Pauline Mitchell
An exemplary life-time of devotion to the cause of world peace. Still actively, tirelessly working for what she passionately believed in, right to the very end of her inspirational life. Those of us who were fortunate to know her, will never forget her. We are thankful for her extraordinary life. The world is a poorer place without her in it, but her spirit lives forever.
An exemplary life-time of devotion to the cause of world peace. Still actively, tirelessly working for what she passionately believed in, right to the very end of her inspirational life. Those of us who were fortunate to know her, will never forget her. We are thankful for her extraordinary life. The world is a poorer place without her in it, but her spirit lives forever.
Dear friend, Rest-in-Peace.
22nd March 2013
3CR was deeply saddened to learn that long-time programmer Pauline Mitchell passed away on Wednesday 20th March 2013. Pauline has been with 3CR since the very beginning of the station in 1976 and Alternative News
was one of our first programs. Pauline was an inspirational figure and
her loss will be greatly felt throughout the 3CR community and
throughout the Left generally. 3CR would like to express its deepest
condolences to her family, friends, comrades and listeners.
From Irene Gale, Australian peace activist:
Last night (Wed 20th March) our dear friend Pauline Mitchell had a massive stroke which caused her death.
A
great many people all around Australia, and overseas, knew Pauline as a
dedicated worker for world peace. She was a highly intelligent, quiet,
persistent and kind activist with an extremely wide knowledge on a wide
range of issues.
She had the ability to transmit this knowledge in an
easily understood manner, and did this
through the weekly peace program on Radio 3CR in Melbourne, and through
articles in the “Peace 2000” magazine of the Campaign for International
Cooperation and Disarmament (CICD) which she produced for very many
years. Pauline was a long-time Executive Committee member of CICD and
helped to run their office in Trades Hall.
Pauline also belonged to other peace organisations as well as CICD, and was always present at peace actions around Melbourne. She
often spoke to services at the Melbourne Unitarian Peace Memorial
Church, explaining the effects of various political situations on world
peace.
Pauline’s absence will leave a huge hole in the various organisations she was involved with and, indeed, for us all.
She will be greatly missed.
- Irene
". . .According to Doug, her grandson who lives with her, she was chirpy that morning before he left for work (she was telling Doug about the news topics she was going to get off the Internet that day for Alternative News). When he got home that evening he found her collapsed and not breathing. She was resuscitated by the ambulance crew, but was taken off life support a few hours later after her heart stopped beating. A scan revealed a brain hemorrhage, perhaps a stroke. Her kids and grand kids were there with her when she passed away, telling her we all love her, and hoping she could hear us and know that we were all there with her. After they removed the tubes and allowed us back into the room she looked beautiful, peaceful and at rest. Mum has donated her body to Melbourne University for research, so there will be no funeral as such. We are planning a memorial for mum in about a month's time. . ." - Kisten
From Pauline's daughter Kisten:
". . .She was a sweet gentle soul with a tenacious commitment to Peace and
social justice that was extraordinary. I love her dearly, and am so
honoured to be her daughter. My darling mother. . ."
". . .According to Doug, her grandson who lives with her, she was chirpy that morning before he left for work (she was telling Doug about the news topics she was going to get off the Internet that day for Alternative News). When he got home that evening he found her collapsed and not breathing. She was resuscitated by the ambulance crew, but was taken off life support a few hours later after her heart stopped beating. A scan revealed a brain hemorrhage, perhaps a stroke. Her kids and grand kids were there with her when she passed away, telling her we all love her, and hoping she could hear us and know that we were all there with her. After they removed the tubes and allowed us back into the room she looked beautiful, peaceful and at rest. Mum has donated her body to Melbourne University for research, so there will be no funeral as such. We are planning a memorial for mum in about a month's time. . ." - Kisten
Pauline Mitchell
CICD Secretary Pauline Mitchell
reflects on the past 50 years of
the Campaign for International Co-operation
and Disarmament.
The CICD celebrated
it's 50th Anniversary in November of
2009, at a gathering in the Melbourne Unitarian Peace Memorial Church.
From the NZ Peace Council:
On behalf of the NZ Peace Council, I want to
send my deepest condolences on the passing of Pauline. Although we never met, I
feel as if I have known her all my life. Pauline was one of those who has
dedicated her whole life doing good things, and not just in the peace movement.
It is always sad to lose people like Pauline
because wonderful and dedicated people of her calibre are few and far
between.
We shall remember her.
Barney Richards
Gerald O'Brien
NZ Peace Council.
Obituary
Pauline Mitchell
The Guardian
deeply regrets to announce the sudden death of Comrade Pauline Mitchell
in Melbourne on March 20 age 82. Pauline is widely known, loved and
respected for her work in the peace movement, media and women’s
movement.
She recounted in an interview recorded on the
occasion of the 50th anniversary of the Campaign for International
Co-operation and Disarmament (CICD) that she first became involved in
politics and decided to join the peace movement when she realised that
her taxes were funding armaments.
Pauline is famous as the person who first alerted
Australians to the establishment of the United States secret military
intelligence base at Pine Gap.
In the 1950s Pauline lived in Alice Springs, working for the local paper the Centralian Advocate.
She noticed the arrival of US Air Force engineers who brought a large
caravan bristling with electronic equipment, a caravan that was out of
bounds to Australian government employees. US planes were landing at
Alice Springs airport with high ranking military personnel and heavy
equipment, tractors and cranes on them. A friend told Pauline he was
blindfolded one day and taken out to the US base to fix some equipment,
then blindfolded and brought back to town again.
When Pauline moved to Melbourne in the late ’50s,
she could not find any reference in any papers about the presence of the
American military in Australia. But eventually she did get the story
out through the Melbourne Unitarian Church.
For over 50 years Pauline was a leading member,
worker, organiser and for a number of years secretary of CICD.
Established in 1959, CICD is Australia’s longest serving peace
organisation. Pauline was an influential leader and activist in the
peace movement as well as being a political leader, maintaining the
CICD’s strong working class connections and anti-imperialist political
line.
Pauline’s Sunday morning broadcast on community
Radio 3CR was one of the first programs that went to air when it was
established. Alternative News has been
produced every week since 1976 till the Sunday before her death. It had a
large loyal audience of people who looked forward to her well
researched and down to earth weekly news and commentary on politics,
peace and social justice, using material from publications and
organisations from around the world.
You only needed to listen to one of Pauline’s
programs to realise how much information and facts could be fitted into
15 minutes in a presentation that was so clear and easily understood.
Pauline was in the CPA and became a foundation
member of the SPA and then the CPA following the Party reclaiming the
name. She remained a loyal member until her death. She never flaunted
her Party membership but her allegiance was well known and her
commitment to an anti-imperialist position in the peace movement was
always rock solid.
Pauline was one of those Communists who, despite
the many struggles and strains, dedicated herself 100 percent to the
people’s cause for peace and social justice.
She continued to work in the CICD office three or
four days a week up until at the age of 81. Last year she could no
longer climb the stairs at Trades Hall in Melbourne. But even then she
continued to come into meetings and she always did the radio program.
The Communist Party of Australia and The Guardian
send condolences to Pauline’s family and her many comrades and friends.
Her magnificent contribution to the struggle for peace and socialism is
her great legacy. She will be sadly missed.
Pauline’s final contribution was that she donated her body to Melbourne University.
From: The Guardian - The Worker's Weekly
Issue # 1587. March 27, 2013
The Pauline Mitchell
Guest Book
This Guest Book will remain online until 25/04/2014 courtesy of Kisten McCandless.
This Guest Book will remain online until 25/04/2014 courtesy of Kisten McCandless.
Sign the guest book, share your condolences,
or read the tributes to Pauline:
or read the tributes to Pauline:
Memorial Celebration of the Life of
Pauline Mitchell
12th November 1930 – 20th March 2013
The most powerful weapon you can be is an instrument of peace
Saturday 27 April 2013,
Unitarian Peace Memorial Church,
Grey Street, East Melbourne.
Unitarian Peace Memorial Church,
Grey Street, East Melbourne.
MC: John Speight - Chair of CICD
Tributes to be delivered by:
Reverend Richard Wootton
Jan Bartlett
Hannah Middleton
John Speight for John Ellis
Kisten McCandless for
Bruce McPhie
Pauline’s family
Slide Show
We were enriched by her down-to-earthness, dignity,
commitment and humility. A great lady indeed.
(Joe and Rita Camilleri & Pax
Christi)
Pauline Dorothy Mitchell (nee Redman)
Born in South Australia.
First job at Fauldings in Adelaide as a typist.
Went to Alice Springs in her teens where she worked for the Works and Housing Dept and the Centralian Advocate newspaper.
It was in Alice that Pauline’s political awakening happened when, while working on the newspaper, she could not get answers as to what the large US military contingent was doing on the outskirts of the town.
It was the secrecy surrounding the so called ‘weather station’ – the Pine Gap spy base – that got her started as an activist.
Also, while working at the newspaper and reporting on a murder trial of a young Aboriginal man who was sentenced and imprisoned, Pauline’s eyes were opened to the absurdity of white man’s law being imposed on the Aboriginal nation that have their own laws.
It was these formative experiences and the realisation that her taxes were funding armaments that compelled Pauline to become involved in politics and join the peace movement.
She moved to Melbourne in 1958 where she was the first to alert Australians to Pine Gap at a meeting in the Unitarian Church.
She was a foundation member of CICD and was active in it for 54 years up to her death. She was Secretary of it for many years.
Her activities at CICD included talking at schools about peace and the nuclear menace, writing submissions, leaflets, speeches, newsletters, speaking at conferences, researching, writing and presenting the weekly radio program - Alternative News - on Radio 3CR since 1976 and before that on ABC Community Radio 3ZZ from 1974.
Married twice and raised two children and three step children.
An accomplished writer, speaker, pianist and a much loved mother and grandmother.
Some of Pauline’s activities and achievements include:
Made a Life Member of CICD in 1990.
World Peace Councillor.
Life member of 3CR.
Foundation member of the Socialist Party of Australia (SPA) now Communist Party of Australia (CPA) – a member until her death.
Member of Melbourne Unitarian Church and spoke regularly there.
Member of Union of Australian Women (UAW) & wrote and presented a monthly radio program for them on 3CR.
Recipient of the Eureka Australia Day Medal in 2006.
Helped form the Moorabbin Peace Group.
Involved in Save Our Sons.
Assistant Secretary of the Melbourne New Theatre.
Wrote plays, one of which won National New Theatre’s competition for best 3 act play. “Face of an Enemy” was about a platoon of Australian soldiers in Vietnam. It had a reading by the New Theatre during the Vietnam Moratorium Campaign.
Romina Beitseen:
Pauline was a very special lady and loved by everyone who knew her.
Pauline was a very special lady and loved by everyone who knew her.
Jane Farrell:
Pauline was a selfless and tireless activist who always worked for the good of all.
Her commitment was admirable, inspiring and unforgettable.
Maree Coote:
Pauline was always dedicated to the Peace Movement, and to my then young eyes, her passion and determination defined her.
Irene Gale:
A great many people all around Australia, and overseas, knew Pauline as a dedicated worker for world peace with justice for all. Her absence will leave a huge hole.
Burt Blackburne:
Her well researched radio programs will be missed but the inspiration she gave will encourage others to continue the struggle.
Allie Dawe:
She was inspirational for her unflagging commitment to her principles and how she worked for those in the world. Everyone who spoke her name did so with love and awe.
Brian McLure:
You are one of the "Good Ones", an inspiration and a real hero of mine.
Tribute from JOHN
ELLIS,
delivered by John Speight:
The following stories are just a few of the things I remember about
meeting and working with Pauline. They are only a few and in no way cover her
lifetime as an activist for peace.
Both Pauline and I were present at the inauguration of CICD in the South Melbourne
Town Hall in 1959. Its
original name was the Australia-New Zealand
Congress for International Co-operation and Disarmament. International speakers
such as Linus Pauling, J. B. Priestly and his wife Jacqueta Hawkes were among
the speakers.
However, another notable speaker who had been invited, the
African-American Paul Robeson, was unable to attend as his passport, which had
been taken from him during the McCarthy period, was restored and he was then
travelling in Europe. But he did send a tape
recording of the speech he would have given at the Congress. For me it was an
electrifying presentation and was the catalyst that moved me to sign up with
CICD.
In 1960 Robeson came to Australia
and CICD gave him a reception. There is a tape recording of this event in our
archives. Pauline is in one of the many photos taken with Robeson.
MOORABBIN
PEACE ACTION
Pauline was one of a small group of people in Moorabbin who came
together and formed Moorabbin Peace Action. It was one of many suburban groups
who bonded together to resist sending our troops to fight in the unwinnable war
in Vietnam.
Our meetings were always held at Pauline and Harry’s house.
We were surprised when our Letters to the Editor were published in the
local paper. As we soon found out, one of the sub-editors was very supportive
of our actions. His name was George Coote and there may be a few people here
who will remember George as a full-on character. He also took on the role as a
counsellor for draft resisters.
Probably the biggest event we held locally was when Dr Benjamin Spock,
an American paediatrician travelled Australia
condemning the American War in Vietnam.
While we filled the town hall with supporters we never expected a group from
the Nazi Party to turn up outside. They were dressed in Nazi-style clothing and
produced a huge flag with the swastika painted on it. Even the Federal Police
who were there to check us out didn’t allow them to enter the meeting.
During the 1975 Federal election which unseated the Whitlam Government,
Barry Johnston, who was an underground draft resister, stood against our
sitting member, Don Chipp. Finding public venues for him to speak while on the
run was challenging. However, we arranged to have him interviewed by the ABC-TV
in our small lounge room – not an easy task with cameras and supporters
cramming in. I took a photo of him being interviewed on our TV screen. Of
course he was done like a dinner at the election.
In the early 1970s Pauline, Les Dalton and I asked for a meeting with
the Minister for Customs, Don Chipp who’s portfolio took in the US Navy’s Omega
Navigation system for nuclear submarines. As opponents of the base we wanted to
tell Chipp of our fears of nuclear retaliation on US bases in Australia.
We had only been seated when Chipp opened up with: “Are you communists?”
We felt this was a tactic to steer us away from our mission, and we left his
office.
On other occasions Moorabbin Peace Action distributed leaflets at our
local railway stations during peak hours and of course pasted up our posters
during the night.
In August 1975 CICD held its Hiroshima Day
action by organising a two-day march from Frankston to Melbourne. It was an ambitious event but was
quite successful. We stayed at billets in Moorabbin overnight and Moorabbin
Peace Action held a very successful concert in a hall in Cheltenham.
Of course, Pauline was very active in this event. On the following day we
marched to the City Square
along St Kilda Road
and joined a huge number of protesters. After speakers we had a mass lie-in.
Thanks to Pauline and Bruce McPhie, CICD’s Alternative News radio program went
to air, not on 3CR as many people might think, but on an experimental ABC
community radio station, 3ZZ around 1973.
There were many hurdles in setting up the station, not least by a motley group
called People Against Communism. The station lasted about two years but
was under such pressure from right-wing groups that the Fraser Government
closed it down.
Fortunately 3CR was, at this stage, doing test broadcasts and Bruce and
Pauline carried on with the weekly Alternative News. Eventually Bruce moved to Vietnam and
Pauline carried on alone.
Of course she always typed her programs on a typewriter. But not only
that she used quarto-sized paper, not A4. Those typed pages are now in the University of Melbourne Archives and are a tribute to
her lifelong persistence and beliefs over many, many years.
These actions that I’ve spoken about are but a few that Pauline Mitchell
was involved in over her adult life. In fact if I were to delve into research
of an activist and an organisation like CICD in this country, I dare say that
it would be difficult to find such a pair.
Some 25 years ago when I retired I started to archive CICD’s history at Melbourne University Archives and have been
successful in securing over 120 boxes of material. After the Vietnam war ended
my interest in documentary photography shifted to world-wide nuclear issues and
the environment.
I returned to CICD in 2008 to continue archiving events that CICD had
been involved in during that interim period. While I was making progress it was
becoming more difficult because while I was disposing of material, Pauline was
into the bins digging out things that she thought would be still relevant. In
other words she was an inveterate hoarder!
After a visit by a couple of archivists from the university archives,
Pauline had to agree with them that, yes, they would need to add another floor
to their building. So I won that argument.
Another 50 boxes have gone to the archives and I estimate about another
20-30 will go before I finish.
I will always, always remember walking into CICD’s office one day
a week around 9.30, sometimes walking behind Pauline as she pulled herself up
the stairs to the office with her two hands. This was after walking from her
home in Turner Road to the Highett station, not a small distance, then fighting
the multitude on lifts at Central Station, then walking up the hill to Trades
Hall, and finally using two hands to pull herself up those stairs. And in all
kinds of weather, I mean . . . what a woman!
Having read many biographies of other activists in this and other
countries whose exploits make you gasp, Pauline Mitchell will always stand tall
among them.
- John Ellis
Tribute from BRUCE McPHIE,
delivered by Kisten McCandless:
To the Memory of PAULINE MITCHELL ~
A
message for Pauline Mitchell’s Memorial, Saturday April 27, 2013,
Melbourne Unitarian
Peace Memorial
Church, from Bruce McPhie.
With the sudden passing of Pauline
Mitchell, a truly remarkable and inspirational woman, so many fine words have
been expressed by so many people, and she deserves every one of them. No amount
of words can adequately express the sadness we feel at losing our dear friend,
and the great loss to the world of a tireless campaigner for peace. Pauline was
everything everyone has written or spoken about, everything good and decent,
and so much more.
I first met Pauline Mitchell in Melbourne in 1970, in the
heady days of the Vietnam Moratorium Campaign. For years, we worked together as
close colleagues on many peace issues at CICD, until I took leave-of-absence in
1978. CICD, Australia’s
longest serving peace organization, was established in 1959 as the Congress for
International Co-operation and Disarmament. It is now known as the Campaign
for International Co-operation & Disarmament. Remarkably, for over 50 years, Pauline was a leading member, worker, organizer and
secretary of CICD.
I was always impressed by her
intelligence, compassion, and her quiet determination to work for a better
world of peace and justice for all. Pauline always retained a confidence in the
importance and ultimate success of her work, despite all the hardships and ups
and downs the peace movement faced.
Together, we presented the Alternative
News each week on ABC Access Radio 3ZZ, from about 1973 until the station was
forcibly closed down by the new conservative government in 1975, and then the
programme transferred to Community Radio 3CR. I left in 1978, but amazingly Pauline
continued the radio programme almost every single week right up until her
death, despite her bouts of illness. Remarkably, she wrote and presented this
radio programme each week for about 40 years. When anyone else would have long
given up, Pauline never did. Such was her exceptional commitment and
dedication.
Even after leaving Melbourne and CICD
and “going bush” in 1978, and then moving to live and work in Viet Nam in 1997,
we always kept in touch, and remained close friends, comrades and kindred
spirits ever since. Every year, we would catch up for stimulating conversations
over lunch, and I always looked forward to those occasions. Sadly, our last
such happy occasion was just last November on my annual holiday in Melbourne. Although
clearly Pauline was weakened physically by age and ill-health, she was still as
mentally alert and focused as ever. Only in death would Pauline ever retire
from her work for peace.
As well as the serious issues we worked
on together, I will always remember Pauline for her wonderfully quirky sense of
humour, which we shared. We clicked. Perhaps this was a necessary balance to
the heavier subjects of war and peace that weighed heavily on our minds.
Pauline would write these amazingly long
letters, sometimes by hand, sometimes on her trusty old typewriter companion,
and always on many sheets of foolscap paper. Her letters free-ranged over the
important world issues of the day, but with lighter, funnier, crazy stuff
thrown in for good measure. I always got a buzz when another letter appeared in
my mail box or at the post office. I only hope that somewhere I have saved
them, so I can go back and relive those very special memories.
Pauline would tell the story of how she
first became involved in politics and decided to join the peace movement when
she realised that her taxes were funding armaments, and when as a young woman
she was concerned as she witnessed the establishment of the secret US military
intelligence base at Pine Gap.
In the 1950s, she lived in Alice Springs, working for the local newspaper the Centralian Advocate. There, she noticed the first
arrival of US Air Force engineers who brought a large caravan bristling with
electronic equipment; a caravan that was out of bounds even to Australian
government employees. US
planes were landing at Alice Springs airport
with high ranking US military personnel and heavy equipment, all shrouded in an
atmosphere of secrecy and intrigue.
When Pauline moved to Melbourne
in the late 1950s, she could not find any reference in any papers about this
presence of the American military in Australia. However, she got the story out through the Melbourne Unitarian
Church, and so was perhaps the first
person to alert Australians to the establishment of the secret US base at Pine
Gap. Pauline continued to present many
well-informed and enlightening addresses at the Unitarian Church
on various issues close to her heart.
Now, reading the many tributes to Pauline
reminds me of just how remarkable, but self-effacing, she was. It is no cliché
to say that she dedicated her life to others, and to the cause of peace, right
to the very end of her life. Pauline was dedicated to her family, to her
friends and colleagues, and to all the ordinary people of the world, even if
they never knew her. We all owe a great debt of gratitude to Pauline.
For those of us who were fortunate to
know her, we will always remember what a unique and special person Pauline was.
When some of the sadness subsides, we will take comfort in remembering the many
positive and happy times we shared with her, and how lucky we were to know her
in our life. We can also be thankful that Pauline was able to keep working on
the things she truly believed in right to the very end, and was spared too much
suffering.
Finally, we can hope that the world will
somehow achieve the peace and social justice that Pauline selflessly dedicated
her whole life for.
Pauline ~ thank you for your life lived
so nobly.
Dear friend, Rest in Peace.
Bruce McPhie
May 23, 2013.
