Commemorative Note: 'The Right Wing Won't Write'1: "Labour History" in 1962

Abstract

The first issue of Labour History, then called the Bulletin of the Australian Society for the Study of Labour History, appeared in January 1962. There were to be two more produced in 1962, one in May and one in November. This commemorative note looks at these first three issues and the circumstances surrounding their publication. Bob Gollan and other labour historians established the Australian Society for the Study of Labour History in a lecture room at the University of Queensland in Brisbane in May 1961. The meeting was held against the background of a Congress of the Australian and New Zealand Association for the Advancement of Science (ANZAAS). British labour historians formed a similar society in 1960 and the visit to Australia of its inaugural president, Asa Briggs, encouraged the Australians to form their own society. Australia's political and intellectual environment also assisted the foundation of the Society. The conservative ascendency in Australian post-war politics heightened the need for historians to assist the labour movement by examining the 'lessons of history' and highlighting the positive contribution of labour to Australian society. Further the decline of the Communist Party in Australia and Britain had resulted in the disarray of the Left. The weakening of ideological divisions also encouraged dialogue between Marxist and non-Marxist labour historians. The Australian society provided a focal point for labour historians and drew in political scientists and industrial relations practitioners.2 As Robin Gollan later noted, 'the Labour History Society was a kind of popular front, politically and intellectually'.3 While the use of 'labour' rather than Tabor' in the name of the Society reflected a preference for the English rather than US spelling, there was a desire avoid the Society being viewed as an 'offshoot' or 'adjunct' of the Australian Labor Party.4 The Society was based at the Australian National University (ANU) and published the first issue of its journal, the Bulletin of the Australian Society for the Study of Labour History, in January 1961. An important objective of the Bulletin was to combat the 'yawning chasm' of writings on Australian labour history. The founders of the Bulletin did not see it as a rival to established journals such as Historical Studies, but as covering an underdeveloped niche in Australian history. The Bulletin also provided an important medium for information on the Society's activities. There was an interest in developing a bulletin for Society news and a separate academic journal, but this was viewed as beyond the Society's resources. Eric Fry, from the History Department at the ANU, was the editor of the first three issues.5 In the first issue of the Bulletin, Gollan, the inaugural president of the Australian Society, reviewed the state of Australian labour history. He expressed concern about its narrow limits the emphasis on biography and political history. However, he noted that there was still work to be done even here. For example, there were no suitable biographies of trade union leaders. Gollan called for a broader approach that included the social history of the working class, class relations, the history of popular culture and histories of major trade unions.6 VII