FRIDAY SEPTEMBER 6
Responses to Bushfires in South Australia from the 1820s to Federation – ELIZABETH BOR
The impacts of many twentieth and twenty-first-century bushfires in South Australia have been well-documented. Yet little has been written about bushfires in colonial South Australia. Searches in newspapers, police station journals, council minutes and memoirs revealed 450 bushfire reports, and evidence of anxiety about uncontrolled fire throughout the colonial era.
The research revealed that Aboriginal people sometimes weaponised fire to resist European occupation. Although rural colonists learned some fire-management skills from Aboriginal people, they turned to European solutions to develop bushfire prevention, mitigation and management strategies.
During the colonial era, three trends emerged. The colonists realised that their own activities were contributing to the outbreak of bushfires. They did learn from past experiences but the effectiveness of their strategies was limited. By the eve of Federation, South Australians had largely accepted that bushfires were an inherent risk to lives and property in country districts. They tried to minimise their losses with vigilance and communal firefighting, and developed an ethos of collaboration in adversity.
About the Speaker: Elizabeth Bor was a primary school teacher and teacher librarian. While in transition to retirement, she enrolled at the University of Adelaide and completed an undergraduate degree with a history major, Honours and a Master of Philosophy.