An Historian's Life: Max Crawford and the Politics of Academic Freedom (Academic Monographs)

410 Pages·2005·2.8 MB·english

by  Fay Anderson

An Historian’s Life

For
Alex

An Historian’s Life
Max Crawford and the Politics of Academic Freedom
Fay Anderson
MELBOURNE UNIVERSITY PRESS
An imprint of Melbourne University Publishing Ltd (MUP Ltd)
187 Grattan Street, Carlton, Victoria 3053, Australia
[email protected]
www.mup.com.au
First published 2005
Text © Fay Anderson, 2005
Illustrations © Belong to the individual copyright holder as
acknowledged in the text.
Design and typography © Melbourne University Publishing Ltd 2005
This book is copyright. Apart from any use permitted under the Copyright
Act 1968 and subsequent amendments, no part may be reproduced,
stored in a retrieval system or transmitted by any means or process
whatsoever without the prior written permission of the publishers.
Designed by Phil Campbell
Typeset in Utopia by J&M Typesetting
Printed by University of Melbourne Design & Print Centre
National Library of Australia Cataloguing-in-Publication entry
Anderson, Fay.
An historian’s life : Max Crawford and the politics of
academic freedom.

Includes index.
ISBN 0 522 85153 3. (paperback)
ISBN 0 522 85154 1. (e-book)

1. Crawford, R. M. (Raymond Maxwell), 1906-1991. 2.
University of Melbourne. Dept. of History - Employees -
Biography. 3. Historians - Australia - Biography. 4.
Academic freedom - Australia. 5. History - Study and
teaching (Higher) - Victoria - Melbourne. 6. Liberalism -
Australia. I. Title.

994.0072
Contents
Introduction 1
1. Origins and Influences 15
2. ‘Forward the Professors’ 53
3. War and Diplomacy 101
4. Brave New World 153
5. Academic Freedom and the Australian Story 217
6. ‘Things Will Never Be the Same’ 278
7. ‘Into the Night’ 321
Conclusion 366
Bibliography 375
Index 388
vii
List of abbreviations
ABC Australian Broadcasting Commission
ACCL Australian Council of Civil Liberties
AIF Australian Imperial Force
ADB Australian Dictionary of Biography
ANU Australian National University
ASIO Australian Security Intelligence Organisation
CPA Communist Party of Australia
FAUSA Federation of Australian University Staff Associations
MI5 Military Intelligence Service, section 5
MUSA Melbourne University Staff Association
MUP Melbourne University Press
NAA National Archives of Australia
NLA National Library of Australia
SRC Students Representative Council
UMA University of Melbourne Archives
VOKS All Union Association for Cultural Relations with Foreign
Countries
WEA Workers Educational Association
viii
Acknowledgements
There are many people to thank for assisting and inspiring me in this
endeavour. They include: Liz Agostino, Perrie Ballantyne, Tony Birch,
Andy Brown-May, Robert Dare, Don Garden, June Factor, Barbara
Falk, Patricia Grimshaw, Ken Inglis, Jamie Mackie, Janet McCalman,
Peter McPhee, Carolyn Rasmussen, Ron Ridley, Richard Selleck, Ann
Standish, Richard Trembath, Graham Willett, Sara Wills and Bart
Ziino. Colleagues in the History Department and Australian Centre
have generously commented on my work in progress and provided
guidance. My particular thanks to Stuart Macintyre who was a great
supervisor and continues to offer advice and encouragement. Thank
you also to the Director of the Centre, Kate Darian-Smith for pro-
viding me with the support and time to see the work to completion
and Roger Averill who emphasised the book’s contradictions and
flaws, with humour.
I am also indebted to the many people who granted me inter-
views: the late Clem Christesen, the late Nina Christesen, the late
Dymphna Clark, the late Lloyd Churchward, Ken Crawford, the late
Lloyd Evans, Sheila Fitzpatrick, Frank Ford, Betty Hayes, Donald
Horne, Laurie O’Brien, June Phillip, John Poynter, the late Geoffrey
Serle, Geoffrey Sharp, Nonie Sharp, Barry Smith, Valerie Tarrant,
Arthur Turner and Cynthia Turner. My sincere gratitude goes to Ian
Crawford and Margaret Cheshire who allowed me to intrude in their
lives, generously offering important information and correcting the
inconsistencies in my work.
Over many years the staff at the National Library of Australia
and the National Archives of Australia have been most helpful. I am
particularly grateful to the University of Melbourne Archives for pro-
viding me with advice and access to their collections. Special thanks
go to past and present staff members, most notably Cecily Close, Sue
Fairbanks, Michael Piggott, Mark Richmond and Jason Benjamin. The
staff at Melbourne University Publishing have been wonderful. Thank
you to the publisher Louise Adler, Amanda Finnis, Nathan Katz and
Monica Dux, who is always so encouraging.
To Sue Lake, Deanne McLaren and the ‘Gin Club’ for their
unerring patience and understanding when I have been
distracted, exhausted and simply annoying. Final thanks I owe to my
parents, and Alex who has lived with this research for much of his life.
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