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Book Cover
Book
Author Luck, Peter, 1944- author

Title Australian icons : things that make us what we are / Peter Luck
Published Port Melbourne : William Heinemann Australia, 1992
©1992

Copies

Location Call no. Vol. Availability
 W'PONDS  994 Luc/Ait  AVAILABLE
Description vii, 200 pages : illustrations (some colour), facsimilies., portraits. ; 29 cm
Contents Includes index
Summary “What are the most precious relics of Australia's past? Phar Lap's heart? Ned Kelly's armour? Nellie Melba's tiara? Or could it be the stern post of the Endeavour - an amorphous half-rotted log of wood, part of which has actually been taken to the moon. No-one but an Australian could understand the mystical significance of a tiny earthenware jar that held something called Vegemite in the 1920s, or the fairly ordinary looking lump of willow, split at the bottom, but which bears the magical signature Don Bradman, and which once hit enough cricket balls around an oval to make up 452 runs not out in one amazing innings in 1930. Australian Icons contains an extraordinary collection of objects, some magnificent, some tatty, some amusing, some poignant, each of which has had a significant part to play in the Australian consciousness
In all, one hundred such hallowed objects have been gathered together to create this unique collection - cultural icons ranging from our oldest boomerang, preserved in a peat swamp for 10,000 years, to Paula Stafford's bikini which helped shape the moral climate of a nation trying to be modern. Here you can find the pen that signed the Proclamation which made Australia a nation, Captain Bligh's amazing diary, Pavlova's pointe shoe, the first Victa lawn-mower and the Hill's Hoist, the original words of 'Waltzing Matilda' and 'My Country', the first Holden and the oldest European relic of our history, Dirk Hartog's plate. These relics are lovingly preserved in dozens of different institutions in Australia and around the world but here they can be seen all at once for the first time.”--Book jacket
Analysis Australia History Miscellanea
Australia Social life and customs
History
Monuments
Movable cultural heritage
Popular culture
Notes Includes index
Bibliography Includes index
Subject Australians -- Collectibles.
Culture.
Icons -- Australia.
National characteristics, Australian.
Popular culture -- Australia -- Miscellanea.
Popular culture -- Australia.
Relics -- Australia.
SUBJECT Australia -- History http://id.loc.gov/authorities/subjects/sh85009591 -- Miscellanea. http://id.loc.gov/authorities/subjects/sh99001944
Australia -- Civilization. http://id.loc.gov/authorities/subjects/sh87002863
Australia -- History. http://id.loc.gov/authorities/subjects/sh85009591
Australia http://id.loc.gov/authorities/names/n79021326 -- Popular culture -- Miscellanea
Australia http://id.loc.gov/authorities/names/n79021326 -- Popular culture
Australia -- Social life and customs. http://id.loc.gov/authorities/subjects/sh2008114315
LC no. 93199360
ISBN 085561451X
Other Titles Australian icons, 100 precious relics from Australia's past