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SPRI Polar Directory

Museums

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There are 7 entries in the museums directory for Australia:

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Antarctic Gallery, Tasmanian Museum and Art Gallery

Website:	www.tmag.tas.gov.au/index.aspx?base=89
Address:	40 Macquarie Street Hobart TAS 7000 Australia
Telephone:	(03) 6211 4177

Australian National Maritime Museum

Website:	www.anmm.gov.au
Address:	GPO Box 5131, Sydney, New South Wales 2001
Telephone:	+61-2-552-7777
Year of foundation:	1985, opened 1991
Collections:	Tilbrook whaling collection.

Marine Studies Centre

Website:	www.sea.uct.ac.za
Address:	Antarctic Environment Learning Unit, Woodbridge, Tasmania
Year of foundation:	1994
Collections:	Visitor centre providing interactive laboratory in which visitors can model Antarctic fisheries. Run by the Tasmanian Department of Education and the Arts.

Museum of Victoria

Website:	www.museum.vic.gov.au
Address:	PO Box 666E, 222 Exhibition St., Melbourne 3000
Telephone:	+61-3-669-9997
Fax:	+61-3-639-1090
Collections:	Together with Tasmanian Museum and Art Gallery developed the exhibition Antarctica: Secrets of the Frozen World. Contact: Curator of Antarctic Studies.

National Museum of Australia

Website:	www.nma.gov.au
Address:	PO Box 1901, Canberra, ACT 2601
Telephone:	+61-6-256-1111
Fax:	+61-6-256-1233
Year of foundation:	1980
Collections:	Possesses one of Mawson's sledges, Hurley's diaries, and other artifacts with Antarctic and Southern Ocean associations.

South Australian Museum

Website:	www.samuseum.sa.gov.au
Contact name:	Mark Pharoah
Address:	North Terrace, Adelaide, SA 5000, Australia
E-mail:	marketing@samuseum.sa.gov.au
Telephone:	+61-(8)-8207-7574
Fax:	+61-(8)-8207-7222
Open to the public? / Opening hours:	Mawson Gallery (front of house): Mon-Sun 10.00-17.00, 25 April (ANZAC Day) 12.00-17.00, closed Christmas Day and Good Friday. Mawson Centre (back of house): Mon-Fri 10.00-12.00 and 13.00-15.00 (these hours are flexible so contact the Centre in advance)
Year of foundation:	1856
Collections:	The Australian Polar Collection contains items collected largely by Douglas Mawson (1882-1958), John Riddoch Rymill (1905-1968), and George Hubert Wilkins (1888-1958).
Publications:	2010, 1913, English, Book, Illustrated edition: The Adelie blizzard : Mawson's forgotten newspaper 1913 / preface by Emma McEwin ; introduction by Elizabeth Leane and Mark Pharaoh ; xxvi, 216 p. : ill. (chiefly col.), maps, plans, ports ; 38 cm. Facsimile.
Notes:	The South Australian Museum houses both the Mawson Gallery and the Mawson Centre. The current Mawson Gallery was opened in 2001 as part of a joint collaboration with the University of Adelaide. (95 years earlier, Mawson had been the newly appointed honorary museum curator of minerals on top of his recent academic employment as a lecturer; as Professor, he would only retire from his University in the 1950s, having never officially relinquished his curatorial title at the Museum – and of which he was chairman of the Board at the time of his death). It was only at the launch of the Gallery that agreement was reached by all parties (including the Mawson family), that the Mawson Collection of artefacts and archival material at the University (Coach House, Waite Campus), would be re-united with the Museum’s Mawson Collection of artefacts – and wider collections of specimens. The Mawson Centre was subsequently opened as part of a redevelopment that saw the former Natural Sciences Building renamed the Science Centre. After the celebrations in the SE of the State for the centenary of Rymill’s birth in 1905, the Rymill family donated their Collection to the Museum. Together with the smaller Wilkins Collection (donated in the 1920s), this led to the establishment of the Australian Polar Collection. Currently, Wilkins is the primary collecting interest of the Mawson Centre, with plans for an exhibition of this Mid-North son of a pioneer family tentatively set for 2017-18.

Tasmanian Museum and Art Gallery

Address:	40 Macquarie St., Hobart, Tasmania 7001
Year of foundation:	1829
Collections:	Antarctic exhibits. Together with Museum of Victoria developed the exhibition Antarctica: Secrets of the Frozen World opened 1994. This focuses on geophysics and on Antarctica's role as the 'climate engine of the world'.