MAKING A HOME IN PERTH
John Curtin's new life in Perth provides an insight into what he spent his life fighting for - security and opportunity for all Australians. The cornerstone of John Curtin's fight was the welfare of the family. At heart he was a very simple man who believed that no one should have to suffer the effects of inequality. He wanted to work towards a society which valued the family by providing decently paid and secure work for fathers, so that they could clothe, feed and educate their children.

Extract from oral history of John Curtin's daughter, Elsie Macleod

John Curtin Prime Ministerial Library, Records of the Curtin family, John Curtin family, April 1922 at 15 Napier St Cottesloe, JCPML 00376/51.

These political aims, based as they were on his own childhood experience, can also be seen in the importance John Curtin attached to his own family and home. John Curtin married his fiancee Elsie Needham shortly after taking up his position as editor of the Westralian Worker. At first they lived in rented accommodation but by 1923 they had

bought a block of land and built their own house in Jarrad Street, Cottesloe. And there they stayed. Having moved so much during his own childhood, John Curtin wanted to ensure that his children grew up in a stable and secure environment.

THE YOUNG FAMILY
These two photographs show how much John Curtin's family meant to him. In one, a formal photograph shows the family in their 'best dress'. It is perhaps a symbol of what John Curtin wanted for all Australians. The other is more informal and shows John Curtin and his two children in the family's backyard, looking happy and secure. Elsie holds a little doll her father bought for her in Geneva where he represented Australia at the International Labor Conference in 1924. The photo was taken just before John Curtin's election to the House of Representatives in 1928.

John Curtin Prime Ministerial Library, Records of the Curtin family, John Curtin with Elsie M and John F Curtin, Cottesloe, n.d., JCPML 00382/19.