How did Menzies' undergraduate career become reflected in the trials and accomplishments of his life as a statesman?

Nick Warren talks to Georgina Downer in this episode of the Afternoon Light Podcast, recorded as part of our Menzies Early Career Network Series.

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In this special summer series of the Afternoon Light podcast you can enjoy the presentations delivered at our November 2024 conference entitled ‘The Final Chapter: Purpose, Endurance and Legacy 1961-66 and Beyond’. This sixth episode features Will Stoltz on 'Managed Decolonisation', Sean Jacob's paper 'Relaxed and Comfortable: Menzies and the fall of Empire (1961-66)' (begins at 19:15), David Furse-Robert's paper 'Homes Material, Homes Human and Homes Spiritual: The Menzies Government and Housing Policy' (begins at 35:25), and Christoper Beer's paper 'The frontier of property-owning democracy: Housing, the reform of Australian liberal urbanism, and electoral politics in Western Sydney, 1961-1966' (begins 54:45).

Will Stoltz is a security and foreign affairs scholar and former Australian national security official. He is a Lecturer & Expert Associate at the ANU's National Security College and a Visiting Fellow at the Robert Menzies Institute, where he's researched the Menzies Government's foreign policy decisions and role in establishing the Australian Secret Intelligence Service.

Sean Jacobs is a Port Moresby-born Australian writer, government relations and policy specialist. He has worked with all levels of government in PNG, Fiji, New Zealand and Australia. He currently works in local government in Australia. Sean is the author of three books, and has published with the Diplomatic Courier, International Affairs Review, Small Wars Journal, The Spectator and the Australian Institute of International Affairs. He is a graduate of Griffith and Macquarie Universities, and currently serves as a Griffith Asia Institute Industry Fellow.

David is a Research Fellow at the Menzies Research Centre. He holds a PhD in history from the University of NSW and is the editor of Howard: The Art of Persuasion (2018) and Menzies: The Forgotten Speeches (2017). Since joining the MRC in 2016, he has written for Quadrant, Spectator Australia, and other publications on the history and contemporary relevance of liberalism in Australia. In 2021 he published God and Menzies: The Faith that Shaped a Prime Minister and his Nation.

Christopher Beer is an academic whose research has spanned many aspects of Australian urbanism. He completed his doctoral studies at the Australian National University and subsequently held associations with the University of Canberra, Macquarie University, and the University of Newcastle.

Was Menzies for class segregation, or was he a vehement opponent of the entire system? 

Maya Khurana talks to Georgina Downer about the Australian middle-class, and how Menzies drove significant change whilst challenging the notion of class at the same time.

This episode of the Afternoon Light Podcast was recorded as part of our Menzies Early Career Network Series. ➡️ Support the Robert Menzies Institute by visiting our website.

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How did Australia's relationship with New Zealand come to define both countries histories, both between each other as well as their relations with neighboring Asia-Pacific countries? 

Orlando Throsby talks to Georgina Downer about the history of Australia and New Zealand's relationship with each other - as well as their neighbors. This episode of the Afternoon Light Podcast was recorded as part of our Menzies Early Career Network Series.

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How much has the value of Australian home ownership changed between Menzies' era and our own? 

On a special edition of Afternoon Light, Georgina Downer talks to Georgia Lowden  This episode of the Afternoon Light Podcast was recorded as part of our Menzies Early Career Network Series.

In this special summer series of the Afternoon Light podcast you can enjoy the presentations delivered at our November 2024 conference entitled ‘The Final Chapter: Purpose, Endurance and Legacy 1961-66 and Beyond’. This fifth episode features Anne Henderson on 'The Menzies Government, B A Santamaria and the Beginning of State Aid', Jennifer Clark's paper on 'Science and Science Education' (begins at 15:00), James Waghorne & Gwilym Croucher's paper 'University unlimited: Commonwealth Scholarships in Australian universities, 1951-1974' (begins at 40:40), and Lyndon Megarrity's paper 'Menzies and Liberal Education' (begins 59:45).

Anne Henderson is the Deputy Director of the Sydney Institute. She is a prolific and respected author having published books on Enid Lyons, Joseph Lyons, Mary Mackillop, Patrick Glynn and more. In 2014 she published Menzies at War, a detailed

Jennifer Clark is a historian from the University of Adelaide. She is the author of Aborigines and Activism: Race, Aborigines & the Coming of the Sixties to Australia and The American Idea of England, 1776-1840. Her current research interests cover

James Waghorne is a Senior Research Fellow at the Melbourne Centre for Higher Education and the University of Melbourne’s de facto historian. His work reaches across the history of university governance, university disciplines, the heritage of

Gwilym Croucher is the Deputy Director of the Centre for the Study of Higher Education at the University of Melbourne. A former Fulbright Scholar, his research focuses on different aspects of the political economy of higher education. He has published widely on higher education policy and management and led large publicly funded research projects. He is also a regular media commentator on higher education in Australia.

Lyndon Megarrity is adjunct lecturer at James Cook University in Townsville, where he teaches history and political science. His research interests include Queensland, Northern Australia, and overseas student policy. He is also the author or co-author of several books, including Northern Dreams: The Politics of Northern Development in Australia, which won the 2019 Chief Minister’s Northern Territory History Book Award. With Carolyn Holbrook and David Lowe, he co-edited Lessons from History (NewSouth, 2022), a collection of essays on contemporary issues and debates informed by history. Published in 2024, Megarrity’s latest book is the first biography of Dr Rex Patterson, Minister for Northern Development in the Whitlam Government.

In this special summer series of the Afternoon Light podcast you can enjoy the presentations delivered at our November 2024 conference entitled ‘The Final Chapter: Purpose, Endurance and Legacy 1961-66 and Beyond’. This fourth episode features Damien Freeman and Senator Dean Smith on 'Recommending an Appointment to the Sovereign', Josh Woodward's paper '"A cure for prejudice": Robert Menzies, Travel and Nationalism in the 1960s' (begins at 27:03), and Michael de Percy's paper 'From the bottom of the sea to the moon: Menzies and Australia’s communications golden age' (begins at 43:27).

Damien Freeman is a Fellow of the Robert Menzies Institute and an Honorary Fellow of Australian Catholic University, whose most recent book is The End of Settlement: Why the 2023 referendum failed.

Dean Smith has been a Liberal Senator for Western Australia since May 2012. He is a member of the Coalition’s Shadow Economic Team, having been appointed Shadow Assistant Minister for Competition, Charities and Treasury in June 2022. He was previously a member of the Coalition Government’s Senate Leadership Team – elected Chief Government Whip in the Senate by his Liberal Senate colleagues in January 2019. Dean was awarded the McKinnon Prize in Political Leadership in 2018 by a panel of eminent Australians, including John Howard and Julia Gillard. Prior to entering the Senate, he held senior executive roles at Insurance Australia Group and SingTel Optus. Dean brings to his Senate role extensive policy experience, having worked as Policy Adviser to both Western Australian Premier Richard Court and Prime Minister John Howard. His Parliamentary Committee roles include member of the Senate Economics Committee and Senate Select Committee on the Cost of Living Committee, Chair of the Senate Scrutiny of Bills Committee and Deputy Chair of the Joint Standing Committee on the Implementation of the National Redress Scheme. He was previously the Coalition Government’s nominee to the Advisory Council of the ANU China in the World Centre, and was appointed to the National Archives of Australia Advisory Council in July 2022. In 2011 he was awarded the Distinguished Service Award by the Liberal Party of Australia.

Josh Woodward is an Australian environmental historian whose research explores representations of nature in tourist advertising. He has published several articles on the tourist promotion of Australian national parks and their emergence as important sites of the settler-nation. He completed his Master’s at the University of Western Australia, where he was the 2019 recipient of the Frank Broeze scholarship. Josh will complete his PhD on twentieth century Australian tourist advertising at the Australian National University in 2025.

Michael de Percy is Senior Lecturer in Politic Science at the University of Canberra. His qualifications include a PhD in Political Science from the Australian National University, a Bachelor of Philosophy (Honours) from the University of Canberra, and a Bachelor of Arts from Deakin University. He is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts, a Chartered Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Logistics and Transport (CILTA), and a Member of the Royal Society of NSW. He is National Vice President of the Telecommunications Association, Chairman of the ACT and Southern NSW Chapter of CILTA, and a member of the Australian Nuclear Association. Michael is a graduate of the Royal Military College, Duntroon where he received the Royal Australian Artillery Prize. He was appointed to the Australian Research Council's College of Experts in 2022 and as the Managing Editor of the Journal of Telecommunications and the Digital Economy from 2025. Michael's political commentary appears regularly in The Spectator Australia and on Spectator Australia TV.

In this special summer series of the Afternoon Light podcast you can enjoy the presentations delivered at our November 2024 conference entitled ‘The Final Chapter: Purpose, Endurance and Legacy 1961-66 and Beyond’. This third episode features Andrew Carr on 'The ADF Menzies Built', Tom Lewis's paper 'The Menzies defence legacy: wise, brave, and enduring' (begins at 20:20), and Lucas McLennan's paper on 'Australian anti-Communist organisations in the Vietnam War debate' (begins at 39:10).

Andrew Carr is a Senior Lecturer in the Strategic and Defence Studies Centre at the Australian National University. His research focuses on Strategy and Australian Defence Policy. He has published in outlets such as Survival, Parameters, Journal of Strategic Studies, Australian Foreign Affairs, International Theory, The Washington Quarterly, and Comparative Strategy. He has a sole authored book with Melbourne University Press and has edited books with Oxford University Press and Georgetown University Press. He is currently a member of the ANU-Defence Strategic Policy History Project, writing a history of Australian Defence White Papers from 1976-2020.

Tom Lewis OAM is a military historian, the author of 22 books, and a public speaker and presenter. He is a retired naval officer who served in combat as an Intelligence analyst; an ex-secondary school teacher, pilot, and scuba divemaster. He was the Director of Darwin Military Museum in its redevelopment from 2009 to 2013. His Order of Australia was bestowed on him for services to naval history. He has won numerous prizes for his literary works, the most recent being as the national winner of the 2021 Australian Naval Institute’s Commodore Sam Bateman Book Prize for Teddy Sheean VC. Tom is an expert on World War II, especially in the Pacific, but he has also written in areas analysing medieval combat, military aviation, and the reality of battlefield behaviour. His latest books are The Sinking of HMAS Sydney, which examined life on board WWII warships as well as the final fight between Sydney and Kormoran, and Cyclone Warriors –the Armed Forces in Cyclone Tracy.

Lucas McLennan works as a Senior History Teacher. He completed an Honours Degree in History and teaching qualifications at Monash University and recently completed a Master of Education from the University of Melbourne. His Masters thesis was on the Education policy of the first Anglican Bishop in Australia, William Grant Broughton, while his earlier Honours thesis examined Australia's compulsory military training schemes between Federation and the First World War. He has a strong interest in Australia's political, religious, and cultural history.

In this special summer series of the Afternoon Light podcast you can enjoy the presentations delivered at our November 2024 conference entitled ‘The Final Chapter: Purpose, Endurance and Legacy 1961-66 and Beyond’. This second episode features Jim Walter's paper on 'Robert Menzies and Allen Brown: The odd couple?', John Hawkin's paper on 'Menzies and the Vernon Report' (begins at 22:52), and Nicholas Brown's paper ‘"A risky enterprise": Menzies, Sir John Crawford and the Vernon Committee' (begins at 42:42).

Jim Walter is Emeritus Professor of Political Science in the School of Social Sciences at Monash University. Walter has published widely on Australian politics, history, biography and culture. Among his books are The Leader: a political biography of Gough Whitlam (1980), The Ministers’ Minders: personal advisers in national government (1986), Intellectual Movements and Australian Society (with Brian Head, 1988), Tunnel Vision: the failure of political imagination (1996), The Citizens’ Bargain: a documentary history of Australian views since 1890 (2002), No, prime minister: reclaiming politics from leaders (with Paul Strangio, 2007), What were they thinking? The politics of ideas in Australia (2010), Settling the Office: The Australian Prime Ministership from Federation to Reconstruction (with Paul Strangio and Paul ‘t Hart, 2016) and The Pivot of Power: Australian Prime Ministers and Political Leadership 1949-2016 (with Paul Strangio and Paul ‘t Hart, 2017).

Dr John Hawkins is deputy head of the Canberra School of Politics, Economics & Society at the University of Canberra. He was awarded a PhD in political science from the Australian National University for his thesis on the Australian treasurers. He also holds an MSc in economics from the London School of Economics and an MA in politics and history from Macquarie University. He is co-editor of History of Economics Review. He previously worked in the Australian Treasury and the Reserve Bank and served as secretary of the Senate Economics Committee. He was interviewed for the Afternoon Light podcast in August 2023 on Menzies as treasurer.

Nicholas Brown is a professor in the School of History, Australian National University, with interests in Australian social, political and public policy history and biography. His current projects include a biographical study of Sir John Crawford, in collaboration with Frank Bongiorno, David Lee and the late Stuart Macintyre.

In this special summer series of the Afternoon Light podcast you can enjoy the presentations delivered at our November 2024 conference entitled ‘The Final Chapter: Purpose, Endurance and Legacy 1961-66 and Beyond’. This first episode features the keynote address delivered by Geoffrey Blainey, David Lee's paper on 'Menzies and the Dual Economy, 1961-66' (begins at 21:29), and Selwyn Cornish on 'RG Menzies and the Introduction of Decimal Currency' (begins at 31:48).

Geoffrey Blainey is known for his texts on Australian economic and social history. His first book, The Peaks of Lyell, was published in 1954. His second book, The University of Melbourne: A Centenary Portrait (1956), led him back to academia, and in 1961 he began his teaching career in economic history at the University of Melbourne. He was made professor in 1968, and in 1977 he was given the Ernest Scott chair in history. His later books included The Causes of War (1973), Triumph of the Nomads (1975), A Land Half Won (1980), A Shorter History of Australia (1994), Sea of Dangers: Captain Cook and His Rivals (2009), and A Short History of Christianity (2011). Before I Forget: An Early Memoir was published in 2019.

David Lee is Associate Professor in the School of Humanities and Social Sciences, University of New South Wales, Canberra. He is the author inter alia of John Curtin, Connor Court, 2022 and The Second Rush: Mining and the Transformation of Australia, Connor Court, 2016.

Selwyn Cornish is Honorary Associate Professor in the School of History, Research School of Social Sciences at the Australian National University, and the Official Historian of the Reserve Bank of Australia.