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ROYAL GEOGRAPHICAL SOCIETY of SOUTH AUSTRALIA
THE ESTABLISHMENT OF GEOGRAPHICAL SOCIETYS IN AUSTRALIA

A little over 25 years after the esatablishment of the [Royal Geographical Society] in London in 1830 the leading men of the burgeoning Australian colonies were looking to the establishment of their own geographical society. There was some support for the proposed society being a branch of the Royal Geographical Society in London, but ultimately 'a new entirely independent organisation' was formed with William John Stephens, Professor of Geology at Sydney University, as President.

The inaugural meeting of the New South Wales Branch of the Geographical Society of Australasia was held on 22 June 1883 attended by over 700 people. Monsieur E. Marin La Meslee, a committee member of the Société de Géographic de Paris, addressed the new Society: 'Situated as we are here, in the centre of that part of the earth's surface which is least known ... there was before an Australian Geographic Society enough useful and interesting work to undertake'.

THE SPREAD TO OTHER COLONIES

Almost immediately the founders began to ensure that branches were established in the other colonies. A Victorian Branch was formed with an inaugural meeting taking place on 18 October 1884. The Victorian President was the well-known botanist Baron Ferdinand von Mueller. In July 1885 a branch was formed in Queensland. The newly-elected President, former explorer the Hon. Sir Augustus Charles Gregory, delivered the foundation address on 'Australasian Exploration' at the Brisbane Town Hall on 8 December 1885.

At the same time, overtures were being made to the leading citizens of Adelaide by Baron von Mueller for the formation of a branch in South Australia.

FOUNDATION IN SOUTH AUSTRALIA

ESTABLISHMENT
At a preliminary meeting held in the Banqueting Hall of the Adelaide Town Hall on 10 July 1885 the Geographical Society of Australasia, South Australian Branch, was founded. Former Premier, Sir Henry Ayers, considered 'Their first duty would be to make themselves acquainted with South Australia, and having done that to make themselves acquainted with neighbouring countries, not only for their own information, but in order that knowledge might be disseminated far and wide.' It was not South Australia's first learned society. In 1834 the South Australian Literary and Scientific Association was formed in London by intending emigrants before the colony itself had been established. The Adelaide Philosophical Society was founded in 1856 and later became The Royal Society of South Australia in 1880. The Royal Society was, and still is, the main avenue for publishing the results of scientific research in South Australia. The prominent pioneer and businessman Sir Samuel Davenport, himself minor explorer with Colonel Peter Egerton Warburton in 1858, was elected the first President of the South Australian Branch of the Geographical Society of Australasia.

FIRST MEETING
The new Society's Patron, Sir William Cleaver Francis Robinson, Governor of South Australia, presided over the inaugural meeting in the Adelaide Town Hall on Thursday 22 October 1885. He suggested that besides organising further explorations, the Society would do good work 'in preserving memorials of the men who risked — and many of them lost — their lives in exploring the vast tract of desert country in Australia'.

Sir Samuel Davenport's inaugural address consisted of a complete survey, illustrated by lantern slides, of exploration of the Pacific region from the time of Columbus to the Australian explorers. Bringing his survey down to 1884 he concluded 'as we see the amount of area of Australia unveiled to us, we see also the blank spaces of varied magnitude awaiting discovery.' New exploration, and the preservation of memorials of those explorers who had gone before, had clearly been placed high on the new Society's agenda.

SOUTH AUSTRALIAN SOCIETY’S OBJECTIVES
The establishment of the South Australian Branch had swelled to 95 the number of geographical societies in existence throughout the world by 1885, and its objectives were little different. These were to promote the advancement of all aspects of geographical science, physical and human, historical and contemporary. Whilst preserving a world-wide view, a particular interest was to be maintained on Australasia, its colonial settlement and exploration. The Society also saw itself in an educational role, disseminating geographical knowledge by means of public lectures, publications and the collection of records for research. These objectives remain the same today.

ROYAL TITLE
In 1886 Sir Edward Strickland, President of the New South Wales Branch, on behalf of all the Australasian branches, asked Lord Carrington, Governor of NSW, to make approaches to Queen Victoria for permission to use the title 'Royal' by the Geographical Society of Australasia. This was granted on 18 October 1886 and the Society in Adelaide became The Royal Geographical Society of Australasia, South Australian Branch. It became an Incorporated Society on 16 July 1918.

The BRANCH WITHOUT A TREE

An Australian parent body had always been intended but it never eventuated and the branshes wandered on alone, some falling by the wayside. Ironically, the founding New South Wales Branch was the first to go, ceasing to exist in 1907.

The Victorian Branch, weakened by the demise of its active founding members, was eventually absorbed by the Historical Society of Victoria (which then assumed the'Royal' title) on 1 December 1920.

The two surviving branches, Queensland and South Australia, were left as branthes without a tree, so to speak. They celebrated their centenaries in 1985 with a joint meeting held appropriately at Haddon Comer- that piece of Souh Australia that juts into Queensland – the two Societies linking hands across the desert.

EXPLORATION
UNLOCKING A CONTINENT

Following on the coat tails of its mentor the Royal Geographical Society in London, the South Australian Society actively encouraged exploration '... for the purpose of exploring the remaining blanks of Australia'. It was the close of the 'heroic' age of Australian exploration and the Society, with its methodical and academic approach to the expeditions with which it became involved, was instrumental in ushering in the 'scientific' exploration era.

Within a few months of its foundation, the Society assisted surveyor- explorer David Lindsay's journey through the unknown portion of the Northern Territory north-east of Charlotte Waters, by providing plant and equipment to enable Lieutenant Dittrich to accompany him as naturalist and botanist.

Over the years a number of expeditions were supported or conducted under the auspices of the Society and in addition, the Society acted as managers for the planning and operation of two major expeditions. The following are a few of the expeditions aided or organised by the Society:

Exploration - Central Australian Exploring and Prospecting Association's Expedition 1887
In conjunction with the Victorian Branch, the Society began to organize an expedition to explore the Lake Amadeus region of Central Australia in 1887. However, insufficient funds were raised and a private company, the Central Australian Exploring and Prospecting Association, was formed, raising the balance of the necessary £5,000 capital. The Expedition, led by Society foundation member William Henry Tietkens, set out from Glen Helen Station, west of Alice Springs, with 12 camels on 16 April 1889.

On reaching the Western Australian border, Tietkens discovered and named Lake Macdonald after the Victorian Branch secretary. Returning east, the party determined the extent of Lake Amadeus, which Tietkens had first visited as second in command to Ernest Giles in 1874. They continued via Mount Olga and Ayers Rock, arriving at Charlotte Waters Telegraph Station on 15 August 1889, where Tietkens telegraphed the Society after an absence of four months. The Expedition added much to the geography of Central Australia but the geological samples revealed no mineral prospects and the botanical specimens added little to the records of Central Australian flora.

Exploration - Elder Scientific Exploration Expedition 1891 & 1993
Possibly the most ambitious Australian expedition of all time was the Elder Scientific Exploration Expedition. Sir Thomas Elder financed the Expedition which was organised and run by the Society. Elder had maintained an active interest in exploration over many years and although he knew there was little prospect of finding good pastoral country, lie was aware that very little scientific work had been done in the Australian deserts. Though many earlier expeditions into the interior had collected plant and animal specimens, and in some cases had naturalists in their parties, the rigours and demands of exploring had resulted in only limited scientific success. Elder believed that, properly organised and led, an expedition could fulfill bodily functions satisfactorily. The Expedition led by David Lindsay, left the railway at Warrina, south of Oodnadatta, on 2 May 1891 on a 6,886 kilometre journey that was to last 12 months. The party was one of the strongest and best equipped expeditions ever sent into inland Australia and consisted of 14 men (three of them scientists) and 44 camels. Conditions for travel were favourable at first, with abundant feed and, fresh water. However, in mid July the Expedition crossed into Western Australia and experienced very difficult drought affected country. Many of the surface waters considered permanent by earlier explorers like Giles, Gosse and Forrest had dried up. After a series of unsuccessful probes into the west and northwest, Lindsay decided to strike southwest to Giles' Queen Victoria Spring. The Spring was reached on 23 September 1891 after one of the longest waterless forced marches in the history of Australian exploration, the camels having covered 868 kilometres on an allowance of only 36 litres of water per animal. They continued on to Fraser Range Station and recuperated before heading north to the Murchison River and the second phase of the Expedition. But the Expedition was dogged by psychological as well as physical problems and matters came to a head on 31 December with the resignation of the scientific officers. Lindsay went to Geraldton and telegraphed the Society for further direction and on 20 January 1892 he was recalled to Adelaide. The Expedition continued eastwards to the Lake Carnegie area under the command of the surveyor, Lawrence Allen Wells. They discovered traces of gold at Lake Way which was soon to be the scene of the Wiluna Goldfield. Elder however, decided to terminate the Expedition on 4 March 1892 and Wells, returning to civilisation in the Murchison District, was notified by telegram that the Expedition was to be abandoned. The Elder Expedition has often been cited as a failure, but its achievements were not insignificant. The scientific results, though variable, were impressive in some disciplines. More than 150 new species of insects were collected and 19 new species of plants were included in the 700 specimens collected by Richard Helms, the naturalist of the party. Collections of land and fresh water molluscs, lichens, fungi birds/mammals and reptiles (116 specimens) were also made. The mammals included several species now extinct in South Australia. Expedition geologist, Victor Streich, made a comprehensive collection of Rocks and minerals and described in detail the geology of the country Traversed. In addition, Helms made some important ethnographic notes On the Aboriginal tribes encountered. The Expedition had also mapped over 200,000 square kilometres of country previously unknown to Europeans. Author of the South Australian Branch, said in his centenary history. The Branch Without a Tree, said that the Society was 'solemnly aware of having participated in a splendid failure, an honourable defeat by the desert'. Almost 100years later in 1993, a small party of Society members relocated Adverse Well in trackless, sand dune country the campsite where Lawrence Wells was forced to abandon most of his equipment in his dash to the Fitzroy River. The members discovered cooking equipment, small arms and ammunition, fragments of scientific instruments, glass photographic plates and more than 50 geological specimens.

Exploration - The Calvert Scientific Exploring Expedition 1896
In 1896 Albert Frederick Calvert, a London mining engineer and author Scientific of two books on Australian exploration who had struck it rich in the Western Australian goldfields, sponsored an expedition into the regions of Central Western Australia left unexplored by the Elder Expedition. In the absence of a geographical society in that colony, the South Australian Branch was asked to organise and manage the expedition. Wells was appointed leader of the Calvert Scientific Exploring Expedition and setting out from Lake Way of his previous explorations, headed north towards the Fitzroy River. Amongst the party of 12 men and 24 camels was Wells' cousin, Charles Wells, second in command; George Lindsay Jones (a nephew of David Lindsay), mineralogist and collector of native vocabularies; and George Arthur Keartland, naturalist and botanist. On entering the Great Sandy Desert, Wells decided to split the party. His cousin and Jones left the main party at Separation Well to reconnoiter country to the west of the main party with the intention of rendezvous in at Warburton's Joanna Spring. Warburton had named the Spring, which had saved the lives of his expedition in 1873, after Joanna BarrSmith, the wife of his sponsor, Thomas Elder. The Spring, however, had been wrongly located on Warburton's map, and Charles Wells and Jones were lost trying to find it in the fearsome heat. The main party, with all Lawrence Wells' surveying experience, were also unable to locate the Spring. Several camels thed in the heat while searching for it and on 31 October 1896, with only 160 litres of water left. Wells decided to make a dash for the Fitzroy River. On reaching Fitzroy Crossing, Wells immediately returned to the field in search of the lost explorers and on his second attempt located the elusive Joanna Spring, ascertaining it had been mapped 24 kilometres too far to the east. He failed to find any trace of his companions. Pastoralist and well renowned bushman, Nathaniel Buchanan, led another search expedition and William Frederick Rudall, surveying in the vicinity of the Oakover River, was also diverted to the cause. Wells undertook another, the fifth search expedition, and eventually located the bothes on 27 May 1897.

Exploration - Crossing the Simpson Desert 1939
‘There is still one patch of Australia where the white man's foot has never trodden, and that is the sandridge desert in the south east corner of the Northern Territory north of Lake Eyre.' These were the words of Dr Cecil Thomas Madigan when he addressed the Society in 1928. The following year the President, industrialist Alfred Allen Simpson (who had been Lord Mayor of Adelaide from 1913-15), contributed generously to the expenses of Madigan's aerial reconnaissance over Lake Eyre and the vast unexplored sandhill desert. After the flights Madigan considered hat the desert and its endless parallel sand dunes '... must surely be one of the most uniform topographical areas in the world'. It was as yet unnamed and Madigan proposed calling it the 'Simpson Desert' after the President of the Society, to which Simpson replied that lie '... would not object to having Iris name attached to so inhospitable a region'. Madigan, with Simpson's financial assistance, led a camel borne scientific expedition across the Simpson Desert in the winter of 1939. His major focus was obtaining information on the natural sciences of the Desert and the party included three scientists and 19 camels. Madigan's route from Charlotte Waters crossed the northern half of the Desert to Birdsville. The arduous journey took over two months, with a waterless stretch of over 400 kilometres, and the scientific results, published by the Royal Society of South Australia, were of considerable importance. Several ABC radio broadcasts were made during the crossing, the link being made possible by a Traeger pedal wireless set. A call was also made to Simpson from near the centre of the Desert.

Exploration - A modern expedition 1993
A particular highlight of recent years was the role the Society played in the Joint Army / Royal Geographical Society Great Sandy Desert Walk during May to July 1993. Five interstate Society members formed the core of the walking party who traversed 880 kilometres with camels, and the President of the Society, traveled with the vehicular support team. Departing from Kintore on the Western Australian Northern Territory border, the expedition traveled across the Great Sandy Desert to Joanna Spring, a place carrying important Links with the Society, and continued through to Broome. The support party had a measure of sophistication undreamed of in the Society's earlier expeditions: six wheeldrive vehicles, refrigerators, HF radios and satellite Global Positioning System navigation units. However, the desert was still as unforgiving as ever and two members had to be airlifted out in a medical evacuation.

Exploration - Memorials to explorers of the century
As the age of Australian exploration drew to a close around the turn of the Society increased its interest in the exploits of past explorers. In recognising the merits of explorers that had gone before its foundation, the Society erected plaques and statues around Adelaide and South Australia to Matthew Flinders, Nicolas Baudin, John A. Horrocks, Edward John Eyre, diaries Sturt, John McDouall-Stuart and, in recent years, to George Woodroffe Goyder.

Exploration - relics and memorabilia
A number of relics associated with early exploration in Australia are held relics and by the Society. Collected over the years, they include memorabilia such memorabilia as compasses, expedition flags, guns, and swords attributed to a number of explorers. Colonel William Light's levelling instrument numbers among the surveying and navigation equipment in the collection along with several compasses and Warburton's box sextant. Of interest are two artificial horizons, used in conjunction with nautical sextants to determine inland positions by explorers and surveyors.

The collection has such oddities as fragments of Captain Charles Sturt's boat, canted on his northern expedition of 1844-45 in search of the mythical inland sea, and two slabs of regrowth from a tree blazed by explorer William Christie Gosse in 1873. Brought in by Tietkens from Glen Edith in 1889, they clearly show, in mirror image, the carved letters 'GOS'.

Another curious item is a piece of pemmican or dried beef that had been jerked by Warburton at Charlotte Waters on his transcontinental journey 1872-74 It was presented to the Society in 1896 by Sir Samuel Davenport to whom Warburton had given it 22 years earlier. Davenport wrote Ón looking at it lately it appears to be as sweet and fresh as ever, so that I conclude it is today as good as ever to cut in thin slices into a tin panakin [sic] and being dissolved in boiling water with a little salt and pepper, to constitute a palatable dish for a bush wanderer'.

A silver-plated engraved whisky flask belonging to the explorer John McKinlay most noted for his searches for the lost explorers Burke and Wills in 1861-62, is among the canteens held by the Society. Another, belonging to William Masters, a member of John McDouall Stuart s party of 1860-61, was found by a surveyor on the Overland Telegraph Line in 1871.

A sad relic is William Coulthard's canteen, containing his pitiful last words scratched on it as he was dying of thirst in March 1858. The message getting more incoherent as each day proceeded reads: '''I never reached water. I do not know [how] long it is since it is I left Scott and Brooks [his companions], but I think it monday bleeding pomp [his horse] to leive on his blood. I took his black horse to look for water and the last thing I can remember is pulling the saddle off him and letting him go — until now is not good - long it may wether 2 or 3 days I do not known I am not shure — my tung is stking to my mouth — and I see what I have rote and know as this is the last time I may have of expressing feelings Blind? Although feeling exu — for want of water - my eyes - to my long - I can see no way I get help'' —'. Coulthard had thed searching for pastoral country to the west of Lake Torrens. His remains, and the message on the canteen, were discovered three months later by the explorer Benjamin Herschel Babbage. A lonely grave—stone now marks the spot

SCIENTIFIC AND GEOGRAPHICAL RESEARCH

In addition to scientific exploring expeditions, the Society has instigated or participated in a number of scientific stuthes. The versatility of the Society's research activities is illustrated by the following:

SOLAR ECLIPSE OBSERVATION
A total eclipse of the sun, which occurred on 21 September 1922, was expected to give excellent opportunities for testing the validity of Einstein's theory of relativity and, as the line of totality crossed Australia from east to west, expeditions from British, American and Australian observatories were organised to conduct observations at several stations across the country.

George Frederick Dodwell, the South Australian Government Astronomer, together with Professor Kerr Grant, led a mixed party of Society members and scientists from the University of Adelaide to Cordillo Downs Station in (the far noth-east of South Australia to observe the eclipse.

They travelled by motor car, set up camp and built an observatory. The weather conditions at all the stations were excellent and valuable observations were made. When the results were co-ordinated, it was announced by some authorities that Einstein's theories had been decisively proved, but it is now accepted dial these particular observations were not confirmatory.

LAKE EYRE FILLING 1950
South Australia's Lake Eyre is normally an expanse of dry salt, despite the huge extent of the internal drainage system dial feeds it.

Madigan had taken a lorry some distance out on the south-eastern crust of the  Lake in 1929 and sunk several bores. He determined the salt crust to be nearly half a metre thick in places and 'would have carried a locomotive'. Madigan concluded that the whole of Lake Eyre could never be flooded at the one time as any waters that reached the Lake would spread out for only a short distance before evaporating. In 1949 widespread heavy rains fell in Queensland over two consecutive seasons and the quantity of water flooding the Cooper and flowing into Lake Eyre led some members of the Society to doubt Madigan's conclusions and aroused speculation as to the  course the water would take in the  dry bed of the Lake, to what extent it would fill the Lake, and how long it would take to evaporate. Clearly an investigation was warranted and as the Federal Government refused to make an RAAF aircraft available, Sir Herbert Mayo, as President, determined that the Society should undertake the work itself.

An aircraft was chartered to investigate the scene, and by 1950 the Lake was full. A Lake Eyre Committee was set up by the Society with Archibald Grenfell Price as Chairman. A key member of the Committee was C. Warren Bonython who organised several field trips to the flooded Lake over the succeeding four years, observing all stages of its drying up.

Members of the South Australian Museum and a number of scientists also participated. The findings of the Committee were published in the  Society's first truly scientific paper: Lake Eyre, South Australia. The Great flooding of 1949-50, published under the editorship of Kenneth Peake-Jones in 1955. This authoritative book, illustrated with black and white photographs, maps and diagrams, received wide acclaim.

LAKE EYRE - THE GREAT FILLING OF, 1974
The Society maintained its interest in Lake Eyre and surveys were carried out by Bonython in 1960 to determine the level of the  lowest point of the  Lake. This was subsequently confirmed as 14.8 metres below sea level at the southern portion of Lake Eyre North. The Committee was reactivated in August 1974 to study the spectacular events unfolding around the Lake. Tills time the convener was the inveterate Warren Bonython.

Exceptional rains, falling simultaneously in the upper catchments of (the Macumba and Neales in South Australia and the Diamantina and Cooper in Queensland, caused another, even greater filling to occur. On this occasion Lake Eyre South was also filled. It was the largest known filling — the Lake holding 32.5 cubic kilometres of water.

Stuthes were made of the climatic conditions giving rise to the filling, the hydrology and salinity levels of the  water, the  form of the lake bed and the redistribution of the salt crust after evaporation. The terrestrial biology of (the area was also investigated together with the aquatic fauna. The protracted period of data collection and collation resulted in the production of a further publication on the Lake by the  Society. The Great Filling of Lake Eyre in 1974 was edited by C. Warren Bonython and A. Stewart Eraser and published in 1989, tills time with colour plates in addition to the maps and diagrams.

THE SOCIETY'S RESOURCES

LIBRARY
It is the Society's Library that distinguishes it from other Australasian societies with similar interests. The diversity, as well as the depth of the collection, makes it unique throughout the world.

The Society's Library started almost immediately after its foundation. Publications from the London Society, the three other Australian Branches together with those from the American, German and Paris Geographical Societies, among others, were received from the outset. By 1898 there were 220 books and upwards of 60 maps in the Society's Library.

Further additions over time specialising in Australian exploration, anthropology, travel and South Australian history have made the Society's Library the largest non-government specialist geographical library in Australia, now numbering over 30,000 volumes and some 800 maps. About 1,200 of the Library's especially valuable and rare books and manuscripts are housed in a separate, secure Rare Book Room. Of these, 861 volumes were printed prior to 1801. The Library is available for reference by the general public. There are reading room facilities for study and trained librarians are on hand to assist with enquiries.

As an aid to researchers, the Library has produced a series of bibliographical references for sale. One of the most popular of these Sources for Genealogy Held in the Library. which was brought out in 1987. The Library has a suprising number of records which are of particular interest to genealogists and holdings include biographical, genealogical and historical material relating to Great Britain, all the Australian States and Territories and New Zealand.

A series of Annotated Bibliographies was produced in 1991, each listing the works held in the Library relating to a particular South Australian explorer. The first four volumes cover the Library's quite considerable holdings on Babbage, Stuart, McKinlay and Sturt.

In the opinion of Valmai Hankel, who had a career as Rare Books Librarian for the State Library of South Australia, ‘The Library, and in particular the York Gate Library, is known nationally and internationally, and helps to bring acclaim and public attention to the Society. Many of its pre-twentieth century books, as well as some of the periodicals and, obviously, the  manuscript items, are not held elsewhere in South Australia or Australia. The Society's Library makes a significant contribution to the State and national information resource'.

Library - The York Gate Library
A source of special pride is the Society's ownership of the world-famous York Gate Library which is part of the Society's Library. Purchased in 1905, this remarkable collection of books and manuscripts relating to many aspects of Pacific exploration, geography and culture, contains original explorers' accounts, British colonial histories, rare maps and atlases and scientific periodicals. The York Gate Library was a private library amassed over a lifetime of collecting by Stephen William Silver (1819-1905), a London shipping merchant. The collection was housed at No 3 York Gate, Silver's London house in Regent's Park.

Silver was a Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society in London and for many years was a member of the Council. He became personally acquainted with many of the explorers who were completing the geographical knowledge of the unknown parts of the world.

So extensive did Silver's collection become that a catalogue of me York Gate Library was published in 1882 with a second edition in 1886. The author, noted bibliographer Edward Augustus Petherick, described the collection as ‘The literature of geography, maritime and inland discovery, commerce and colonisation'. The Society's Library, including (the York Gate Library, is housed in the Royal Geographical Society Rooms adjacent to the State Library's Rare Books and Named Collections section on North Terrace. It is maintained as an 'active' collection with new material continually being acquired by purchase and by exchange with other geographical institutions through-out the world. In addition, growth over thee years has been augmented donations and the bequests of the private libraries of Thomas Gill in 1924 Dr Frederick Lucas Benham in 1939 and more recently, the South Australian regional history collection of the late Jim Faull in 1990.

THE LIBRARY BOOKS

Library - Early works on geography from 1559
The Society's Library contains a most delightful collection of some of the rarest and earliest works on the subject of geography. The ancient Greeks held the belief that the earth was a sphere and indeed, the astronomer, geographer and mathematician Eratosthenes had, in the 3rd Century BC, calculated the circumference of the earth to with in 320 kilometres of the accepted modern measurement. We know this from the extensive writings of Strabo (63 BC23 AD) a Greek philosopher, geographer and historian in Roman times. In the Society's Library is a handsome leather— bound Latin version of the commentaries of Strabo's Geography 'newly translated from the Greek original by Conrado Meresbachio and published in 1523 in Basle by Valentinus Curio. Strabo's books describe, and therefore preserve, the works of the early geographers up until this time. Another early geographical work in the Library, this time in English, is The cosmographical glasse, conteinyng the pleasant principles of cosmographie, geographic, hydrographie, or navigation by William Cuningham (1531-86) printed in London by John Day in 1559. Cuningham, a medical doctor, was also a pioneer surveyor and cartographer, and an early user of the astrolabe, compass and surveyor's chain. Drawings of their use, together with diagrams showing latitude and longitude and the division of the earth into climatic zones (burning, temperate and frozen) can be found gracing the pages of tills learned treatise. The versatile Cuningham was also an engraver and some of the illustrations contained in the volume are his own work. The work of the German geographer and historical cartographer, Philipp Clüver (1580-1622) is also represented in the Library. He was a principal figure in the revival of geographical learning in Europe and attempted to write the first comprehensive modern geography. His Introductio in Universam Geographiam (Introduction to Universal Geography) printed in Amsterdam in 1697 was a standard reference work through to the 18th century. The Society also has an impressive Cluverius Atlas, Tabulae geographicae, quius universa geographia vetus continetur, published in Padua in 1699.

With the emergence of the geographical discipline as an academic study in the universities in (the late 18th and early 19th centuries, the German natural scientist, Alexander von Humboldt (1769-1859), was among the first to write and teach as an academic geographer. His books attempted to order and arrange all geographical knowledge in a systematic fashion. A first edition of Alexander von Humboldt's major work the two volume Kosmos, published in 1845-47, came to the Society through Dr Richard Schomburgk, a distinguished botanist and foundation member of the Society. Humboldt had presented this set to Schomburgk, then Director of the Adelaide Botanic Gardens, who had been associated with him in scientific researches in South America.

Library - Voyages and travels from 1590
Particularly noteworthy in this area is Johann Theodor de Bry's rare series of Eastern and American voyages, Collectiones peregrinationum in Indiam Occidentalem et in Indiam Orientalem, published in Latin in Frankfurt from 1590-1634. The books are magnificently illustrated with many very fine drawings depicting the customs of native peoples encountered, together with some marvelous maps. The de Bry volumes, many of them first editions, contain the journals of a great number of early navigators. Alongside Columbus, Amerigo Vespucci, Drake and Cavendish, is the account of Willem Schouten and Jakob Le Maire's voyage of 1615-17 during which Cape Horn was discovered. It was a voyage of importance to Australia for had it not been for Schouten's reluctance to continue west as Le Maire had intended the east coast of Australia might have been discovered long before Cook. Instead, they sailed north-west, falling in with the south coast of New Guinea. The Society's de Bry works were consulted in 1994 by a United States researcher to assist in the location of a Spanish treasure ship, which sank off the coast of Chile. Two of the best-known collections of voyages of the 16th and 17th centuries in English are those by Richard Hakluyt and Samuel Purchas. Hakluyt's Principall Navigations, Voiages and Discoveries of the English Nation first appeared in London in 1589 and was the Elizabethan geographer's major publication. The Society also owns his much enlarged three volume folio edition of 1599. Hakluyt, regarded as the first professor of modern geography at Oxford, compiled his work by reading and copying every account of a voyage he could find. He consulted with many mariners of the day together with the celebrated Flemish mapmakers Abraham Ortelius and Gerardus Mercator. Hakluyt was a superb editor and translator and his prose reads like poetry, making his Voyages one of the great works in the English language. Purchas published Purchas his Pilgrimage in London 1613 and the Library has the third (1617) edition. Purchas his Pilgrim, Microcosmus or the Histories of Man followed in 1619. After Hakluyt's death in 1616, Purchas acquired a great many of his papers and published them in five volumes in 1625 as Hakluytus Posthumus or Purchas his Pilgrimes; conlayning a history of the World in Sea Voyages and Lande Travells, by Englishmen and Others. Sadly, Purchas was no editor of the calibre of Hakluyt, and many accounts of the voyages, which he edited, are garbled and truncated. Nevertheless, his books, which are all in the Society's Collection, contain first accounts of voyages and travels not to be found elsewhere. One of the books in the Library from Cook's era is A Catalogue of the Different Specimens of Cloth Collected in the Three Voyages of Captain Cook to the Southern Hemisphere compiled by Alexander Shaw and printed in London 1787. It has a particular interest as it is bound with over 30 specimens of actual tapa or bark cloth swatches.

Library - Early works on Australia from 1629
In addition to having the well known accounts of voyages by Cook, Flinders, Peron and Freycinet, (most of which are first editions), the Society's Library has a number of rare and unusual volumes with very early descriptions of the Southern Continent. An early Dutch book is Francois Pelsaert's tragic Ongeluckige Voyagie van't schip 'Batavia' 1628-29 published in Amsterdam in 1648, describing the bizarre saga of the Batavia, which was wrecked, on a reef of the Houtman Abrolhos Islands off the coast of Western Australia in 1629. Another important volume is William Dampier's New Voyage Round the World, London 1697. During this voyage in the Cygnet in 1688, Dampier became one of the first Englishmen to set foot on mainland Terra Australis.

Dampier's account of his second voyage to Australia in the Roebuck was A Voyage to New Holland in the Year 1699, published in London in 1703. The work gave him greater acclaim than the voyage itself, which had failed to achieve much in the way of new discovery. Dampier's works aroused great public interest, which indirectly contributed to the British discovery and early settlement of eastern Australia.

Charles de Brosses, a judge and politician of Dijon, Burgundy, collected accounts of all the voyages made to the South Seas by Spanish, Portuguese, Dutch and British mariners, translating them into French. His work was originally published as the two volume Histoire de Navigation aux Terres Australes in 1756. The first English version, which appeared in 1766, is in the Library and, interestingly enough. Cook had a copy with him. It was one of the most carefully— stuthed books in the Endeavour's Library.

First or early editions of most of the inland Australian explorers' published journals are held in the Library. Those of Major Thomas Livingstone Mitchell, Count Paul Edmund de Strzelecki, Frederick Wilhelm Ludwig Leichhardt, Augustus Charles Gregory and William Landsborough are but a few. Of South Australian interest are a number of first edition accounts by Sturt, Eyre, Stuart and McKinlay.

Amongst fictional works of interest to South Australians in the library is the 1751 edition of Jonathan Swift's celebrated satire Travels into Several Remote Nations of the World by Lemuel Gulliver.

Interestingly, the latitude and longitude of the Irish author's Land of Lilliput equates exactly with Saint Peters Island of the Nuyts Archipelago in the Great Australian Bight. Discovered and named in January 1627 by Dutchman Pieter Nuyts, supercargo on the Gulden Zeepaard under the command of Francois Thyssen, they are the oldest place names in South Australia.

Library - Natural history volumes illustrating nature and culture from 1808
Illustrations are important in many scientific publications and some of the most attractive are to be found in 18th and 19th  century books on natural history.

The oldest and rarest of the Library's volumes on Australian natural history is the splendidly illustrated Birds of New Holland with their Natural History, collected, engraved and faithfully painted after nature by John William Lewin, London 1808. This edition of exquisite hand-coloured engravings is extremely rare as all but six of the books printed were lost. Only the English subscribers to the work, of which Sir Joseph Banks heads the list, received their copies and the 56 copies sent to Australia were lost at sea.

The Society also owns a copy of Lewin's very rare Prodromus entomology; natural history of Lepidoplerous Insects of New South Wales which was published in London in 1805. The 18 hand — coloured plates depict an assortment of moths and their larvae, the '...first fruits of the labours of Mr John Lewin, who spent near eight years in the Colony, solely occupied in the pursuit of Natural History...' The plates had been engraved in Sydney in 1803 (the earliest produced in Australia).

The riches of John Gould's works are also well represented. Holdings include the complete set of his beautifully illustrated eight-volume epic Birds of Australia, completed in 1869 with a grand total of 681 colour plates. The volumes are rare because many were broken up to allow the plates to be sold separately. The three-volume Mammals of Australia, 1863 is also in the collection. The Society's volumes are in extremely good condition, having been subjected to little use over the years, enhancing the opulent grandeur of the plates.

In the same category of handsome folios and of special interest to South Australians is George French Angas's South Australia Illustrated, a series of hand - coloured lithographs depicting the scenery, ethnography and early social life in the Colony, published in London 1847. There are seven other publications in the Library by Angas containing illustrations of his sojourns in New Zealand and South Africa. These books are superb examples of the art of lithography which reathed its zenith about the middle of last century.

The Society also has ten of the original Kaffir paintings from his The Kafirs Illustrated and eight Rio de Janeiro scenes, painted opportunistically by Angas when his ship put in there for repairs en route to England in 1846. The set was intended for his Scenery of Rio Janeiro in a series of sketches and includes a design for a title page. It was never published.

THE MANUSCRIPTS

Manuscripts - From quill pen 1766 to typewriter
A wealth of original manuscript material is held by the Society. Apart from the Society minute books and correspondence dating from its inception in 1885, documents in the collection range from handwritten or typescript papers to hand-drawn maps, paintings and drawings.

Some of the more significant items are papers by Sir Joseph Banks. His handwritten diary ‘Journal of a voyage to Newfoundland and Labrador, commencing April ye seventh and ending November ye seventeenth, 1766'. covers his voyage on HMS Niger to protect the British fisheries from depredations by the native Indians.

From Newfoundland, Banks journeyed to Lisbon and the diary of tins visit is also in the Collection. Two years later lie sailed with Captain Cook on the Endeavour during the memorable voyage which placed the eastern coast of Australia on the map.

Another of Banks' interests was Iceland and the Society has his manuscript book 'Notes on & Brief History of Iceland 1801-1809' in which he relates Iceland's history from 860 to 1799. Some of the notes deal with the activities of Jorgen Jorgenson, the Danish adventurer who had explored in Australia with Grant and Flinders in 1802, during his brief reign as the self-styled 'King of Iceland' in 1809.Jorgensonwas taken to England and was transported to Van Diemen's Land for petty theft. He later explored there on his own account in 1826.

The Society has a 20 page holograph by Dr John Rae dated 1856 detailing his Voyages and Travels in the Arctic Regions. Rae describes his Arctic wanderings in the service of the Hudson Bay Company from 1833 to 1854 and includes his searches for the missing Sir John Franklin on behalf of the Royal Geographical Society in London.

Manuscripts - Early Australian from 1786
The Library's version of Alexander Dalrymple's A Serious Admonition to the Publick on the Intended Thief-Colony at Botany Bay is a handwritten copy of the rare publication printed in London in 1786. Dalrymple was a noted hydrographer, firstly with the East India Company, and later for the Admiralty. In the paper he recommends Tristan da Cunha as the ideal penal colony instead of New South Wales. Ferguson's Bibliography of Australia cites the pamphlet as being 'one of the rarest items of Australiana'.

The private diary of Daniel George Brock from 10 August 1844 to 28 January 1846 lay on the shelves for something like 28 years after it was donated to the Society in 1938. When it came to light it caused a sensation. Brock had accompanied Sturt on his inland expedition as armourer and collector and the unofficial diary's frank description of events contrary to  popular belief and led to some reappraisals of Sturt himself.

It was put on display and as press coverage of Brock's criticism of the erstwhile hero Sturt captured the public imagination, steps were taken to publish it. The diary was edited by Kenneth Peake-Jones and published by the Society as To the Desert with Sturt in 1975. It is now in its second edition.

A rather curious collection of 21 pen and ink drawings is preserved in the Library. They were made on Babbage's expedition north-west of Port Augusta in 1858 by the Bavarian artist and naturalist, Joseph Albert Franz David Herrgott. Many of the subjects are of a humorous nature depicting the lighter side of expedition life. Herrgott also travelled with Stuart who gave his name to Hergott Springs (now Marree).

Two small leather-covered diaries in the collection are in the minuscule pencil hand of John McDouall Stuart. The diaries, from 29 November 1860 to 3 July 1861 and 4 July to 5 September 1861 give accounts of his transcontinental expedition attempts.

Another exploration account, the three journals kept by Robert Henry Edmunds, second in command to McKinlay on his disastrous expedition to Arnhem Land in 1865-66, contain extensive day to day details of the expedition. Edmunds liked lists and there are lists of supplies, instruments and native words. The Society also has Edmunds' rifle and chart case among its relics.

There is also William Christie Gosse's 'Rough Diary' of his 1873 expedition when he discovered and named Ayers Rock after the Premier of South Australia, later a Founding Member of the Society. In his entry for Saturday 19 July 1873 Gosse wrote '''Continued the same course at 7.30am. Still the same wretched country. As we approached the hill it presented a most peculiar appearance. The upper [surface] covered with small holes. When we got to the end of the sand hills and within 2 miles of the foot of the hill, what was my astonishment to find it was one immense ROCK and the wholes [sic] I had noticed, where [sic] caused by the water, there a [re] numbers of very large caves. We only found a small hole of water, enough to replenish our water bags but not sufficient to give the camels I have named this Ayers' Rock after Sir Henry Ayers'''. The Rough Diary is valuable as it differs from the published version.

Richard Thilwell Maurice's abstract journals of his expedition from Ooldea to the Rawlinson Ranges in 1901, his 1902 transcontinental journey, and the Maurice-South Australian Government Prospecting Expedition which examined the country north of the Nullarbor Plain towards the Western Australian border are in the Manuscript Collection. Some of these journals contain watercolour drawings of Aboriginal cave  paintings from the Everard and Musgrave Ranges in the far north ofSouth Australia.

ATLASES AND MAPS

Atlases and maps - Filling in the gaps from 1482
Not surprisingly, the Society's Library is also rich in maps and atlases. The collection began with a donation of old colonial maps and plans by a member in July 1886. Subsequently, a good many early atlases were acquired with the York Gate Library and Thomas Gill, an avid enthusiast on Australian exploration, added further maps to the collection.

The Society's collection of early atlases and maps are of particular importance as they not only show the growth of knowledge of the world but demonstrate the improvement and elaboration of the art of cartography.

The Greek astronomer Hipparchus, in about 190BC, developed the work of Eratosthenes by establishing the method of dividing the world into meridians of latitude and longitude, enabling meaningful maps to be  drawn. Claudius Ptolemaeus (Ptolemy c75-153 AD) extended this work by producing a map of the known world by calculating the latitude and longitude of every known place - some 8,000 of them. He devised various ways of depicting the spherical surface of the globe on a flat sheet including the conical and trapezoidal projections.

No map has survived from Ancient Greece but the European geographers, emerging from the dark ages, were able to reconstruct them using the coordinates left in the Ptolemiac texts. The oldest cartographic work, and indeed the oldest book in the Society's Library, is Francesco Berlingliieri's 15th century paraphrase in Italian verse of Ptolemy's Geographia, printed by Nicolaus Todesclio and published in Florence in 1482, ten years before Columbus sailed from Spain to discover the Americas.

The handsome volume, superbly re-bound in decorated led morocco exemplifies the skill of the early printers in the arts of typography and engraving. In fact, the maps are some of the earliest produced from metal engravings. Another rare volume of Ptolemy maps in the Library is an edition of his Geographicae edited by Michael Servetus and published in Lyons in 1535. Copies of this book are extremely rare as every volume that could be obtained at the time was burned by John Calvin along with its editor. Ptolemy's maps were regarded as authoritative until well into the 16th Century and considering the importance placed on his work, it was unfortunate that he had rejected the more accurate calculations of Eratosthenes. Ptolemy also discarded the correct theory that Africa was surrounded by water, and joined its east coast to the land-mass of Asia, turning the Indian Ocean into a vast lake. The southern shore of this lake was later designated Terra Australis Incognita, and belief in his mythical land persisted well into the 17th century.

The great Flemish cartographers of the 16th century, Gerardus Mercator and Abraham Ortelius, produced up-to-date maps that finally superseded the outmoded Ptolemaic maps. Abraham Ortelius produced his celebrated map of (the world on a single sheet using the Mercator Projection in 1570. This he bound in a book with 69 other maps of individual countries and regions to produce what is regarded as the first modern atlas, Theatrum Orbis Terrarum (Theatre of the World), published in Antwerp. Sir Francis Drake had a copy of tills atlas with him when he circumnavigated the globe in (the Golden Hind' in 1577-80. The Society has the 1571 edition of this atlas as well as the last French edition dated 1598, Théâtre de l'univers, contenant les cartes de tout le monde, which contains 119 decorative and intriguing hand-coloured maps, ascribed to many cartographers. Gerardus Mercator was the first cartographer to apply the term 'atlas' to a collection of bound maps in 1595 and the Library has a copy of Historia  Mundi or Mercator's Atlas, London 1635, which is one of several editions enlarged by Judocus Hondius.

Mercator is best known for his map projection in which the meridians of longitude are drawn parallel instead of converging at the poles and  parallels of latitude are spaced further apart to compensate for this. It allows compass bearings to be drawn as straight lines and is still used today for almost all sea charts.

Atlases and Maps - Terra Australis mapped from 1566
The Society also has a hand-drawn and coloured copy of the original Nicholas Desliens' 1566 Mappemonde in the Bibliothequé Nationale in Paris, made by Henri Delachaux in 1884. There was no consistent convention of north at the top until the use of the compass became widespread. The Desliens map of the world has south at the top of the drawing. It is also of interest as it shows the 'Java la Grande' which has been the cause of much debate in recent years.

Marco Polo first described (the Islands of Java Minor and Java Major but place names from the latter were transferred by some early mapmakers to Terra Incognita. Although many of the early Renaissance maps and charts were French, the names along the coast of this fifth continent on the Desliens map were mainly Portuguese, giving rise to theories that the Portuguese first visited Australia more than 70 years before the officially accepted discovery by the Dutch.

Atlases and Maps - Australian mapping from 1848
The Society's collection of Naval and Admiralty charts covering various parts of the world includes some Australian and South Australian charts by Baudin and Flinders. Other Australian maps include some original survey maps of explorers and surveyors. Examples of these are Stuart's pastoral survey plan of 'Warrow' Run drawn in 1848 and a map drawn by Babbage showing the country surrounding Lake Torrens and Lake Gregory (now Lake Eyre). There are a great many printed pastoral and exploration maps dating back to the 1850s.

An extensive series of early colonial atlases and maps in the collection is useful for charting the progress of settlement in each colony from the 1830s through to the 1890s.

Early in his Presidency, Allen Simpson formed a subcommittee of the Society in 1925 to prepare a submission to the government on the dearth of Australian Maps. Over 20 years later in 1948 Major-General Browne, Director-General of the British Ordinance Survey was still able to comment that 'Australia is the least mapped country in the world; in fact, it is practically unmapped'.

This situation was redressed with the work of the Australian Survey Corps and National Mapping.

Many of these maps are in the collection and of special interest is a series of military intelligence maps and accompanying notes of North Australia and South East Asia, developed during the war. The Society holds a complete set of National Mapping 1:1,000,000 series along with coverage of the Australian Antarctic Territory.

PHOTOGRAPHIC COLLECTION

Photographs - Geography through the eye of the lens from 1903
There are some 2,000 photographic images in the Society's collection dating from its inception and spanning across a diverse evolution of media - from glass plates and lantern slides of the black and white era to colour transparencies and video tapes.

Expeditions are well represented, of course, with several albums of Dr Elliot's Elder Expedition photographs recording the routine of 19th century expedition life. An album of Wells' North West Prospecting Expedition of 1903 to the Musgrave and Petermann Ranges includes  some of the earliest photographs of Ayers Rock and the Olgas. A series of photographs from Maurice's exploration trips contains panoramic views  of Fowlers Bay, the Everard and Musgrave Ranges and Aborigines of Flora Valley and Wyndham. Madigan's 1929 aerial photographs of Lake Eyre and the Simpson Desert are also in the collection together with those  taken on the 1936 camel crossing of the Desert by Edmund Albert (Ted)  Colson, the first white man to accomplish the feat. The photographic lens has also brought us an ethnographically important collection of Aboriginal photography by Professor Walter Baldwin Spencer and Francis James Gillen, taken on their Central and Northern Australian Expedition of 1901-2. The main purpose of the journey was to record the fast-disappearing traditional Aboriginal life-style.

One of the most interesting and unique photographic collections came  into the Society's hands by a mysterious and circuitous route. A remarkable set of 27 photographs of Tibet came to light when Reg Farquharson, a member of the Society and an amateur photographer, obtained a number of undeveloped rolls of film in London in 1928. Much to Farquharson’s surprise, the resulting prints turned out to be photographs of the British Expeditionary Mission into Tibet in 1903-4 led by Francis Edward Younghusband.

Farquharson sent a set of the photographs to Sir Francis Younghusband who was still alive, and his reply confirmed that they were indeed films which had been lost on the return journey from Lhasa. With the threat of Tsarist expansion hanging over Central Asia, Younghusband's expedition had made an assault on the forbidden city of Lhasa forcing the conclusion of the Anglo-Tibetan Treaty on 6th September 1904.

PERIODICALS

Periodicals - A window on the world of geography from 1785
The periodical section of the Library is a vast, comprehensive collection of geographical journals ranging from an almost complete set of National Geographic magazines on the popular side to academic journals from  universities and geographical societies from all over the World. There is also a complete set of The Geographical Journal of the Royal Geographical Society in London dating from that Society's inception in 1830 to the  present day.

Acquired either by exchange or by subscription, some 180 journals and periodical titles are received by the Library, a number of series dating from the Society's foundation in 1885. Many of these are in languages other than English, particularly from kindled geographical societies including French, Danish, German, Polish, Chinese and several of the Eastern European countries. They could be better utilised as a research resource for students of ethnic backgrounds.

The current periodicals and pamphlets are of importance to research workers and provide up-to-date information on world geography. SOCIETY ACTIVITIES

Society Activities - Publishing – Books from 1886
In addition to its annual journal, the Society has, over the years, produced a number of high quality books and occasional papers covering subjects ranging from urban development to the Simpson Desert, and the flooding of Lake Eyre to a guide books on the Discover and Explore the Barossa Valley, Discover Kangaroo Island and the Explore the Flinders Ranges.

Indeed, the publication of geographical material has been an objective of the Society from the outset. The Society's journal has been published since its inception, originally as The Proceedings, from 1885 to 1986, now the South Australian Geographical Journal. The series is a valuable research resource on a wide variety of geographical subjects covering anything from soils to cities, and indexed through the Australian Public Affairs Information Services.

Many of the Society's first books were publislied as supplements to The Proceedings and most notable of these were Colonel Light's Brief Journal in 1911 and The Centenary History of South Australia in 1936. The latter was an ambitious task undertaken by the Society when the State Centenary Committee declined to do so. The Society had among its members considerable literary expertise and the project was came to a successful conclusion with the publication of a handsome 420-page volume - a chef d'oeuvre compared with the tourist booklet proposed by the State’s Centenary Committee.

Another publishing success was the Brock diary already mentioned, published as To the Desert with Sturt in 1975 and reprinted by the Government Printer in 1988. An earlier Brock diary was also published by the Society in 1981. Recollections of DGB, 1843 recounts his personal experiences while travelling throughout the settled areas of the Colony gathering information for the South Australian Almanac. The book, also edited by Peake-Jones, was illustrated in colour with early South Australian water colours.

The Society was instrumental in producing Explore the Barossa in 1991, first edition, in a series of South Australian guide books fulfilling the ever-increasing need for authoritative guides to the tourist regions of South Australia. Society members contributed their expertise to the volume, edited by Dr Sue Barker and Brian Ward, combining history and geography supplemented by town and country walks and drives. The guide is well illustrated in colour with maps, diagrams and photographs and was published by State Publishing in 1991. The guide was followed by a second in the series, Explore the Flinders Ranges, published in 1995, discover Kangaroo Island in 2000 and two volumes, Discover, and, Explore, the Barossa Valley in 2005.

Also published in 1991 was a facsimile of the 1891 Handbook of Instructions for the guidance of the Officers of the Elder Scientific Exploration Expedition to the Unknown Portions of Australia reprinted to commemorate the centenary of the Expedition. The book outlines the conduct and duties expected of the expedition members together with general directions for the collection and preservation of scientific specimens. Mark Shephard's handsomely, illustrated book The Simpson Desert - Natural History and Human Endeavour was published in 1992, the first definitive work on the Simpson Desert. This publication was the culmination of the Society's interest and participation in exploration and study of this Desert  over the years. Apart from the resources available in the Library, the expertise the Society brought to the book was considerable and included contributions by Colson's nephew. Professor Colin Home, geologist Dr Reg Sprigg, and long-distance walker and conservationist, C. Warren  Bonython.

Society Activities - Monograph Series from 1950
The Society, through its South Australian Geographical Papers, publishes occasional monographs in both human and physical geography present ing original findings dealing with South Australian topics. The series aims primarily at publishing contemporary research of a high quality in a form  accessible to as wide a range of readers as possible.

The series opens an avenue for members or those outside the organisation to present original geographical thought, particularly in the academic field, where an author might not otherwise find a publisher.

Society Activities - Meetings and field trips from 1880's
For over 124 years the Society has arranged a programme of public talks and meetings on a wide range of subjects of geographical, historical and travelling interest. In addition, exhibitions are regularly arranged in the Society's rooms and occasionally elsewhere. They have always proved popular, displaying the Society's exploration relics or treasures from the Library.

Successful field trips and excursions are a feature of the Society's programme of events. A flurry of activity in connection with the Society's centenary in 1985 included the safari to Haddon Corner and the Elder Expedition memorial construction trip mentioned earlier. In 1986 a four-wheel-drive Simpson Desert crossing was organised 100 years after Lindsay and 50 after Colson. To mark the Bicentenary of Australia in 1988, the Queensland Society constructed a marker at the geographical centre of the continent and in  conjunction with this, the South Australian Branch organised the Centre Safari to enable Members and friends to visit tills remote spot.

Successful Field Trips have also been conducted to the Gawler Ranges, South East and Mid Murraylands with shorter excursions to the Barossa Valley and Killalpaninna tthe remains of a Lutheran mission along the Birdsville Track) in 1992.

A specialty of Society tours is the extensive and informative trip notes provided for participants. This, together with contributions from the pool of expertise among the members on environmental, cultural and geo graphical aspects of the country travelled through, makes a Society tour a worthwhile experience.

AWARDS AND RESEARCH GRANTS

Awards and Research - John Lewis memorial Awards from 1947
The John Lewis Memorial Fund was financed from a gift to me Society by the Lewis family in memory of Hon. John Lewis, who died in 1923. He had been President of the Society for seven years from 1913-20. He was elected to the Legislative Council in 1897 and was keenly interested in land matters, particularly in the Northern Territory where, during the construction of the Overland Telegraph Line lie ran the Estafette (mounted courier or pony express) between the ever-closing ends of the line until it was finally joined up in 1872. Lewis' original leather Estafette bag is a treasure in the Society's relics collection.

Foremost of the awards given out of the proceeds of the fund is the Society's prestigious John Lewis Gold Medal, awarded from time to time for noteworthy geographical achievements in exploration, research or literary work. It was first awarded to Dr Charles Fenner in 1947 and other recipients include Dr Archibald Grenfell Price, Sir Douglas Mawson, Sir Edmund Hillary, C.P. Mountford, Sir John Cleland, Dr Norman Tindale and C. Warren Bonytlion. It is interesting to note that Mawson had previously received the Nachtigal Gold Medal of The Gessellschaft für Erdkünde (commemorating Germany's celebrated North African explorer Gustav Nachtigal) on the occasion of the German Geographical Society's centenary in Berlin in 1928.

A Silver medal was instituted in 1993 for outstanding or meritorious work for the Society and the author was one of the four inaugural recipients. A Bronze medal is awarded annually for the secondary student gaining the highest marks in Geography for year 12 examinations, together with a cash prize for the top student in first-year geography at each of South Australia's tertiary institutions.

Awards and Research - G.W.Symes Research Award from 1980
Major-General George William Symes settled in South Australia after a distinguished career in the British Army and became Private Secretary to the Governor from 1956-64. His interest in historical geography led him to join the Society and he served as President from 1954-57. He made a special study of the Northern Territory and in particular its explorers and the construction of the Overland Telegraph Line, writing several papers on these subjects. He thed in 1980 aged 84 leaving the Society a bequest of $5,000  to be used for an 'Award for historical research into the history of South Australia and the Northern Territory insofar as it affects the history of South Australia'.

The first biennial Award was made in 1978 and the fund continues to provide valuable assistance for researchers to complete their projects in this field.

Awards and Research - Centenary Foundation Fund from 1985
The Centenary Foundation (Trust) Fund was set up by the Society during its centenary year of 1985. Donations to the fund are tax deductible and once sufficient capital is established, it will be used to give support for scientific and educational study on projects of any aspect of geography.

Society - CURRENT ROLE

During its formative years, the Society successfully fulfilled a role in the geographical field of the day - exploration and filling in the maps – and its membership was firmly entrenched in the Establishment. However, the scope of geography has considerably widened since then and the   Society now contends with all-embracing issues concerning social geography and the environment. The appeal of geography is no longer purely academic and the Society caters as much for the person in the street.

The Royal Geographical Society provides a practical forum for the academic geographer and the lay person alike, whether their interests lie in utilising its resources, field trips, travel talks or the environment in which they live and work. The facilities provided by the Society are there for active participation by all.

Membership is open to anyone and enquiries are welcome in person or by letter, telephone or fax to: ''The Royal Geographical Society of South Australia State Library Building, North Terrace, Adelaide PO Box 3661, Rundle mall, Adelaide S.A. 5000 Telephones (08) 2077265 (Administration), (08) 2077266 (Library), or Fax (08) 207 7265.''

Society - goverance
The Society, incorported since 1917 in South Australia, is governed by an elected Council, with the executive postions of President, vice President and Treasuer falling due annually. Three of the longest serving Councillors also retire annually.

The Society has several sub committees advising the President and Council. The Society is generally volunteer based. More details are at www.rgssa.org.au

Society Patron
The Governor of South Australia is the Society's Patron.