Poet and dramatist.

The Half Dozen Group of Artists was founded in 1941 by Lilian Pedersen, Mona Elliott, Frank Sherrin, Len Shillam, Ann Ross and Rosalie Wilson as a group of professional artists whose aim was ‘to enlarge and add to the art interest of Brisbane’ (Minute Book, 1941). Since 1941 the group has held annual art exhibitions. In 1951, it established the LJ Harvey Memorial Prize, which was administered by the Queensland Art Gallery until 1987. As well as the founding members, other past members have included Irene Amos, Vincent Brown, Nutter Buzzacott, Betty Churcher, Roy Churcher, Margaret Cilento, Donald Friend, Cyril Gibbs, Melville Haysom, L J Harvey, Vida Lahey, Kenneth Macqueen, Daphne Mayo, Jon Molvig, Mervin Moriarty, Margaret Olley, Margaret Preston, Lloyd Rees, John Rigby, William Robinson, Kathleen Shillam, James Wieneke. Since 1975 the group has offered untutored and tutored workshops to its members. Through the 1980s and early 1990s the focus of the group gradually changed to become an association of largely self-taught amateur artists. Members of the Half Dozen Group were also active in the Arts Council of Australia (Queensland Division), and a few records contained in this collection, dating from 1952 to 1960, relate to this group.

Born in England, he moved to Australia with his family at the age of 11. He is an Australian film director.

Maxwell Dunn (1916-1965) was born in Launceston, Tasmania, and began his working life as an insurance agent. Turning to writing, he wrote radio plays first for the ABC, beginning with Jungle Drums in 1937, and later for the Macquarie network where he became production manager. He wrote and adapted numerous plays, serials and documentaries for the Macquarie network and its subsidiary Artransa. In 1950 Dunn joined the United Nations Radio and Television department, working for ten years in New York and New Delhi. Dunn returned to Australia shortly before his death in 1965.

Edith Mary England was born on 1 July 1899 in Townsville, Queensland. At six years old the family moved to a farm near Boonah. In 1922 she married Schomberg Montagu Bertie. Bertie died in 1937. In 1942 she married Harry August Anders. England wrote novels, short stories, poetry and verse. She won several poetry and verse awards. England worked in a variety of jobs, including the social editor of The Queensland Times, and as a music teacher.

Examinations board for musical education originally launched in 1887 by the University of Melbourne and Adelaide. It became a national body in 1918. Resources and examinations for speech and drama were also introduced in the 1920s.

Actor/singer/comedian Jenny Howard (1902-1996), born Daisy Evelyn Louise Blowes in London, first performed in Australia on the Tivoli Circuit in 1929 and settled there permanently with husband Percy King in the 1940s. For over 50 years, she appeared in musical theatre throughout Australia, including the popular Christmas pantomimes.

Scott Balson was the One Nation party's Internet Webmaster from 1997 to 1999. He is the author of Murder by Media (1999), Inside One Nation (2000), and Enemy of the State (2000).

Kate Durham is a Melbourne artist who founded Spare Rooms for Refugees, a program to provide community accommodation and other support to refugees. In late 2001 Durham and others began exchanging letters with asylum seekers detained on Nauru by the Australian Government. Durham and BBC journalist Sarah Macdonald travelled to Nauru clandestinely in June 2002, becoming the first independent eyewitnesses to visit the refugee detention centre and interview its occupants.