Geoffrey Curgenven Bolton (5 November 1931 – 3 September 2015) was an Australian historian, academic and writer.

Life

He attended Wesley College, Perth from 1943 to 1947. He published works on Australian history, authoring 13 books, his final being ''Land of Vision and Mirage: Western Australia since 1826''. His book, ''Daphne Street'', published by

Fremantle Press Fremantle Press (formerly known as Fremantle Arts Centre Press) is an independent publisher in Western Australia. Fremantle Press was established by the Fremantle Arts Centre in 1976. It focuses on publishing Western Australian writers and writin ...

, describes his early surrounds, and is an attempt to write national history at the local level. He was a frequent contributor to

radio in Western Australia This is a list is of local medium wave radio broadcast stations, by date of establishment in Western Australia, as they developed from the 1920s to the 1940s. 6WF, 1924 Established by Wesfarmers in 1924, 6WF was eventually taken over by the ...

and did much to bring

Western Australian history The human history of Western Australia commenced between 40,000 and 60,000 years ago with the arrival of Aboriginal Australians on the northwest coast. The first inhabitants expanded across the east and south of the continent. The first record ...

and socio-political development to life. Part of his career was spent setting up the Australian Studies Centre (now the Menzies Centre) at the University of London in the United Kingdom. He was Chairperson of the

Western Australian Maritime Museum The Western Australian Museum is a statutory authority within the Culture and the Arts Portfolio, established under the ''Museum Act 1969''. The museum has six main sites. The state museum, now known as WA Museum Boola Bardip, officially re-ope ...

's Archaeology Advisory Committee. Bolton was a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society (London), Fellow of the Academy of the Social Sciences in Australia, Fellow of the Australian Academy of the Humanities, and Fellow of the Royal Western Australian Historical Society. He served as the Chancellor of Murdoch University from 2002 to 2006. In 2008, he published a single-volume short history of Western Australia since the start of British settlement in 1826, covering the social, cultural, political and economic development of the most geographically isolated area in the world. Bolton died on 4 September 2015, in Perth, at the age of 83. He was married to Carol Grattan and has two sons and five grandchildren.

Awards

Bolton was the recipient of several prestigious awards including his appointment as Officer of the Order of Australia (1984) in recognition of distinguished service to Australia for his services to education. In 2001, Bolton received the Centenary of Federation prize at the New South Wales Premier's History Awards for ''

Edmund Barton Sir Edmund "Toby" Barton, (18 January 18497 January 1920) was an Australian politician and judge who served as the first prime minister of Australia from 1901 to 1903, holding office as the leader of the Protectionist Party. He resigned to ...

: The One Man for the Job'', a biography of Australia's first Prime Minister. The one-off prize was intended to recognize a major work contributing to the understanding of Australian political, social and cultural issues during the Federation period. The biography was also shortlisted for the Colin Roderick Award (2000) and the National Biography Award (2001). Since 2004, the State Records Office of Western Australia has hosted The Geoffrey Bolton Lecture series, acknowledging his service on various committees of the State Archive and his long period of use and promotion of archives. The aims of the Geoffrey Bolton Lecture are to encourage the expression of ideas and debate about the meaning and nature of history, culture and society, grounded in archival research; and to provide archival and historical context to national debate on contemporary issues. In recognition of his major contribution to Australian history and the community, Bolton was named the Western Australia's 2006

Australian of the Year The Australian of the Year is a national award conferred on an Australian citizen by the National Australia Day Council, a not-for-profit Australian Governmentowned social enterprise. Similar awards are also conferred at the State and Territo ...

Memorials

There are a number of eponymous memorials to Bolton. In 2014 a new street, central to the

Elizabeth Quay Elizabeth Quay is a mixed-use development project in the Perth#cbd, Perth central business district. Focusing on an area located on the north shore of Perth Water near the landmark Swan Bells, the precinct being developed by the project was nam ...

waterfront development, then under construction, was named ''Geoffrey Bolton Avenue'' in acknowledgement of the contribution made by Bolton to conserve, record and teach the history of Western Australia. At a dedication ceremony held on 21 February 2017,

Murdoch University Murdoch University is a public university in Perth, Western Australia, with campuses also in Singapore and Dubai. It began operations as the state's second university on 25 July 1973, and accepted its first undergraduate students in 1975. Its n ...

renamed its library ''The Geoffrey Bolton Library'' to recognize Bolton's long association with the University.

Publications

Citations to this author abbreviate his name to G. C. Bolton. * '' Alexander Forrest: his life and times''. 1958 * ''The Passing of the Irish Act of Union: a study in parliamentary politics''. 1966 * ''

Dick Boyer Sir Richard James Fildes (Dick) Boyer, (24 August 1891 – 5 June 1961) was an Australian Pastoral farming, grazier and broadcasting chairman, chief. From 1945 until his death he served as chairman of the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, Aus ...

, an Australian humanist''. 1967 * ''A fine country to starve in''. 1972 (reprinted 1994, ) * ''Britain's Legacy Overseas''. 1973 * ''Spoils and spoilers : Australians make their environment 1788–1980''. 1981 (second edition 1992, ) * ''History of

Royal Perth Hospital Royal Perth Hospital (RPH) is a 450-bed adult and teaching hospital located on the northeastern edge of the central business district of Perth, Western Australia. History The hospital traces its history back to the first colonial hospital, whi ...

''. 1982 * ''It had better be a good one : the first ten years of Murdoch University''. 1985 * '' John Ramsden Wollaston: the making of a pioneer priest''. 1985 * ''The Oxford history of Australia. Volume 5, 1942–1988 : the middle way''. 1990 * ''Who owns Australia's past?''. 1993 * ''Daphne Street''. 1996 * ''Claremont: a history''. 1999 * ''

: The One Man for the Job''. 2000 * ''The Fuss That Never Ended: The Life and Work of Geoffrey Blainey''. 2003 (joint author with Stuart Macintyre,

Deborah Gare According to the Book of Judges, Deborah ( he, דְּבוֹרָה, ''Dəḇōrā'', "bee") was a prophetess of the God of the Israelites, the fourth Judge of pre-monarchic Israel and the only female judge mentioned in the Bible. Many scholars ...

and

Tom Stannage Charles Thomas Stannage, AM (14 March 19444 October 2012) was a prominent Western Australian historian, academic, and Australian rules football player. He edited the major work ''A New History of Western Australia'', which was published in 198 ...

) * ''May it please Your Honour : a history of the Supreme Court of Western Australia 1861–2005''. 2005 (with Geraldine Byrne) * ''Land of Vision and Mirage: Western Australia since 1826''. 2008 * "A thousand miles away" * ''

Paul Hasluck Sir Paul Meernaa Caedwalla Hasluck, (1 April 1905 – 9 January 1993) was an Australian statesman who served as the 17th Governor-General of Australia, in office from 1969 to 1974. Prior to that, he was a Liberal Party politician, holding min ...

: A Life''. 2014

Academic career

* Educated at the University of Western Australia and Oxford University * Research Fellow at the Australian National University in 1957 * Senior Lecturer at Monash University in 1962 * Professor of Modern History at the University of Western Australia in 1966 * Foundation Professor of History at

in 1973 * Pro Vice-Chancellor of Murdoch University from 1973 to 1975 * Dean of the School of Social Inquiry at Murdoch University from 1976 to 1978 * Visiting Commonwealth Fellow at St John's College, Cambridge 1978 and 1979. * Professor and head of the Australian Studies Centre at the University of London from 1982 until 1985 * Professor of Australian History at the University of Queensland in 1989 * Professor of History at Edith Cowan University, Western Australia * Retired from academia in 1996 *

Chancellor Chancellor ( la, cancellarius) is a title of various official positions in the governments of many nations. The original chancellors were the of Roman courts of justice—ushers, who sat at the or lattice work screens of a basilica or law cou ...

of Murdoch University from July 2002 to November 2006.

References

* ''Citation for Fellowship: Geoffrey Curgenven Bolton'' in ''Early Days'' 11(3), 1997. {{DEFAULTSORT:Bolton, Geoffrey 1931 births 2015 deaths Historians from Western Australia Officers of the Order of Australia Fellows of the Royal Historical Society Fellows of the Academy of the Social Sciences in Australia Writers from Perth, Western Australia People educated at Wesley College, Perth University of Western Australia alumni Monash University faculty Historians of Australia Edith Cowan University faculty University of Queensland faculty Alumni of the University of Oxford Australian National University faculty Australian Book Review people Fellows of the Australian Academy of the Humanities