Bulletin

Issue: March 2005

News

130 years of change at Kew Cottages

How we have coped with difference in our society

What went on in
Kew Cottages, Australia’s best known institution for people with intellectual disability, since its foundation in 1887?

A research team from La Trobe University will spend between now and 2007, when Kew Residential Services – as Kew Cottages are now known – finally closes, providing answers to this question.

‘It will certainly be a telling revelation of how our attitudes to people with intellectual disability have changed over 130 years,’ says historian Dr Lee-Ann Monk who, as an Australian Post-Doctoral Fellow, will research the history of the institution.

La Trobe University, with Kew Residential Services (KRS), has won a three-year, $730,542 Australian Research Council Linkage grant to conduct the research.

The multi-disciplinary team – comprising Dr Monk, fellow historians Drs Richard Broome, Christine Dew and Katie Holmes; Dr Christine Bigby from Social Work, who has expertise in the field of intellectual disability; communication specialist Hilary Johnson from Communication Sciences; and Dr John Tebbutt from Media Studies – will work closely with KRS manager, Ms Alma Adams, and her staff.

The researchers will explore archives for a scholarly history to be published in book form; conduct an oral history involving those who have lived, worked or been associated with the institution; and work with residents to document their memories and experiences through images and sound recordings.

A volume of oral histories will be produced and the collaborative research with residents will be exhibited in an on-site installation at KRS. Dr Monk says the inclusion of people with intellectual disability in documenting their own history is a first for Australia. It will also produce a radio documentary, a web site, and a photographic archive.

‘KRS is the largest and longest surviving institution of its kind in Australia. Consequently, its history encompasses the broad shifts in intellectual disability policy and practice,’ says Dr Monk.

‘When it was established in 1887 it was the first specialised institution for people with intellectual disability in Australia and a symbol of the contemporary belief that those with intellectual disability possessed the potential to be educated. But in the context of a community concerned with eugenics and racial superiority, attitudes to people with intellectual disability changed and they came to be seen as incurable and a danger to the Australian nation. The institution became a means to isolate them from the community and fell into a neglected state, reaching its lowest ebb during the first half of the 20th century.

‘Our project is a study of these changing attitudes and practices because how we have conducted Kew Cottages reflects how we have coped with difference in our society.

‘Over the years many Melbourne people, although they may have had no connection with the institution, knew about Kew Cottages and its purpose, but in the main had no concept of what went on there.

‘People travelling along Princes Street, Kew, could see Willesmere, the large imposing building that housed the psychiatric hospital, and the Cottages built in its grounds.

‘But what was happening there mirrored the changing conscience and ideas the community held about how to treat people who were different.

‘There were occasions when there was intense community interest in the institution, particularly after World War Two and after the fire in 1996,’ Dr Monk added.

‘The 430 residents will be “deinstitutionalised” by 2007 although about 100 of them will be integrated into the new residential community that will be established on the 27 acre site. Thus contemplating its history is timely,’ she said.

People who have worked or lived at KRS, or have been involved in other ways, are invited to offer information, photographs or expressions of interest in being interviewed. They can contact Dr Monk on tel: (03) 9479 2366 or email: L.Monk@latrobe.edu.au.