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| Australian Agricultural Company Archives | ||||
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Register no. | 005 | ||
| Year of registration | 2003 | |||
| Abstract | The archives of the Australian Agricultural Company comprise a unique body of documentation of many aspects of economic, political and social life in Australia. Established in 1824, the Australian Agricultural Company is Australia's oldest agricultural company. In the nineteenth century, the Company was initially involved in the wool industry and the coal industry. It also made significant contributions to the development of the cattle and wheat industries and in communications. It is still operating today in the cattle industry in Queensland and the Northern Territory and is Australia's second largest beef cattle company. During its long history, the Company's activities have been conducted at various times in New South Wales, Queensland, Western Australia and the Northern Territory. As well as providing evidence of the origins and later development of a nationally significant business, the archives provide sources for other areas of research including the history of land use, the early history of roads and railways in NSW, interactions between business and government, European-Aboriginal contact, family history and labour relations. | |||
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| 1.0 Identity and location | 1.1 Name of documentary heritage | Australian Agricultural Company Archives | ||
| 1.2 Country | Australia. | |||
| 1.3 State, Province or Region | Australian Capital Territory (ACT). | |||
| 1.4 Name of organisation or institution (if appropriate) | Noel Butlin Archives Centre (NBAC). | |||
| 1.5 Address | 12 Balmain Crescent, Acton, ACT 2601 (Building 76, Australian National University, ACT 0200). Telephone +61 2 6125 2219, Facsimile +61 2 6125 0140, Email butlin.archives@anu.edu.au, http://www.archives.anu.edu.au/. | |||
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| 2.0 Legal information | 2.1 Owner (name and full contact details) | Australian Agricultural Company, 109 Melbourne Street, Brisbane Qld 4101. Telephone +61 7 3840 5610, Facsimile +61 7 3844 1974, Email aaco@aaco.com.au. | ||
| 2.2 Custodian (name and full contact details) | 12 Balmain Crescent, Acton, ACT 2601 (Building 76, Australian National University, ACT 0200). Telephone +61 2 6125 2219, Facsimile +61 2 6125 0140, Email butlin.archives@anu.edu.au, http://www.archives.anu.edu.au/. | |||
| 2.3 Legal status (if different from 2.1) | ||||
| (a) category of ownership | Private. | |||
| (b) details of legal and administrative powers for the preservation of the documentary heritage | The preservation of the Australian Agricultural Company's archives has been achieved by negotiation, documented in successive deposit agreements between the Company and the NBAC. | |||
| (c) accessibility | The archives are available for research at the NBAC. The archives include the records of various subsidiaries. Extensive detailed descriptive lists of the archives are available for consultation in the NBAC Reading Room. The NBAC List of Holdings at http://www.archives.anu.edu.au/nbac/html/listholdings.html provides basic information about the collection. An article on the Company and its records is available at http://www.archives.anu.edu.au/nbac/html/ABLativeNo1_1985-AA&PeelRLand_MinCo.html. Requests for reproduction of individual items from the archives are referred to the Company as owner of the archives. Records after 1940 are closed, but applications for research using these records may be made on a case-by-case basis. | |||
| (d) copyright status | Portions of the archives are subject to copyright, which is vested in the owner. | |||
| 2.4 Responsible administration | Noel Butlin Archives Centre, Australian National University. Administration of the archives is by agreement between the owner, the Australian Agricultural Company, and the custodian, the Noel Butlin Archives Centre. | |||
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| 3.0 Identification | 3.1 Description and inventory | Archives of the Australian Agricultural Company. Australian Office and London Office. | ||
| 3.2 Bibliographic/Registration details | Deposit 1 (Australian Office) and Deposit 78 (London Office), together with numerous subsequent additions. The archives comprise many different types of company records including Board minutes, despatches, reports, employment records, financial records, land sale records, maps and plans. They also include operational records of the pastoral enterprises of the company (1824-1995) and its coal mining interests (1825-1916). The archives include the records of the Peel River Land & Mineral Company 1854-1960. The quantity of material currently held by the NBAC is 299 shelf metres. | |||
| 3.3 Visual documentation, if appropriate (for example photographs or a video of the documentary heritage | It is not feasible to attach images of such a large collection of business records. | |||
| 3.4 History | In 1955 the first deposit of records was received in Canberra from the Australian Agricultural Company?s Australian Office (then located in Newcastle) covering pastoral, mineral, land-owning and urban development interests, 1824-1914. Since then, records have been received on a continuing basis, for example in 1966, 1969, 1979, 1981, 1984, 1988, 1989, 1996 and 1997. The first transfer of records from the London Office was received in 1966. The Australian Agricultural Company?s records were the first major pastoral collection solicited by Noel Butlin and his colleagues at the Australian National University in their efforts to assemble a collection of significant non-government records to facilitate the writing of the economic history of Australia. The preservation of the Australian Agricultural Company?s archives intact and available for research use at the Noel Butlin Archives Centre at the Australian National University from 1955 to the present day provides a singular example of a long term joint commitment to the preservation of non-government Australian archival resources by a major Australian company and a university-based archives specialising in business and labour archives. | |||
| 3.5 Bibliography |
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| 3.6 Names, qualifications and contact details of up to three independent people or organisations with expert knowledge about the values and provenance of the documentary heritage |
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| 4.0 Assessment of the documentary heritage against each criterion | Criterion 1 - Influence | The Australian Agricultural Company archives are unique and irreplaceable: they form a comprehensive body of original records covering a long time span (1824 -1995) and document a broad range of activities across several major industries including wool, coal and cattle. The archives reflect the significant role of the Company in NSW in the nineteenth and into the twentieth century, for example its role in land development in and around Newcastle. In some cases, the records document the first years of European settlement, for example in the Port Stephens district. The Company's later expansion into other states is further evidence of its national significance. The national profile of the Company is well-recognised, but its archives also document the interaction between the Australian colonies and Great Britain and later between Australia as an independent nation and Great Britain and other countries, including the United States of America. The records which have been selected for retention as the Company's archives are amongst the most complete of any body of business records in Australia, in terms of both the operational Australian end and the London directorate and secretariat. Their influence is established through the Company's contributions to several key industries and through the diversity of research which continues to be undertaken using the archives. | ||
| Criterion 2 - Time | The archives span the period 1824 to 1995. One of the key series of records are the despatches from Australia to the London Head Office for the years 1824 to 1976, when the Head Office was relocated to Tamworth, NSW. These despatches provide a unique insight from the business viewpoint into the economic and political life of Australia, including major events such as Federation. | |||
| Criterion 3 - Place | The Australian Agricultural Company's operations began in New South Wales and subsequently expanded into Queensland, Western Australia and the Northern Territory. The archives are particularly important for the history of Newcastle, Port Stephens and the sites of the earliest stations, Warrah (Qurindi), Goonoo Goonoo (Tamworth). | |||
| Criterion 4 - People | The archives were created by many people over many years. At the highest level, they are the formal record of business decisions made by directors of the Company and senior managers. However, they also document the working lives of its employees - the many thousands of Australians in several industries including wool, cattle and coal. The archives are a rich source for the study of changing patterns of employment in rural industries over time. The indentured employees brought to NSW by the Company between 1825 and 1860 are one group in whom there has been significant research interest. There are also records documenting the employment of Aborigines at different locations and at different periods of the Company's history. | |||
| Criterion 5 ? Subject/Theme | The subject of the archives is business - the archives of private companies are generally difficult to locate and access and are underrepresented in Australian public collections, despite their importance to the economic development of Australia. | |||
| Criterion 6 ? Form and style | The range of record formats included in the archives is extensive and it is difficult to specify which forms are the most significant. A collection of records as large as this one and spanning the early nineteenth to the late twentieth century is in itself a valuable source for the history of office technology. The archives contain many handwritten documents, for example minutes, correspondence and reports as well as hand-drawn maps and plans. | |||
| Criterion 7 ? Social value | The social value of the Australian Agricultural Company archives derives from the nature and diversity of the Company's activities over time. Rural industries have been at the centre of Australian economic life for over two centuries. The social value of the archives is also highlighted by the variety of uses which researchers have made of them, for example industry history, regional history and family history including Aboriginal family history. | |||
| Secondary criterion 1 - Integrity | The integrity of the records covered by this nomination has been maintained by the direct transfer of successive deposits from the Company's offices to the NBAC as custodian. | |||
| Secondary criterion 2 - Rarity | The Australian Agricultural Company archives are an unique accretion of the records of a significant Australian business covering a period of more than 170 years. There is no duplicate of this archival collection and only a very small quantity of the original records of the Company not held by the NBAC are held by other institutions, notably the Mitchell Library, State Library of NSW and the University of Newcastle Archives. | |||
| 4.2 Contextual assessment including an assessment of the importance of a series of documents, the importance of a series of documents in a particular setting, and the assessment against other documentary heritage | ||||
| 4.3 An evaluation of the authenticity | Records are transferred direct from the Company's office to the Archives in Canberra. | |||
| 4.4 An assessment of any threat(s) to the preservation of the documentary heritage | There is no threat, either physical or political, to these records. The management of the archives has been undertaken by the Australian National University from the time of the first deposit in 1955. Until 1997, the NBAC (and its predecessor, the Archives of Business and Labour) was part of the Research School of Social Sciences. From 1998 to July 2001, the NBAC was administered by the University Library. In 2002, the NBAC and the University Archives comprise the ANU's Archives Program. The Archives Program is situated within the Division of Information and has a recurrent, sustainable budget. | |||
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| 5.0 Management plan | There is no specific preservation plan for this collection. It is housed in the repository of the Noel Butlin Archives Centre at the Australian National University in Canberra. This facility is managed by a staff of professional archivists responsible for all aspects of the preservation of a large collection of business, labour and university records (over 13 shelf kilometres). The repository is underground and is fitted with appropriate fire protection, including sprinklers. Environmental conditions in the repository are monitored and in 2003 it is planned to upgrade the facility to ensure compliance with current building codes. In common with accepted archival practice, individual items that are too fragile to be handled are not made available for use by researchers. In such cases, copies or surrogates will be provided where possible. For example, the despatches 1824-1854 have been microfilmed as a preservation measure. Access is provided by the NBAC in accordance with the deposit agreement with the owner. Each researcher wishing to use the archives is required to complete and sign an access agreement that sets out their obligations. | |||
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| 6.0 Consultation | 6.1 Details of consultation about the nomination with the: | |||
| (a)Owner | Nomination supported by owner - extract of email message received reads: "...we advise that we are very pleased to be included in the Australian Memory of the World Register. Yours sincerely, Australian Agricultural Company Limited. DJ Mackay Executive Director, Operations". | |||
| (b) Custodian | Nomination is by the custodian. | |||
| (c) Relevant Regional or National Memory of the World Committee (if appropriate | Advice was sought from Adrian Cunningham, member of the Australian Memory of the World Committee, on some points regarding this nomination. UNESCO Australian Memory of the World Committee, ANU Centre for UNESCO, 5 Liversidge St., Australian National University, Canberra ACT 0200. Telephone +61 2 6125 9943, Facsimile +61 2 6125 4959, Email carole.caldwell@anu.edu.au, http://www.amw.org.au. | |||
| (d) Independent institution(s) and/or experts |
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| 7.0 Nominator | 7.1 Name | Noel Butlin Archives Centre, Australian National University. | ||
| 7.2 Relationship to the documentary heritage | Custodian. | |||
| 7.3 Contact person (if appropriate) | Dr Sigrid McCausland or Ms Emma Jolley. | |||
| 7.4 Contact details | Noel Butlin Archives Centre, Australian National University, 12 Balmain Crescent, Acton, ACT 2601 (Building 76, Australian National University, ACT 0200). Telephone +61 2 6125 2219, Facsimile +61 2 6125 0140, Email butlin.archives@anu.edu.au, http://www.archives.anu.edu.au/. | |||
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