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The mining town of Kalgoorlie's most unconventional tourist drawcard might be its historical society.
Key points:
- Ancestry tourism has been popularised by television shows like Who Do You Think You Are? and internet-based genealogy research
- Each month more than 200 people visit the Eastern Goldfields Historical Society, most come in search of their ancestors
- The region's tourism organisation, Australia's Golden Outback, is launching an ancestry tourism campaign
Each day the society's volunteers sift through archives and navigate online databases finding details from which a life can be sketched for the tourists who visit.
These visitors belong to a growing trend of people travelling in search of their ancestors.
Often called ancestry or genealogy tourism, at the historical society they call it emotional tourism.
'It's poignant and emotional'
Each month more than 200 people from across the country pass through the Eastern Goldfields Historical Society, executive officer Claire Weir said.
The vast number of people who descended on the region in goldrush times makes the West Australian Goldfields a hotspot for ancestry tourism.
"I think they've heard stories, they want to see if they're true," volunteer Diana Stockdale said.
Ms Stockdale confronted her own family's desire to keep the past hidden in order to became an avid family researcher.
Having unearthed convict ancestors and a Eurasian from Hong Kong who 'passed' at a time Asians were banned on the goldfields, now she is keen to help others.
Sometimes people are excited by what they find, other times they would rather not know.
"It's about discovery, and the unknown, it can be exciting or devastating," Ms Weir said.
Standing in a wedge of light in the historical society's main hall, sisters Lyn Slater and Maureen Young are searching for information about their grandparents.
The toss of a coin led their Irish grandfather to the Goldfields, now they have returned to see the places where he raised a family.
"I'm feeling quite emotional just being in the streets," Ms Slater said.
"My dad probably walked down one of these streets when he was a kid. It's emotional it really is."
They have also come to visit the grave of a baby they never met — their Aunty Molly who died aged 14 months.
"When Nana used to talk about [her death] it was heart-wrenching, I was only quite young hearing these stories but they are so real, the emotion was so strong that it really does impact your life," Ms Slater said.
The sisters leave the historical society with a map in hand, marked with the places they will visit on their personal tour of Kalgoorlie.
"It gives you more of a sense of belonging. It cements you more to the country I suppose," Ms Slater said.
"It gives you an appreciation of the hardships they went through."
Longing and discomfort
In a settler colony such as Australia, what is aroused in these searches is often complex and contradictory.
According to Anna Haebich, Distinguished Professor of History at Curtin University, the desire can be fuelled by a "discomfort about why we came here and how we came here".
But it often springs from a deep longing to link family memories and stories with a place, she said.
Professor Haebich has been on her own 'emotional tourism' journeys in both Australia and Germany.
Visiting the Holstein region of Germany, locals were incredulous that she had returned to have a look.
"They kept asking why," she said.
But when Professor Haebich saw a collection of items in a local museum they resonated with a sense of style she had observed in the women of her family.
"I really had a strong feeling of them as people, how they spoke and did things," she said.
Travelling alone in Queensland after her father's death, Professor Haebich said she felt a strong need to simply 'be' in the places he had once inhabited.
"I was very upset I wasn't with him [when he died]," she said.
"It helped with my grieving, it brought back lots of memories and lots of his stories."
New tourism campaign
For the region's tourism organisation, Australia's Golden Outback, ancestry tourism is a novel way to entice people to regional Australia.
The organisation announced they are working with Eastern Goldfield's Historical Society on a new ancestry tourism campaign showcasing a personal journey into the region's history.
They are calling out for people across Australia who would like to be part of the campaign and participate in a documentary to discover their own links to the Goldfields.
"If you look at the popularity of shows like Who Do You Think You Are? and companies who are providing [genealogy] services online, I think there's a market for ancestry tourism," Marcus Falconer, the organisation's CEO said.
Mr Falconer thinks appealing to people's interest in family history helps overcome the barriers which stop people from travelling to regional and outback Australia — time, distance and cost.
This personal time travel could also be growing in popularity as it gives tourists a sense of purpose.
"These places that have family connection might be in our imagination. We've heard the stories, we have that longing to go there and fulfil something in ourselves," Professor Haebich said.
Topics: tourism, travel-and-tourism, history, kalgoorlie-6430
First posted