Museum Metadata Exchange

Names

Name PrimaryThe Thomas Steel Collection: late 19th century

IDs

ID LocalAM0025

ID UriOffline Only

Descriptions

Brief DescriptionBetween 1887 and 1924 Mr Thomas Steel (1858-1925) donated a total of 103 artefacts to the Australian Museum. They were from several countries including Australia, Fiji and the United States. 86 were stone artefacts from Australia, Fiji (22 of which Mr Steel collected on Rewa River, Viti Levu in 1885-86) and New Caledonia. In 1927 Mr Steel’s widow, Mary Sinclair Steel donated 77 artefacts to the museum, many of which were stone arrow heads collected by her husband in the United States.

SignificanceMr Steel was a Scottish-born industrial chemist and naturalist who migrated to Australia in 1882. He worked in sugar mills in Queensland and Fiji until 1887. He was a fellow of the Linnean Society of London and a councillor of the Linnean Society of New South Wales. He donated many Australian faunal specimens to the Australian Museum.

Subjects

scotCollecting

localIndigenous artefacts; Late 19th century

pontStone tools

Coverage Spatial

TextFiji; Australia; New Caledonia; United States of America

Coverage Temporal

From1887

To1924

Dates

Date Record Updated2012-05-30 23:41

Date Created in MME2011-03-18 09:25