2005 Media Releases
May 20, 2005
ONE MILLION TEN POUND POMS
About a million of them arrived in Australia after 1945 — and half a century later their story has finally been told.
They are the Ten Pound Poms — British migrants who paid 10 pounds for their fare and the Australian Government paid the rest.
Their joys, woes, problems, attitudes and feelings are now revealed with the forthcoming publication of the results of a major research project into post-war British migrants in Australia.
'Ten Pound Poms: Australia’s Invisible Migrants' written by Dr Jim Hammerton, formerly an associate professor and now honorary research associate in La Trobe University’s History Program and Dr Alistair Thompson, reader in Continuing Education and History at Sussex University.
In a massive project over five years, Dr Hammerton interviewed British migrants who had elected to make their life in Australia. Dr Thompson interviewed many who had migrated but later returned home.
The authors draw upon a rich life history archive of letters, diaries, personal photographs and oral history interviews. They offer original interpretations of key historical themes, including motivations for emigration, gender relations and the family dynamics of migration.
They discuss the ‘very familiar and awfully strange’ confrontation with the new world, the anguish of homesickness and return, and the personal and national identities of settlers and returnees, 50 years on.
Melbourne musician (composer of 'Up There Cazaly') and broadcaster, Mike Brady, commented on the book:
‘It wasn’t until I read this wonderful book that I realised how little had been written of British post war emigrants to Australia. My own vivid recollection of arriving as an 11-year-old in our new home city of Melbourne on a bleak July day in 1959 and the subsequent experiences could well have come from the pages of this book.
‘Before long I was transported back to the austere concrete and corrugated iron of the migrant hostel – a familiar yet somehow strange experience of life in a far corner of the British Empire.’
Published by Manchester University Press and distributed in Australia by the Sydney publisher Footprint, the book is being launched between 16 June and 7 July in both Britain and Australia.
The initial launch will be on 16 June at Australia House, London, the second on 1 July by shadow Immigration Minister Julia Gillard at the Immigration Museum in Melbourne, and the third on 7 July by Michelle Rayner of the ABC History Unit at the Australian Historical Association Conference in Sydney.
For further information:
Please contact Dr Jim Hammerton, Tel: +61 3 9479 2364 or 04 0980 4110, or contact La Trobe University Public Affairs Office, Tel: +61 3 9479 2316.