Guide to Photographs

New buildings for the Research School of Physical Sciences were completed in 1952

The University Archives holds a considerable quantity of photographs documenting the history of The Australian National University. The images include many of the ANU site from the early 1950s, group staff photographs and construction progress shots of buildings including University House and the Menzies Library building. There are also images of academic and ceremonial events, dating from the Easter Conference in 1948 (a major event in the academic planning of ANU) and the laying of the foundation stones in October 1949.

The photographic collections contain many images taken by the Australian News and Information Bureau, the Commonwealth Government agency responsible for promoting Australia overseas. This includes a set of albums of Canberra scenes used in the ANU London Office in the early 1950s to show prospective staff what to expect when they arrived.

Particular strengths include black and white prints of ANU places and people in the 1950s and 1960s and aerial views of the Acton campus and its environs.

There is a basic list of subjects of photographs in the Archives and this will be improved in 2002. If the University Archives does not hold a particular ANU image you are searching for, we may be able to help you locate it.