Sovereign Hill Reflection

Life in the 1850s

 In the 1850s a lot of girls didn’t go to school while boys did therefore there is a higher chance of boys getting a better job. A lot of people came to the goldfields to find gold or sell items such as dresses, soaps and a variety of different foods.

Out of everyone on the goldfields the Chinese were the most mistreated. They were often bullied by the bush rangers and troopers and also just the common folk.

To get gold people would mine and pan for gold. Mining was a much harder, but you had a higher chance of finding a nugget then you did panning for gold. A lot of people had to walk long distances or ride boats to get to Australia or New Holland as they called it back then. If you wanted to wash your clothes you would have to go down to the local lake but it is most likely polluted by sewage, that’s also where you also get your water from so you had to be careful so you didn’t get a disease. Lets say you get and infected arm or leg you would go to the apothecaries and they would most likely cut the infected area off your body.

What was really unfair was how the troopers would come around and trick you into giving them money because you had to have a gold license and trick you by saying things such as “that’s expired,” or “It’s a fake,” which is most of the time untrue and you couldn’t tell anyone, and eventually another trooper will come by and most likely do the same thing.

1850s Businesses 

In the 1850s a lot of people came to the goldfields to mine or pan for gold. But the people who didn’t come to pan or mine for gold would set up stalls/shops and would sell salts soaps and dresses or other unique products or accessories. The Chinese would sell lanterns and other products or foods such as soups and dumplings. Since there was heaps of people in Ballarat the  stores flourished and would pop up every where. 

Eureka Stockade 

The Eureka Stockade was when Australia abolished the miners license and became its own country. The reason the Eureka Rebellion started was because of the miners license and how unfair it was. The miners believed that the miners license was unfair because they were constantly having to pay for it and the troopers would come around and ask them for it so they had to pay for it then another trooper would come along and ask you again and you would have to pay again and if you didn’t you could get into a great amount of trouble. The place Peter Lalor decided to step up and say liberty was Bakery Hill. Many people helped  building the ramshackle stockade but few were there when the troopers attacked because no one expected an attack on the Lords day. Many miners died on that day and if you had not been killed you were most likely later on put in jail.

Famous and important figures 

A famous australian is Peter Lalor because he was one of the few men who helped led the rebellion and luckily he survived the Eureka stockade but his arm did get shot off in battle. Another important australian figure is Charles Hotham as he was the person who abolished miners license.

Important dates

One important date is the December 3, 1854 as it was when the Eureka stockade had happened. Another important date is the 11 November 1854 as that was the meeting on bakery hill where Peter Lalor stepped up and said “Liberty.”

My Building and profession 

The building I researched was the Clock and Watch makers. The owners of the Clock & Watch makers was Rees and Benjamin. Rees & Benjamin was located on Main Road, and sold watches and jewellery. They also sell instruments for land and mining surveying. Rees & Benjamin is the place for 1850s Victorian style jewellery, estate jewellery, fob watches, clocks and other unique things.

Reading 

When I went to sovereign hill I had to learn a whole new vocabulary and how to speak old fashioned which was a challenge for me as I had never done it before so it was a new experience but I loved it.

Writing 

Writing was almost has hard as reading and writing because I had never been able to learn how to write in copperplate. Some words were easier then others because in my opinion they were more in joint writing then copperplate.

Math 

Math was kind of easy because it’s in the same kind of way that I do in the present. There was a few things that I learnt about math and that was that they didn’t use number lines that much back then.

PLAs

Something that was challenging was how we kept on changing tiles because we on the tile where the Eureka stockade was so had to give it up then some kind of muck up happened and we couldn’t actually find where our tile was until two days before we were presenting and that was a bit of a setback. Another thing that was a setback was the size of the building and we should of had a veranda but our building took up to much space therefore we had to remove the umbrella.

Some major highlights was when I finally finished and could look back at it and judge if I did a good job or not really and I personally thought I did pretty good at designing it apart from a few setbacks. Something I enjoyed was designing my building to the best I could maybe if I had more time I could of done slightly better but otherwise I’m really happy with my building.

Something I would of have done differently was the size of the building because if you don’t consider that you might not be able to fit everything you want in or not enough things in. I could of possibly altered the shape of how it looked as it wasn’t the correct shape compared to the actual building.

I had a great experience right through this unit from the start to finish. My favourite part was the end of making the diorama because I could look back at it and reflect what I’ve done and judge how well I went and like I said before I think I went well but I definitely wasn’t the best diorama there.

 

What do you like about Sovereign Hill?

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