Anzac for Sale: Consumer Culture, Regulation and the Shaping of a Legend, 1915–21

Abstract

After the Gallipoli landing on 25 April 1915, the word Anzac began to appear with increasing frequency to brand a range of Australian consumer products, and many traders applied to change the name of their businesses to Anzac. On 25 May 1916, the federal government issued War Precautions Regulations prohibiting the unauthorised use of the word Anzac ‘in any trade, business, calling or profession’. This article explores applications to use the word Anzac for commercial purposes between 1915 and 1921 to argue that consumer culture became a battleground where individuals and groups competed to assert ownership over the word and the social currency it represented.

Notes

¹ Sub Regulation (1) of Regulation 2 of the War Precautions (Supplementary) Regulations, The Commonwealth of Australia Gazette, in National Archives of Australia (hereafter NAA) A432, 1929/3484 (Part 15).

² Peter Dennis et al., ‘Anzac’, in The Oxford Companion to Australian Military History (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008). www.oxfordreference.com/view/10.1093/acref/9780195517842.001.0001/acref-9780195517842-e-61.

³ C. E. W. Bean, The Story of ANZAC: Official History of Australia in the War of 1914–1918 (Sydney: Angus & Robertson, 1936).

⁴ The Sydney Morning Herald, 8 May 1915, 13.

⁵ K. S. Inglis, ‘The Australians at Gallipoli’, Historical Studies 14, no. 54 (1970): 221; Kevin Fewster, ‘Ellis Ashmead Bartlett and the Making of the Anzac Legend’, Journal of Australian Studies 6, no. 10 (June 1982): 17–30.

⁶ D. A. Kent, ‘The Anzac Book and the Anzac Legend: C.E.W. Bean as Editor and Image-maker’, Historical Studies 21, no. 84 (April 1985): 376–90; Fewster, 27; Richard Ely, ‘The First Anzac Day: Invented or Discovered?’, Journal of Australian Studies 9, no. 17 (November 1985): 41–58.

⁷ Newspaper clipping, ‘Day By Day’, Daily Telegraph, 29 May 1916: NAA A432 1929/3484 (Part 25).

⁸ Robert Crawford, But Wait, There’s More: A History of Australian Advertising 1900–2000 (Melbourne: Melbourne University Press, 2008). For a broader overview of Australian consumer culture see Robert Crawford, Judith Smart and Kim Humphery, eds, Consumer Australia: Historical Perspectives (Newcastle: Cambridge Scholars, 2010); and Beverley Kingston, Basket, Bag and Trolley: A History of Shopping in Australia (Melbourne: Oxford University Press, 1994).

⁹ Susie Khamis, ‘Class in a Teacup: The Bushells Brand 1895–1920’, in Consumer Australia, eds Crawford et al., 14–15.

¹⁰ Susie Khamis, ‘Class in a Teacup: The Bushells Brand 1895–1920’, in Consumer Australia, eds Crawford et al., 14–15.

¹¹ Amanda Scardamaglia, ‘A History of Trade Mark Law in Australia: The Colonial Trade Mark Regime’ (PhD thesis, University of Melbourne, Faculty of Law, 2011); Benedict A. C. Atkinson, The True History of Copyright: The Australian Experience 1905–2005 (Sydney: Sydney University Press, 2007).

¹² Thomas Richards, The Commodity Culture of Victorian England: Advertising and Spectacle, 1851–1914 (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1990), 3.

¹³ Anne McClintock, ‘Soft-Soaping Empire: Commodity Racism and Imperial Advertising’, in Imperial Leather: Race, Gender and Sexuality in the Colonial Contest (New York: Routledge, 1995), 207–31.

¹⁴ Khamis, 13.

¹⁵ Dale Southerton, ed., Encyclopaedia of Consumer Culture (Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications, 2011), xxix.

¹⁶ Peter N. Stearns, ‘Stages of Consumerism: Recent Work on the Issues of Periodization’, The Journal of Modern History 69, no. 1 (March 1997): 110; Elizabeth Outka, Consuming Traditions: Modernity, Modernism, and the Commodified Authentic (New York: Oxford University Press, 2008).

¹⁷ The Register, 17 December 1908, 5.

¹⁸ Kalgoorlie Miner, 25 April 1917, 4.

¹⁹ The Sunday Times, 6 February 1916, 6 (with thanks to Carolyn Holbrook).

²⁰ The Northern Miner, 29 April 1916, 5.

²¹ Letter from Queensland State War Council, 3 April 1916, NAA: A432, 1929/3484 (Part 15).

²² Letters from State War Councils in South Australia, Victoria and New South Wales, NAA: A432, 1929/3484 (Part 15).

²³ Letter from J. H. Cann to Attorney-General, 30 May 1916, NAA: A432, 1929/3484 (Part 15).

²⁴ H. J. Gibbney, ‘Hugh Mahon 1857–1931’, Australian Dictionary of Biography, vol. 10 (Melbourne: Melbourne University Press, 1986).

²⁵ Peter Dennis et al., ‘War Precautions Act’, in The Oxford Companion to Australian Military History (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008).

²⁶ Minute paper written by Robert Garran, NAA: A432, 1929/3484 (Part 15).

²⁷ Letter from George Pearce to the Attorney-General’s Office, 20 April 2016, NAA: A432, 1929/3484 (Part 15).

²⁸ Sub Regulation (1) of Regulation 2 of the War Precautions (Supplementary) Regulations, The Commonwealth of Australia Gazette, in NAA: A432, 1929/3484 (Part 15).

²⁹ The Mercury, 25 May 1916, 5.

³⁰ Telegram to British Secretary of State, 26 May 1916, NAA: A432, NAA 1929/3484 (Part 15).

³¹ Letter from Downing Street, 7 September 1916, NAA: A432, 1929/3484 (Part 15).

³² The Register, 27 October 1916, 10.

³³ Motion of Want of Confidence: War Precautions (Referendum) Regulations, House of Representatives Hansard, 1 December 1916. http://parlinfo.aph.gov.au/parlInfo/search/display/display.w3p;page=0;query=Id%3A%22hansard80%2Fhansardr80%2F1916-12-01%2F0081%22

³⁴ NZ Gazette No. 93, NAA: A432, NAA 1929/3484 (Part 15).

³⁵ Telegram from Australian Governor-General, 3 April 1916, NAA: A432, 1929/3484 (Part 15).

³⁶ John Horne, ed., State, Society and Mobilization in Europe During the First World War (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997).

³⁷ Marilyn Lake, A Divided Society: Tasmania During WW1 (Melbourne: Melbourne University Press, 1975); Bobbie Oliver, War and Peace in Western Australia: The Social and Political Impact of the Great War 1914–1926 (Perth: University of Western Australia Press, 1995); Susan Welborn, Lords of Death: A People, a Place, a Legend (Perth: Fremantle Arts Centre Press, 1983).

³⁸ The Mercury, 3 January 1916, 5.

³⁹ The Mercury, 3 January 1916, 5.

⁴⁰ Graham Seal, ‘ANZAC: The Sacred in the Secular’, Journal of Australian Studies 31, no. 91 (2007): 137.

⁴¹ Graham Seal, ‘ANZAC: The Sacred in the Secular’, Journal of Australian Studies 31, no. 91 (2007): 137.

⁴² ‘Day By Day’, Daily Telegraph, 29 May 1916.

⁴³ Letter from Joseph Levy, February 1916, NAA: A432, 1929/3484 (Part 13).

⁴⁴ Correspondence between the Commonwealth Match Works (Mr Sugar), Attorney-General’s Office and Defence Department, NAA: A432, 1929/3484 (Part 13).

⁴⁵ Newspaper clipping, Stewart Dawson’s Jewellers, NAA: A432, 1929/3484 (Part 13).

⁴⁶ Notes taken by Department of Defence staff during a deputation from the Federated Jewellers, Watchmakers and Allied Trades Union of Australia (Victoria Branch) at the Victoria Barracks, 10 August 1916, NAA: A432, 1929/3484 (Part 13).

⁴⁷ Notes taken by Department of Defence staff during a deputation from the Federated Jewellers, Watchmakers and Allied Trades Union of Australia (Victoria Branch) at the Victoria Barracks, 10 August 1916, NAA: A432, 1929/3484 (Part 13).

⁴⁸ Notes taken by Department of Defence staff during a deputation from the Federated Jewellers, Watchmakers and Allied Trades Union of Australia (Victoria Branch) at the Victoria Barracks, 10 August 1916, NAA: A432, 1929/3484 (Part 13).

⁴⁹ Notes taken by Department of Defence staff during a deputation from the Federated Jewellers, Watchmakers and Allied Trades Union of Australia (Victoria Branch) at the Victoria Barracks, 10 August 1916, NAA: A432, 1929/3484 (Part 13).

⁵⁰ Letter from Kops Brewery, 1 June 1916, NAA: A432 1929/3484 (Part 17).

⁵¹ Letter from Cooperative Mineral Waters, 7 June 1916, NAA: A432, 1929/3484 (Part 17).

⁵² Letter from Cooperative Mineral Waters, 7 June 1916, NAA: A432, 1929/3484 (Part 17).

⁵³ Correspondence between Mr Perry, George Pearce and Robert Garran, NAA: A432 1929/3484 (Part 25).

⁵⁴ Interview of Frederick Rogers conducted by A. E. Whittle, 10 October 1916, NAA: A432 192/3484 (Part 6).

⁵⁵ Correspondence between Lillian King and Robert Garran, NAA: A432 1929/3484 (Part 25).

⁵⁶ Letter from Alice Pennington to Robert Garran, 12 July 1916, NAA: A432 1929/3484 (Part 25).

⁵⁷ Letter from Alice Pennington to Robert Garran, 12 July 1916, NAA: A432 1929/3484 (Part 25).

⁵⁸ Letter from Frank Netheray to Robert Garran, 8 July 1916, NAA: A432 1929/3484 (Part 25).

⁵⁹ Letter from Sapper Myers to the Attorney-General, 18 January 1919, NAA: A432 1929/3484 (Part 17).

⁶⁰ Letter from Collison & Co. law firm to Hugh Mahon (acting Attorney-General) enclosing a letter from Clarence H. Campbell, 7 June 1916, NAA: A432 1929/3484 (Part 25).

⁶¹ Letter from Collison & Co. law firm to Hugh Mahon (acting Attorney-General) enclosing a letter from Clarence H. Campbell, 7 June 1916, NAA: A432 1929/3484 (Part 25).

⁶² Letter from Collison & Co. law firm to Hugh Mahon (acting Attorney-General) enclosing a letter from Clarence H. Campbell, 7 June 1916, NAA: A432 1929/3484 (Part 25).

⁶³ Correspondence from RSSILA Secretary (F. Murray) to the Attorney-General, 24 August 1916, NAA: A432, 1929/3484 (Part 15).

⁶⁴ Correspondence from RSSILA Secretary (F. Murray) to the Attorney-General, 24 August 1916, NAA: A432, 1929/3484 (Part 15).

⁶⁵ Letter from Garran to RSSILA General Secretary, 29 September 1916, NAA: A432, 1929/3484 (Part 15).

⁶⁶ ‘Returned soldiers: Use of term by firms 1918–19’, RSL Archive, National Library of Australia, MS 6609, Series 1, 327.

⁶⁷ ‘Returned soldiers: Use of term by firms 1918–19’, RSL Archive, National Library of Australia, MS 6609, Series 1, 327.

⁶⁸ With the exception of Anzac, the following words were administered by the Department of Repatriation under the War Precautions Act: Our Wounded Heroes/Our Wounded Heroes Brand (Commonwealth Gazette 5/4/17); War Chest and War Chest Brand (Commonwealth Gazette 14/06/17); Comfort Fund and Australian Comforts Fund (Commonwealth Gazette 15/8/18); Aussie, Returned Sailor and Returned Soldier (Commonwealth Gazette 15/5/19); Australian Imperial Force and A.I.F. (Commonwealth Gazette 12/7/19). See NAA: A432, 1929/3484 (Part 15).

⁶⁹ Letter from Department of Repatriation to Attorney-General, 7 October 1919, NAA: A432, 1929/3484 (Part 15).

⁷⁰ Letter from Robert Garran to Department of Defence, 12 October 1916, NAA: A432, 1929/3484 (Part 15).

⁷¹ Minute paper from Robert Garran outlining ‘Supplementary Regulations No. 2 & 2A’, NAA: A432, 1929/3484 (Part 15).

⁷² The Catholic Press, 10 February 1916, 25.

⁷³ Bart Ziino, A Distant Grief: Australians, War Graves and The Great War (Perth: UWA Press, 2007).

⁷⁴ The Ballarat Courier, 25 June 1915, 4.

⁷⁵ Correspondence between Arthur Farrar and the Attorney-General’s Office, 23 October 1916, NAA: A432 1929/3484 (Part 19).

⁷⁶ Correspondence between Arthur Farrar and the Attorney-General’s Office, 23 October 1916, NAA: A432 1929/3484 (Part 19).

⁷⁷ ‘Names of Streets’, NAA: A432 1929/3484 (Part 20).

⁷⁸ Joan Beaumont, Broken Nation (Sydney: Allen & Unwin, 2013), 99.

⁷⁹ Joan Beaumont, ‘Whatever Happened to Patriotic Women, 1914–1918?’, Australian Historical Studies 31, no. 115 (2000): 273.

⁸⁰ Letter to Robert Garran from J. H. Lister (MP) on behalf of Mrs E. Musther, 2 September 1918, NAA: A432 1929/3484 (Part 16).

⁸¹ Letter to Robert Garran from J. H. Lister (MP) on behalf of Mrs E. Musther, 2 September 1918, NAA: A432 1929/3484 (Part 16).

⁸² Letter to Robert Garran from J. H. Lister (MP) on behalf of Mrs E. Musther, 2 September 1918, NAA: A432 1929/3484 (Part 16).

⁸³ Letter from Robert Garran to D. Davis & Co., 29 September 1916, NAA: A432 1929/3484 (Part 14).

⁸⁴ Letter from Robert Garran to May Summerbelle, 29 September 1916, NAA: A432 1929/3484 (Part 14).

⁸⁵ Letter from Robert Garran to May Summerbelle, 29 September 1916, NAA: A432 1929/3484 (Part 14).

⁸⁶ Letter from Attorney-General’s Office to William Watt, 30 August 1918, NAA: A432, 1929/3484 (Part 15).

⁸⁷ Minute paper from Robert Garran, 30 August 1918, NAA A432, 1929/3484 (Part 15).

⁸⁸ Sydney Morning Herald, 27 October 1917, 20.

⁸⁹ Sydney Morning Herald, 27 October 1917, 20.

⁹⁰ Sydney Morning Herald, 27 October 1917, 20.

⁹¹ Robert Crawford, ‘Emptor Australis: The Australian Consumer in Early Twentieth Century Advertising Literature’, Australian Economic History Review 45, no. 3 (November 2005): 228.

⁹² Letter from Robert Garran to the Commonwealth Crown Solicitor, 13 April 1918, NAA: A432 1929/3484 (Part 17).

⁹³ Robert Crawford, ‘The Quest for Legitimacy: The Growth and Development of the Australian Advertising Industry, 1900–1969’, Australian Historical Studies 36, no. 124 (2004): 357.

⁹⁴ Robert Crawford, ‘The Quest for Legitimacy: The Growth and Development of the Australian Advertising Industry, 1900–1969’, Australian Historical Studies 36, no. 124 (2004), 360.

⁹⁵ Robert Crawford, ‘The Quest for Legitimacy: The Growth and Development of the Australian Advertising Industry, 1900–1969’, Australian Historical Studies 36, no. 124 (2004), 360.

⁹⁶ Robert Crawford, ‘The Quest for Legitimacy: The Growth and Development of the Australian Advertising Industry, 1900–1969’, Australian Historical Studies 36, no. 124 (2004), 361.

⁹⁷ Correspondence from Controller of Repatriation to Robert Garran, NAA: A432, 1929/3484 (Part 15).

⁹⁸ War Precautions Act Repeal Act 1920 (Cth), Section 22.

⁹⁹ Protection of Word ‘Anzac’ Regulations (Statutory Rules 1921 No. 2).