Summary

Full colour digital photograph of Herbert and Eleanor Portanier and their young daughter Sarah, standing on the front verandah of their new home in Bentleigh in late 1979. They moved into what would be their first and only house about six or eight months after they arrived in Melbourne in 1979. The house would be changed and extended over the years.

Herbert and Eleanor Portanier and their three year old daughter Sarah migrated from Malta to Melbourne on 27 March 1979, arriving at Tullamarine Airport on 29 March 1979. They had visited Australia in 1977 to see Eleanor's family who were already in Melbourne and enjoyed it so much they decided to return permanently. The Portaniers were assisted migrants, and Herbert already had employment arranged. The couple settled in Bentleigh and their son James was born in 1981.

Description of Content

A man and woman standing on the verandah of a white weatherboard house, the woman holding a young girl sitting on the iron verandah fence.

Physical Description

Colour digital photograph

Significance

This small collection provides a valuable represention of assisted migration to Australia during the 1970s, a story little told. migrant plane journeys are difficult to portray through material culture as plane tickets and related documentation are highly ephemeral and hard to acquire.

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