Where do you find a city's soul? Where is its pulse, its personality? When we walk across the skin of a city, do we listen for its laugh? Terri-ann White draws together an eclectic group of Perth people in this collection to share their insights on a rapidly evolving city. From an architect's perspective on heritage to a historian's ruminations on Perth's swampy origins; from a walk down streets that don't exist to Noongar place names; from the union movement to public art to criminal Perth to conversational Perth, this book encourages new encounters with the city. Perth: a guide for the curious traverses social, cultural and political spaces as the reader traverses the streets, kindling a sense of curiosity about a city by unearthing buried treasure. This is not a book of nostalgia. It doesn't posit a golden age or list a series of laments. This is a book about continuities and unfolding narratives. Perth situates the present in the past and illuminates possible futures. Perth: a guide for the curious is meant to be thumbed through in cafes, stuffed into satchels and walked around the city like a tireless companion. Perth promises to delight and inspire both visitor and local alike. *** "Thoroughly 'reader friendly' in tone, commentary, organization and presentation, 'Perth: A Guide for the Curious' is unreservedly recommended for another living in and/or anticipating visiting the ever-evolving city of Perth, Australia." -- Midwest Book Review, Wisconsin Bookwatch: August 2016, The Travel Shelf [Subject: Travel, Australia]

Perth is the capital city of the largest Australian state. Isolated on the west coast of the continent for many years, Perth was separated by enormous deserts from all the other colonies until a road was built across the Nullarbor Plain. From the time the British settled there in 1829, Perth's early growth was slow. The settlers resisted accepting convicts for many years but eventually had to give in. There were not enough people to fill jobs and build public works, so convicts were made to take on these roles from the 1850s. Perth became the last Australian colony to take convicts from Britain, with the last ones arriving in 1868. Perth is now one of Australia's major tourist attractions and welcomes visitors from around the world, many of whom come to experience its beautiful Indian Ocean beaches.

For notes and corrections to this work by E. B. O'Callaghan, see New York Genealogical and biographical record, Jan. 1906, vol. 34, p. 50- 51.