Summary

Small blue savings passbook issued by the Natal Building Society, Cape Town, South Africa. It belonged to Mr L.S. Motherwell, and dates from August 1968 to May 1969. Lindsay Motherwell was a drummer who travelled through Africa playing music, and settled in South Africa from 1967-1969.

Sylvia Boyes (a South African-born orphan) and Lindsay Motherwell (a Melbourne-born drummer) met in Cape Town, South Africa in 1967 through their theatre connections. They fell in love but due to apartheid laws were forced to leave South Africa to marry in London. They subsequently relocated permanently to Melbourne in 1970.

Physical Description

Blue savings passbook, 4 pages, all of which are filled. Last transaction is withdrawal of the whole account.

Significance

Statement of Historical Significance:
This collection provides a significant opportunity to represent political and personal freedom as a motivation for migrating to Australia within the international context of both apartheid in South Africa and the end of the White Australia policy in Australia. The personal narrative is well documented and the objects provide a material way to follow the lives of both Lindsay and Sylvia, both separately and where they coincide in South Africa and onwards together to Melbourne. While this is ultimately a love story, it plays out through the collection against the backdrop of apartheid South Africa, sixties London and an increasingly multicultural Australia.

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