Look History in the Eye is produced in Melbourne, Australia at the Victorian Archives Centre, where a hundred kilometres of historic records about Victoria’s past are carefully preserved in climate controlled vaults. We meet the people who dig into archival boxes, look history in the eye and then wonder why. You can download copies of original records featured in each episode by going to the Look History in the Eye page on the Public Record Office Victoria website here: https://prov.vic.gov.au/look-history-eye-podcast
Victoria's Abortion Racket. Dr. Jo Wainer on the 1968 campaign to end illegal abortions.
What can almost 1,000 inquest records tell us about dark history we should know more about? In the latest episode of Look History in the Eye podcast, Public Record Office Victoria speaks with Dr Jo Wainer AM, one of Australia's most influential feminist campaigners, about the fight to end Victoria's backyard abortion industry. She survived death threats and court challenges but wouldn’t rest until women stopped dying. Dr Wainer reflects on the campaign she and her husband Bertram led fr...
8 Apr 2026
Names In The Margins: The Ghost Signs Guy Part 2
Behind Melbourne’s fading advertisements lie stories that were never meant to survive. In this talk, author and historian Sean Reynolds uncovers the hidden lives of women revealed through his Melbourne Ghost Signs research - stories found not only on walls, but in rate books, police files, directories, inquests, and the deep holdings of PROV. Recorded live at the Victorian Archives Centre in February 2026. This podcast is produced by Public Record Office Victoria the archive of the state gove...
17 Jun 2025
Melbourne's ghost signs: Stories of entrepreneurs and automobiles
Sean Reynolds explores Melbourne's ghost signs, revealing stories of entrepreneurs like Sidney Albert Cheney and brands like Maison Marnay Brandy in this interview.
7 Jan 2025
The Sandy Point skeleton: Solving a decades-old enigma
Unravel the enigma of the 'Sandy Point Man'. Discover how advanced forensic techniques combined with historical detective work put a name to a skeleton discovered off the coast of Victoria in 2017. With Victorian forensic experts Dr. Dadna Hartman and Dr. Runa Daniel leading the charge, hear how they applied complex methods like bomb pulse dating and forensic genetic genealogy to give the body a name and reveal what happened the day he disappeared.This podcast is produced by Public Record Off...
10 Dec 2024
Travelling to Tomorrow: Australian women of 1920s America
Historian Dr. Yves Rees guides us through the remarkable stories of pioneering Australian women in 1920s America, whose art, sport, politics, and societal achievements bridged the Pacific before World War II.
19 Nov 2024
The Brookside girls
Interview with award-winning journalist Erica Cervini. The Brookside girls is episode 14 of Look history in the eye. Erica Cervini is an award-winning education journalist, researcher and family historian. She recently wrote an article for Public Record Office Victoria's Provenance Journal about the Brookside Reformatory for Girls in Cape Clear, ten miles from Scarsdale Victoria. We delve into her research in this episode, including the cruel and unusual treatment, multiple escapes, and...
6 Feb 2024
Unravelling phrenology: a dive into a controversial past and its modern implications
Prepare to journey back in time to the captivating, yet controversial world of phrenology, with our guest Dr. Alexandra Roginski. This episode takes you from the hustle and bustle of public readings and fortune-tellers in Melbourne's Eastern Arcade to the somber tale of the Gunn-Alley Murder. We shed light on the rise and fall of phrenology, and delve into the intriguing parallels between phrenology and modern facial analysis technology and artificial intelligence. With Australian technology ...
29 Aug 2023
Unearthed: The audacious story of Fanny Finch, pioneer and rule-breaker
Hold on to your hats as we unearth the audacious story of Fanny Finch, an English emigrant who journeyed to Australia in the 1830s. Finch, a woman of colour, dodged open mine shafts and drunken men to succeed as a businesswoman and a trailblazer for women's rights in her efforts to survive as a single mother. We also bring to light how her life inspired an award-winning stage play, which clinched the Victorian Community History Award for innovative historical interpretation in 2021.Our ...
27 Jun 2023
The Boy in the Dress
Author, Jonathan Butler shares insight into his book The Boy in the Dress. This gripping family memoir shares Butler's archival research journey investigating the unsolved murder of his serviceman relative. It shines fresh light on Australia’s queer military history. Today’s episode is a recording of our Melbourne Writers Festival event from 2022 with author Jonathan Butler in conversation with Dr Yves Rees. Dr Rees is an historian at La Trobe University and co-host of the Archive Fever podc...
13 Jun 2023
Activism on the goldfields: Victorian Chinese petitions
The Australian gold rush years saw a boom in immigration and prosperity, but it wasn’t always a harmonious time. Racist attitudes towards Chinese people in Victoria led to discriminatory legislation. Standing up against this oppression, thousands of Chinese people presented petitions to government. These petitions are some of Victoria’s earliest examples of activism and they provide a rare opportunity to capture Chinese perspectives and their experiences in the young colony. This is a recordi...
16 May 2023
Queer stories from the archives
Talk by Angela Bailey, Vice-President of the Australian Queer Archives.Queer stories from the archives, episode 9 of the podcast series Look history in the eye discusses the Australian Queer Archives and the records in PROV’s collection that have a unique meaning to Victoria’s contemporary queer communities. This talk was originally given at the Victorian Archives Centre for International Archives Day 2022.Presented by Public Record Office Victoria.This podcast is produced by Public Record Of...
24 Jan 2023
The Kamarooka panther
Interview with Desiree Pettit-Keating from the Bendigo Regional Archives Centre.We're venturing out of Melbourne forThe Kamarooka panther, episode 8 of the podcast series Look History in the Eye. This episode is about the 1907 sighting of a creature known as the 'Kamarooka Panther'. The big cat was first spotted by sisters Alheith and Trine Christensen and made headlines from Bendigo to Melbourne, and right across the State.In this episode, Bendigo Regional Archives Centre's Desiree Pettit-Ke...
28 Jun 2022
Charles Troedel Archive
Talk by Amanda Scardamaglia, Associate Professor and Department Chair of the Swinburne Law School and author of Printed on Stone: The Lithographs of Charles Troedel.Charles Troedel Archive, episode 7 of the podcast series Look history in the eye explores nineteenth century Melbourne through the lens of advertising. This talk was originally given at the Victorian Archives Centre for Melbourne Design Week 2022.Presented by Public Record Office Victoria.This podcast is produced by Public Record ...
26 Apr 2022
Pioneer girls and flappers
Talk by Katie Wood, PhD Candidate in history at La Trobe University and Senior Archivist at the University of Melbourne Archives.Pioneer girls and flappers, episode 6 of the podcast series Look history in the eye looks at the women who worked in Footscray’s munitions factory during World War One, and earlier. This talk was originally given as an online presentation for International Women’s Day 2022. Presented by Public Record Office Victoria.This podcast is produced by Public Record Office V...
19 Apr 2022
Pentridge prison escape
Interview with crime writer Susanna LobezPentridge Prison Escape, Episode 5 of the podcast series Look History in the Eye is about the 1955 escape of five prisoners. Yet this was not to be the first escape from Pentridge and it would not be the last.As guest crime writer Susanna Lobez puts it: "There are three ways to undergo a prison sentence. The soft way. Which is where the prisoner obeys all the rules and works off their time as quickly as they can. The hard way. In which case they cause ...
12 Apr 2022
Deadtown to musictown
Interviews with food writer Michael Harden, restaurateur Tiberio Donnini, and economist John NieuwenhuysenBefore the pandemic Melbourne was considered the music and food capital of Australia, and it all happened in just two decades. This episode Deadtown to Musictown for Look History in the Eye, explores the backstory behind how food and music culture became the lifeblood of the City. Some claim it’s all thanks to a person called John. The story begins with the discovery of a protest poster h...
5 Apr 2022
They called her Madame B
Interview with archival historian and writer Barbara Minchinton. They called her Madame B is the third episode of the podcast from Public Record Office Victoria, Look History in the Eye. Little was known of famous 19th Century Melbourne businesswoman Madame Brussels, that is until Barbara Minchinton researched her family tree and discovered in 2018 an old photo album which belonged to her family was still in the hands of an ancestor Dennis James. It finally put a face to the rumours which had...
29 Mar 2022
Monuments for the masses
Interviews with architectural historians Derham Groves and Seamus O'Hanlon. Monuments for the masses, episode 2 of the podcast series Look history in the eye explores the reasons why Melbourne was desperate for a landmark in the 1970s and where it all went wrong. Melbourne loves to look back and laugh at the kitschy ideas that were submitted in the Landmark Competition. But the archives tell a different story, one where world-famous architects and artists were let down by a process too ideali...
29 Mar 2022
The silent prison: Pentridge and the panopticon
Interviews with Melbourne archaeologists Adam Ford and Geoff Hewitt. The Silent Prison, Episode 1 of the podcast Look History in the Eye is about the convergence of ideology and design. Pentridge Prison, in Melbourne and its on-site panopticons were the physical manifestation of criminal reform ideas in the 1800s. Radical concepts of that time were designed into the architectural vision for the prison and introduced a method we now know as one of mankind’s most brutal forms of punishmen...
Reach and audience
Public platform figures. Ratings count people who left a rating, not total listeners.
YouTube views
169,248
Score snapshot 15 Sept 2025
Spotify
5.0 / 5
6 ratings
Podcast Authority Score: 45 / 100
A composite of feed quality, social presence, YouTube performance and engagement. Read the methodology.
Quality
43
Social presence
0
YouTube
86
Engagement
32
Contact Look History in the Eye, Melbourne
Guest appearances
Books guests
Based on episode analysis; this does not confirm that the show is currently accepting guests.
Pod Engine is an independent podcast discovery and analytics service and is not affiliated with or endorsed by this podcast. Artwork and show content belong to their owners. Full legal notice.
Explore this show Podcast research with Pod Engine
