Category: Recent News

The Royal Historical Society of Victoria and Gender Equity Victoria’s Put Her Name On It campaign have released a free, downloadable toolkit enabling anyone to run a session recognising outstanding women in their community.

Across Victoria, countless women shaped our communities, our streets, our suburbs — yet their names are missing from the public spaces they helped build. A new, free toolkit by the Royal Historical Society of Victoria (RHSV) and Gender Equity Victoria’s Put Her Name On It campaign is designed to change that,

On behalf of the Council of the Royal Historical Society of Victoria (RHSV), President, Robert Pascoe, is pleased to announce Dr Steven Cooke has been appointed to the role of Executive Director.

Dr Cooke brings to this role many years of experience in the cultural heritage field.

The RHSV was formed in 1909 to advance how Victorians understand our history.

It serves as a catalyst for the 340 historical societies across the state,

The Victorian Community History Awards (VCHA) will not run in 2025. We hope they will return in 2026. Stay tuned. 

The RHSV, in a joint statement with the National Trust of Australia (Victoria), call on the Victorian Government to ensure that the state’s planning reforms deliver more housing without sacrificing the heritage, character, and green spaces that make our neighbourhoods liveable and loved.

We invite our supporters to join us in this advocacy. Read the full media release below, and email your local MP to make your concern heard.

National Trust of Australia (Victoria) and Royal Historical Society of Victoria Joint Statement on Victorian Planning Reforms 

Quotes attributable to Collette Brennan,

Dear Members

We look forward to welcoming as many members as possible to the RHSV’s Special General Meeting (SGM) and Annual General Meeting (AGM) on Tuesday 27 May 2025. To register for the SGM and AGM or to record your apologies please click here.  You can use the same link to book for the Weston Bate Oration which follows the AGM (with a short break for refreshments).

On Tuesday evening,

Welcome Claudia Donovan, the newest member of the RHSV team! She will be joining us mid-May to start her new role as images collection officer. We have a huge amount of material catalogue and preserve, so we welcome the extra hands to help us with it.

Claudia holds a Master of Cultural Heritage and Museum Studies with a specialisation in Curatorship and Collections, alongside a Bachelor of Arts (Honours) in History, Sociology, and Anthropology.

Congratulations to everyone who took part in the 2024 Victorian Community History Awards!

We extend our heartfelt thanks for your invaluable contributions to our collective understanding of Victorian history. We know that the amount of work that goes into the creation of submissions like these. Your efforts ensure that the stories of the past continue to inspire and educate future generations.

Click here to see the full website for all the details of the winners,

Our two newest staff members will be joining us next week.

Oliver Sperlich, who will be filling a brand new position as Operations/Office Manager, will work Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday. Oliver brings splendid expertise in IT and technology as well an impressive entrepreneurial ability. Oliver will be looking after our IT, the building and all that entails and the hirers of our space as well as events and projects. Members will get many opportunities to meet Oliver over the coming months.

The RHSV bookshop is getting more successful every year – in 2024 our sales increased by 50% on 2023 which was already a record year. And it is getting too large for the staff to look after it so we are looking for volunteers to make sure our sales keep on increasing. We have two brilliant volunteers in place but need at least 3 more.

There are a myriad of jobs associated with the bookshop –

31 March 2025 is the extended deadline for lodging the annual not-for-profit self-review return. Nearly all historical societies, if they are an incorporated association, will need to lodge this return. However, if your society is already a charity it is exempt from lodging a self-review. By lodging this return you are proving to the ATO that your society is exempt from paying income tax. 

This is the link to the page on the ATO website where it outlines the steps you take to lodge the review.

The latest RHSV article in CBD News has been published and can be read in full here (scroll down to P20). Written by Julie Bevan

The man in his coat and stovepipe hat drives his cart away from us down the empty street towards the nothingness at the centre of the image, leaving only the newsboy to stare towards us sentinel-like defending his territory. And defending his territory was a necessary skill.