What We Do And How We Do It
The Western Australian Explorers’ Diaries Project is making available the reports and journals of all Western Australian exploration from 1826 through to the present.
These reports and journals are compiled, checked and then published in a masterful series titled Western Australian Exploration.
Each volume of Western Australian Exploration comprises exact transcriptions of explorers’ diaries, fieldbooks or journals.
Each diary is preceded by a summary of the exploration and includes appendixes on flora, fauna, firearms, mode of transport, and navigation. Interspersed among the diaries in each volume is a great variety of maps, illustrations and photographs.
The transcript of each diary is been taken from source documents, ensuring accuracy and validity.
The first volume covers exploration from the time of first settlement in Western Australia at King Georges Sound in 1826 through to 1835. Coupled with the next chronological volume, Western Australian Exploration 1836-1845, they cover the initial exploration in the Swan River Colony, driven by the settlers’ need for agricultural land and the desire to find out what was around them.
Western Australian Exploration 1846-1859 and the discrete volume of Surveyor General John Septimus Roe’s explorations record the unveiling of the rich agricultural lands to the north, south and south east of Perth. The diaries in Exploration Eastward 1860-1869 show the search for pastoral land to the east of the settled districts, and for a possible route through to the eastern colonies. To the Golden Land brings together all the diaries that led to the finding of the fabulous goldfields and beyond.
The epic Due North combines for the first time ever, the journals of those who opened up the Gascoyne, Ashburton and Pilbara.
The exploration of the Kimberley and the epic desert journeys follow. Exploration by horse, by camel and by motor vehicle continued until well into the 20th century.
As part of the Western Australian Exploration series but discrete in themselves are the journals of major expeditions (Robert Austin, John Brockman, Herbert Basedow, Knut Dahl, H.W. Hill, Erik Mjoberg, George Fletcher Moore, David Lindsay, Samuel Hübbe, and A.W. Canning ).
Western Australia Exploration is an ongoing series that extends into the modern era.