History

For much of its history, the Athenaeum was a very male affair. It was eight years before a woman was even mentioned in the minutes. That woman was Mrs Beale, the live-in ‘keeper’ appointed to look after the Athenaeum and Mining Museum when it moved into the former Post and Telegraph Office. She was there in 1872 when juniors, both male and female, were admitted as members for the first time. She was there in 1873 when the cellar flooded and a man was hired to empty it. She was there for the whole period when the Athenaeum was expanding its services to also include a lending library.

Appointed on 1 November 1871, Mrs Beale wasn’t paid a wage. Instead she got a roof over her head, with the exclusive use of two rooms, water, firewood for heating and cooking, enough kerosene for lighting one lamp and a piece of ground out the back for growing her vegetables. In exchange, she had to:

• keep the Reading Room and Museum clean and tidy
• light and attend to the fire and lamp when needed
• open the doors daily to subscribers at 9am and close them at 9pm unless subscribers were in the room, in which case closing time was extended to 10pm
• make sure that only subscribers used the room, unless the committee directed otherwise
• keep a general oversight of the property when the librarian, Mr Freeman, wasn’t there.

Perhaps Mrs Beale continued the routine of locking up the chess and drafts boards on Saturday nights and replaced them on tables on Monday mornings as had been done before the move. Perhaps she attended the readings held fortnightly on the winter nights of 1873 and ’74. These were hugely popular − the Athenaeum was ‘crowded to overflow’ for the reading on English, Irish and Scottish poets:

“… every available corner” was densely packed, even the book shelves were taken possession of by the younger portion of the audience, and many could not even squeeze into the porch, and either went away disappointed, or (as some did) patiently stood outside … rather than miss the intellectual treat provided by Mr Massey, who was in admirable cue, and thoroughly entertained his audience, moving them alternately to tears and laughter (Tarrengower Times August 23, 1873).

Mrs Beale may have been among the crowd; undoubtedly she was there afterwards cleaning up before opening the next morning.

Mrs Beale would have seen the flourishing of the Mining Museum. The institution already had the beginnings of a museum before moving into the more spacious building, and, over the next few years, received more donations of minerals from local, interstate and international mines. The purpose of the collection, as reported in The Tarrangower Times in Feb 1872, was ‘to assist the miner in determining the character of the various products of our mining district’.

The most long-lasting change Mrs Beale would have seen, however, was the introduction of a lending library. In 1866, while there was still as yet no space to have a library, there was already the possibility of moving into the old Post and Telegraph Office. In anticipation of the move, the committee appointed Mr Freeman at £10 pounds per annum to clean and keep the reading room orderly, file the papers daily and ‘in the event of a library being established in the room, to attend at such hours as the committee may appoint for the purpose of receiving and giving out the books’.

The committee also decided to spend £20 pounds on buying books. They put a notice in the reading room asking for members’ suggestions on what books to select and also asking for contributions towards a library. On moving into the new premises in 1871 the library became a reality. Borrowing hours were set at 9.30 to 10am daily and 3.30 to 4.30pm on Wednesdays and Saturdays. The committee continued to solicit donations of books and to purchase them when it could.

In June 1875 Mrs Beale became the librarian after Mr Freeman left the district. She was paid £10 a year as was Mr Freeman before her. The lending library she presided over was focussed on colony-building with titles such as ‘New Rural Industries’, ‘Mineral Statistics’, ‘Patents and Patentees’. Later there were government publication such as Smyth’s ‘Aborigines of Victoria’ and Shillinglaw’s ‘Historical Records of Port Phillip’. There were, however, strict rules for borrowing government publications during the book’s first year in the library: a subscriber had to first submit an application to the Committee for approval, and then, once approved, could borrow for one week only.

Mrs Beale wasn’t there long enough to see the focus of the library begin to change when, in 1887, the committee decided to introduce ‘light literature’. Two pounds (£2) was allocated to buy some novels. If she had been, perhaps she might have read them at night by the light of her kerosene lamp.

Mrs Beale had taken up residence in 1871 when the piece of Crown Land on which the Athenaeum still sits was only temporarily reserved for the then named Athenaeum and Mining Museum. Had she been still there, would she have celebrated in February 1889 when it was announced in the Government Gazette that the site was now permanently reserved for an ‘Athenaeum, Mining Museum and Free Library’? Would she have been proud of her part in the transformation of the Athenaeum into an officially recognised library? But would she also have wondered why it was called a free library when it was only available to subscribers?

We don’t know what happened to Mrs Beale, perhaps she died, or otherwise moved on but in 1883 a Mrs Croft successfully applied to be resident caretaker and librarian, which she volunteered to do for no salary.

Lynda Achren
on behalf of the Maldon Athenaeum Library,
2024

References

Library minutes held in the Maldon Athenaeum Archive Collection. For use within the library only.

National Library of Australia Digitised Newspapers − trove.nla.gov.au

The Tarrangower Times and Maldon and Newstead Advertiser, 14 February 1872, page 2.

Tarrengower Times and Maldon, Newstead, Baringhup, Laanecoorie and Muckleford Advertiser, 23 August 1873, page 2.

Tarrengower Times and Maldon, Newstead, Baringhup, Laanecoorie and Muckleford Advertiser, 18 October 1873, page 2.

Victoria Government Gazette, n56, 18 August 1871, page 1351.

Victoria Government Gazette, n28, 15 March 1889, page 945.