Guide to the Guide to Manuscript Collections on women's suffrage in the National Library of Australia

Collection Summary

Title

Guide to Manuscript Collections on women's suffrage in the National Library of Australia

Date Range

c.1890s-1970s

Collection Number

MST 3

Extent

21 collections

Language of Materials

English

Repository

NLA

Sponsor

The work to preserve, digitise and describe the Library's collections about women's suffrage was made possible by the generous financial support of donors to 2016 Tax Time Appeal. The Library gratefully acknowledges this support.

Introduction

Purpose

The purpose of this guide is to provide researchers with an overview of and links to the National Library of Australia's manuscript collections with content on or related to women's suffrage.

Overview

The National Library holds a number of collections of personal papers of prominent Australian feminists, including those who participated in the fight for women's rights to vote and to hold elected office both in Australia and internationally.

The collections in this guide pertain to women who were active campaigners on a range of feminist issues that included women's suffrage, or who were active collectors of the record of women's suffrage activism.

Of special interest are the Papers and Objects of Bessie Rischbieth, which include several series on Australian and international suffrage movements and key figures, including the militant suffrage campaign in Great Britain.

Other significant collections related to women's suffrage, and subsequent feminist and social activism include the Papers of Ruby Rich, the Papers of Jessie Street and the Papers of Catherine Helen Spence. Some influential figures included in this guide, such as Vida Goldstein, are only minimally represented in the National Library collection, but the small collections about these women form contribute to record of how they advocated for enfranchisement, and to improve women's rights in general.

The organisational collections included in this guide highlight the work that was an extension of women's enfranchisement. For example, the papers of the Australian Federation of Women Voters are a documentary record of how Australian women used their enfranchisement to lobby on a wide range of political and social welfare issues, and to promote female delegates to international forums including the League of Nations and United Nations.

View our holdings

Most of these items are available for viewing in our Special Collections Reading Room. In order to request items you will need to be registered as a reader, which can be done online. Items need to be requested online via the Library's catalogue prior to your visit. If you are unable to visit the Library in person, you can access information about our holdings via the Library's catalogue. Following is a list of all of the Library's currency holdings. Each entry is linked to the individual catalogue record which provides a description of the holding and a link to finding aids and digitised images, where available.

Contacting us

Have you uncovered new information relating to any of our collections? If so, we would like to hear from you. You can contact us via our Ask a Librarian service.