropriate acknowledgement and protection of privacy and security.
  • As part of the history research identification and research of places that have significant migration heritage associations including  the regional migrant accommodation centres and major worksites; and
  • Community appreciation of the important contribution of migrants to the development and prosperity of the Hunter region from Post Second World War migration and recognising patterns of earlier migration