Dermot Casey is known in Australian archaeology, if he is known at all, as someone who assisted the premier prehistorian of Australia, John Mulvaney, in his excavations of the late 1950s and 1960s. But when Casey began his collaboration with Mulvaney he was already 58 years old and had already had a continuing and significant archaeological career, working in England and South Asia with Mortimer Wheeler, as well as in Australia.

In 1935, the Reverend A. H. Voyce from New Zealand, gave French Marist priest Father P. O’Reilly an archaeological collection consisting of pottery and the remains of lithic tools. Voyce was a Methodist missionary in Bougainville and O’Reilly was in the region on a scientific mission sponsored by the Musée de l’Homme in Paris. Exploring the history around their encounters, their interpretations of these remains in relation to the peopling of Bougainville Island, and establishing that Reverend Voyce was one of the very few missionaries to conduct archaeological excavations in the Pacific at the time, this paper offers a narrative that transcends national and imperial borders: a transnational history of Pacific archaeology.

David Mellor took sabbatical leave with Linus Pauling in 1937–8 intending to extend his knowledge of crystal structure analysis. He returned to the University of Sydney fired with enthusiasm for magnetochemistry, establishing magnetochemistry in Australia and influencing many other Australian inorganic chemists.

Working in the 1960s, Robert Edwards was a seminal figure in the development of research into Australian rock art. He was one of the first rock art scholars to attempt a quantitative and comparative survey of rock engravings in south and central Australia. In this paper we explore the development of Edwards’ approach to rock art in the context of his interests in art, museums and heritage.

Founded in 1926, Australia’s principal scientific research body, CSIR (later, CSIRO), became one of the largest research agencies in the world by the end of the World War 2. It evolved from an agricultural research institution, to one that was broad-based, conducting world-leading applied and fundamental research. The authors analyse the relationship between scientific research and national development in CSIR against the backdrop of a changing global economic and political environment during the second quarter of the twentieth century.

International incidents and the SARS virus threatened the viability of the 25th general assembly of the international astronomical union, that was to be held in Sydney in July 2003. Fortunately, the virus was quickly brought under control so that overseas and local astronomers were not deterred from attending and the conference was successful. With plans for another general assembly in Australia, there are lessons to be learnt from the one in 2003.