History

The creation of a new Australian nation was a key political issue in the decade preceding Federation, although the seeds had been sown by figures such as John West and John Dunmore Lang in the 1850s. The real driving force was New South Wales Premier Henry Parkes. Although he had long advocated federation, in 1889 he made his famous ‘Tenterfield speech’ at the eponymous town in the New England region, in which he called for a federal convention. Several such conventions took place through the 1890s, which ultimately resulted in a federal constitution being drafted and finally approved by Queen Victoria. The Commonwealth formally came into being on January 1, 1901 (sadly Parkes did not live to see it, having died in 1896).

The federation of the six Australian colonies was a momentous occasion. It was marked by celebrations across the new nation, and a great many souvenirs were produced to mark it. Children were given medallions at school and their parents could buy anything from tableware to head scarves. Much of the pomp and ceremony centred around the visiting royal couple, the Duke and Duchess of Cornwall and York (later King George V and Queen Mary). They represented King Edward VII at the opening of the first Commonwealth Parliament in Melbourne on 9 May and undertook an extensive tour of the new Commonwealth, visiting all six state capitals to cheering, enthusiastic receptions by locals.

All of the 111 original Commonwealth Parliamentarians are depicted on this map. This includes seven Prime Ministers (Barton, Deakin, Watson, Reid, Fisher, Cook and Hughes) and other luminaries who had a significant impact on the early days of the Australian political landscape, including John Forrest, George Pearce, William Lyne, Isaac Isaacs, Frank Tudor, H.B. Higgins, Richard O’Connor and Gregor McGregor.

Interestingly, the printer or designer has made an error and mixed up two of the men shown. Billy Hughes and Dugald Thomson have their names transposed. At the time, Hughes had primarily been a NSW MP and union leader, so an Adelaide-based designer probably would not have known him by sight. A few other minor errors are also noticeable on careful examination; some first initials are either wrong or omitted entirely and a few names are misspelled. This perhaps indicates the map was not proofed properly; were they trying to finish it quickly so they could get it out in time for the next edition of Quiz?

Quiz magazine was a successor to the Adelaide Punch, based on the British publication of the same name. Adelaide Punch was absorbed by the Lantern in 1884, which itself was absorbed into Quiz. Quiz was founded by Advertiser journalist James Hutchinson in 1889, and ran until 1930, making it Australia’s longest-running comic magazine to that time. (SA Memory website)

The map is credited to Claude Marquet, but it is unknown how much involvement he had. He was one of Quiz’s resident cartoonists from 1897, but by 1900 he had also started submitting cartoons to the Bulletin. Marquet (1869-1920) was primarily a pen-and-ink political cartoonist, so this rather reverent production is not his usual style. The map uses printed photographs of members, so it is possible Marquet drew the map of Australia itself and someone else laid out the photographs and captions.