Catherine Helen SpencePrint Page

The sculpture commemorates Catherine Spence (1825 - 1910), the social and political reformer.

Between 1854 and 1889, Catherine Spence produced seven novellas and a religious allegory. Her first work "Clara Morison: A Tale of South Australia” during the Gold Fever (1854) was the first novel about Australia written by a woman.

Spence`s earliest writings were published anonymously or under her brother’s name. However by the mid 1860s she was publishing under her own name and in 1878 this resulted in an offer of regular employment on the literary pages of the "South Australian register". Her other sphere of interest was social and educational reform.

In 1872, with Caroline Emily Clark, she established and ran the Boarding-Out Society for orphaned, destitute and reformed delinquent children committed to the Industrial School. She was a member of the East Torrens School Board and in 1880 wrote the first South Australian social studies textbook for schools. The Laws We Live Under. She also participated in the work of the State Children`s Council, established in 1886.

Location

Details

Dedication