In 1997 Brigitte Muir became the first Australian woman to conquer Mount Everest and the first Australian to climb the Seven Summits – the highest peaks on each of the seven continents. Her motto, 'We must live our dreams, not dream our lives', is based on a quote from Stendhal (the...
Dame Mary Gilmore (16 August 1865 – 3 December 1962) was a prominent Australian socialist poet and journalist. She also campaigned for better working conditions for working women, for children's welfare and for a better deal for indigenous Australians. It is Gilmore's image that appears on the Australian $10 note,...
Arthur Merric Bloomfield Boyd, AC, OBE (24 July 1920 – 24 April 1999) was born at Murrumbeena, Victoria and became one of the leading Australian painters of the late 20th century. A member of one of the most renowned artistic dynasties of Australian art history, Boyd was influenced by...
Judith Wright (born 31 May, 1915) was a prolific Australian poet, critic, and short-story writer. She was also an uncompromising environmentalist and social activist campaigning for Aboriginal land rights. She believed that the poet should be concerned with national and social problems.
Judith Arundell Wright was born near Armidale, New...
Florence Broadhurst was born in rural Queensland in 1899. Initially in her career, she was a singer, winning local eisteddfords – the first group she joined was known as the “Diggers” who performed in Toowoomba. In 1922 she joined a comedy sextet known as the "Globe Trotters" and later...
Jessica Watson, (born 18 May 1993) is an Australian sailor. She resides in Buderim, Queensland. In May 2010, she unofficially became the youngest person to sail non-stop and unassisted around the world.
Watson departed from Sydney on 18 October 2009, heading eastbound over the Pacific Ocean, Atlantic Ocean and the...
Uncle Bob Randall was born around 1929 in the bush of the Central Desert region of the Northern Territory (NT), Australia. He is a“Tjilpi” (special teaching uncle) of the Yankunytjatjara Nation and one of the listed traditional keepers of the great monolith, Uluru. At about age 7, Bob was...
David Helfgott was born in Melbourne to Polish-Jewish parents. He became known as a child prodigy after his father started teaching him the piano when he was five. When he was ten years old he studied under Frank Arndt, a Perth piano teacher, and won several local competitions—sometimes alone...
Archer was born Robyn Smith in Prospect, South Australia. She began singing at four years old and singing professionally from 12 years old, everything from folk and pop and graduating to blues, rock, jazz and cabaret. She graduated from Adelaide University and immediately took up a full-time singing career....
Gillian Armstrong was born in Melbourne, Victoria on December 18, 1950. She was the middle child of a local real estate agent father and a primary school teacher mother. Her father was a frustrated photographer who, whilst unable to follow his dreams professionally, always practiced as an amateur (Armstrong reminiscences...
