POWERHOUSE COLLECTION

Notes

The doll was dressed by Florence Breaden (then aged 8 years 3 months) for the 1901 Young Person's Industrial Exhibition, held at the Royal Agricultural Grounds. The medal was presumably inscribed for the same event. Florence Catherine Breaden (1893-1929) who was born on 22 January 1893, at Nowra, New South Wales, the daughter of Thomas Henry Breaden, a mariner, and Emily James (or Jane?) Breaden, (nee Howland). Florence was the youngest of seven children. She had four brothers and two sisters. When Florence was born the family was living at Moruya, south of Nowra, on the New South Wales south coast. Later Florence's father was transferred to Sydney and the family travelled up the coast on board a passenger/cargo ship. One of Florence's brothers recalled arriving in Sydney on the ship and seeing the live cargo of pigs, common around Moruya at the time, which had undertaken the voyage on deck, unloaded in the city and herded up George Street to the markets. The Breaden family lived in the inner city suburb of Leichhardt and Florence attended Petersham School. Florence appears to have been a diligent student. In 1901 she was awarded a silver medal at the Young People's Industrial Exhibition held at the Royal Agricultural Grounds at Moore Park from the 27th May to the 4th June, 1901. The display was described in the Exhibition booklet as a competitive exhibition of all kinds of literary, musical, artistic, mechanical, domestic and other work of young people under 21 years of age … attending schools, colleges, institutions, technical colleges, factories and workshops. The Exhibition included musical competitions, callisthenic displays, cookery demonstrations, pet shows, home work, technical college exhibitions, a special doll show and kindergarten demonstrations. Model engines and electrical machinery were also on show. At this exhibition Florence was awarded a silver medal for hand sewing a set of clothes for her doll. The doll wears Florence's medal around her neck. During the 1920s Florence had art lessons and excelled at watercolours. While on holiday in Cooroy, Queensland, she met Norman Gilliland and they were married in Cooroy in 1927. Florence became the wife a farmer and lived at nearby Eumundi, in the Sunshine Coast hinterland, but became ill with Tuberculosis shortly after. Only 14 months after her first child, Rowley Thomas John Gilliland, was born in 1928, Florence died at the age of 36 on the 24th August, 1929. She was buried in Cooroy cemetery. Florence's husband remarried and baby Rowley was brought up by his step mother. The doll was passed on to one of Florence's brothers, Arthur Breaden, and was always displayed in a glass case. By the 1970s it passed into the collection of Anne Schofield and exhibited in 'Seen but not heard' and sold to the Museum at auction by Leonard Joel.