The Living History of Fort Scratchley
This interdisciplinary research project begun in 2004 and was completed in 2008. Communication academics Susan Kerrigan and Dr Phillip McIntyre and Historian Dr Erik Eklund, worked on the project.
A documentary DVD and a website on Fort Scratchley were created as part of Susan Kerrigan's PhD in Communication and Media Art. The PhD will focus on the Creative and Collaborative process of community filmmaking.
“Fort Scratchley a Living History” - Website
www.fortscratchley.org
“Fort Scratchley a living history ” is a website which allows you to navigate through Fort Scratchley's history from 1797 till the present day. These histories are presented through five historical tours - Awabakal, Coal Mining, Military, Maritime and Theatre.
Each tour offers easy access to over 300 historical images, photographs, convict artwork, archival newspaper articles, military documents, video interviews and animations on the Fort Scratchley site.
“Using Fort Scratchley” - Documentary DVD
“Using Fort Scratchley … a location in transition” is a 53 minute documentary on the history of the Fort Scratchley site. The documentary was completed in June 2008. It is about the people who have been using Fort Scratchley for over 200 years.
The documentary also contains oral history stories about the site. Before it became Fort Scratchley the site was known as Fort Fiddlesticks, Collier's Point, Signal Hill, Flagstaff Hill and Captain Allan's Hill. These names represent the different communities who used the site before the Military built the Fort in 1882.
Fort Scratchley is important because it is the only Australian Coastal Defence Battery to have returned fire on an enemy vessel during WWII. When the military quit the site in 1972… the community moved in. The DVD is on sale at Fort Scratchley, Newcastle.
Newcastle City Council and the University of Newcastle funded the project with special assistance from Fort Scratchley Historical Society. The copyright on the DVD resides with Susan Kerrigan, however by special arrangement all the proceeds from the DVD will be returned to Fort Scratchley.
Researcher Profile
- Susan Kerrigan
School of Design, Communication and Information Technology
Project Publications
- Kerrigan Susan Maree, 'Collaborative and Creative Documentary Production in Video and Online', in: Proceedings of the 14th International Symposium of Electronic Art (ISEA 2008), 25 July - 3 August 2008, Singapore, pp. 265-267. (2008), [E1]
- Kerrigan Susan Maree, 'Using Fort Scratchley Re-deployed: the story of a location in transition', Newcastle City Council in conjunction with the University of Newcastle Community Preview Screening of DVD, 27 June 2008, Newcastle. (2008), [J2]
- Kerrigan Susan Maree, 'Creating documentaries: Collaborative video and online practice', Create World 2007: Apple University Consortium. Sessions, Brisbane (2007) [E3]
- Kerrigan Susan Maree, Fort Scratchley, http://www.fortscratchley.org (2007) [J2]
- Kerrigan Susan Maree, 'Reflecting on Documentary Video Practice', Speculation and Innovation: Applying practice led research in the creative industries, Queensland University of Technology (2006) [E1]
