In Australia’s colonial period, before there were universities, technical and agricultural colleges, and when post-elementary schooling was uncommon, there were few institutions that were able to disseminate advanced or “useful knowledge”. This was a period in which more scientific approaches to agricultural, mining and later, industrial production, were increasingly advocated. Spreading the new knowledge, was haphazard, often dependent on what recent immigrants, newspapers, periodicals and books arriving from Britain had to contribute.… Continue Reading »