The Historical Guide to New South Wales is a unique reference work. Never before has there been an attempt to succinctly record the location, history, industries, buildings, calamities and the population of over 9,700 cities, towns, villages, hamlets and localities (outside Sydney), whether extant or defunct. Neither has a record ever been made of the numerous surveyors who laid out our towns and the architects, engineers and builders who designed and built their most important structures. The small size of most of these places has never justified their inclusion in any standard reference book and, until now, their location and history have been a mystery to most. This book attempts to collate the significant details of each place from 1788 to 2020. More specifically, it indicates when a place was settled, surveyed, gazetted and established; the local produce of the district; the public services available and when they were provided; the natural disasters, accidents, epidemics and infestations that affected the inhabitants; the churches where they were baptised and married; the factories, mills and mines in which they worked; and the graveyards and cemeteries where they were buried. In addition, it gives details of many thousands of churches, industrial structures, public buildings, public works and utilities etc. and, in many cases, who designed them, when they were built and by whom. The Historical Guide to New South Wales will be indispensable to historians, geographers, librarians, heritage consultants, local historical societies, local councils, journalists, those tracing families, and inquisitive tourists.

The present edition of Panopticon versus New South Wales and other writings on Australia consists of fragmentary comments headed ‘New Wales’, dating from 1791; a compilation of material sent to William Wilberforce in August 1802; three ‘Letters to Lord Pelham’ and ‘A Plea for the Constitution’, written in 1802–3; and ‘Colonization Company Proposal’, written in August 1831, the majority of which is published here for the first time. These writings, with the exception of ‘Colonization Company Proposal’, are intimately linked with Bentham’s panopticon penitentiary scheme, which he regarded as an immeasurably superior alternative to criminal transportation, the prison hulks, and English gaols in terms of its effectiveness in achieving the ends of punishment. He argued, moreover, that there was no adequate legal basis for the authority exercised by the Governor of New South Wales. In contrast to his opposition to New South Wales, Bentham later composed ‘Colonization Company Proposal’ in support of a scheme proposed by the National Colonization Society to establish a colony of free settlers in southern Australia. He advocated the ‘vicinity-maximizing principle’, whereby plots of land would be sold in an orderly fashion radiating from the main settlement, and suggested that, within a few years, the government of the colony should be transformed into a representative democracy.

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Now back in print. Plants of Western New South Wales grew from the long experience and expertise which the authors acquired during their employment with their respective organisations in the arid and semi-arid pastoral areas of the State. Each author became aware of the need for a comprehensive record illustrating and describing the great array of plants in the area. The need was identified both for people involved in research and advisory services, and particularly for the landholders who need to manage the plants for their livelihood. The book is a landmark because it draws together all of the existing knowledge of plants from the area, adds to it the extensive collections and research of the authors and presents the whole as a comprehensive collation and description of the plants of the dry pastoral portion of the State. Because of its comprehensive nature, the work is significant to pastoralists and people concerned with plants throughout Australia. The 1992 edition of Plants of Western New South Wales has been reprinted and published by CSIRO PUBLISHING with a one page appendix giving website addresses of various herbaria in Australia where the reader can readily access up-to-date information on botanical name changes.