And Miss Margaret Cramp danced in blue taffeta

Spike opened a letter today from the Registrar of Sydney University.  It read:

"Dear Douglas,

Congratulations on winning the 2010 Margaret Cramp Memorial Prize for a Part-time Student in First Year English" ... and on it went.

The University web site gives this information about the prize (which I didn't even know exists).  

"Margaret Cramp Memorial Prize for a Part-Time Student in First Year English
Established in 1945 from part of a gift of 1000 pounds from the Evening Students Association. Awarded annually to a part-time student for proficiency in first year English, in memory of Margaret Cramp, a former evening student and Library Assistant in the Fisher Library."

I know it couldn't have been a vast field of candidates but it's pleasing all the same to have some external recognition of my first semester efforts as an undergraduate.  

Later (after a Google search) I discovered this story from the Sydney Morning Herald, dated 11th May 1940 (sourced from Australia Trove)

UNDERGRADUATES' BALL.

A male ballet, a Maori sketch, and renditions of extracts from "Scram," this year's University songbook, were highlights of the Undergraduates' Ball, which took place at the Trocadcro last night.

Flowers in autumn tonings decorated the official table, at which a large party was entertained by Miss Margaret Christie, woman vice-president of the Students' Representative Council, and Mr. W. Granger, president of the council. Miss Christie wore a short fur jacket over her gown of black taffeta. One of tile honorary secretaries, Miss Helen Aspinall, chose black net and a floral lame coat, and Miss Margaret Cramp danced in blue taffeta. The guests included Mr. and Mrs. Hugh McConnell, the latter in a frock of dull-gold hand-painted satin, Dr. and Mrs. R. M. C. Gunn, Professor and Mrs. H. Tasman Lovell, Mr. and Mrs. W. A. Selle, Mr. and Mrs. John Bowie Wilson, Mr and Mrs. Vincent John Flynn, Misses Helen St. Vincent Welch, Robin Curtis, Betty Douglass, and Dorothy Dowling, Sir John Pcúii, and Professor von Wilier.

At most, the dancing Miss Cramp had five years to live.  And so, methinks, like Miss Cramp we should dance while we may.

Then ... Another Google search led me to this article from page 13 of the SMH, 11th April 1942 (a similar story appeared in newspapers in Perth, Melbourne and Adelaide).

"HORROR OF HOME ENVIRONMENT"

At the inquest yesterday on Margaret Alexandria Cramp, 22, a doctor stated that she had "almost a horror of her home environment."

Miss Cramp was found dead in front of a gas oven in a friend's home on March 27. The Coroner's finding was suicide.

Dr. John McGeorge, psychiatrist, of Macquarie Street, gave evidence by letter that when he first saw the girl at her home, in Birriga Road, Bellevue Hill, in May, 1941, she had made a half-hearted attempt at suicide. Her home surroundings were unbelievably gloomy, more like a scene from a Bronte novel than real life.

Her mother had died, and her father insisted on displaying pictures of her all round the house, including an Illuminated one, which he kept alight all night.

The girl's activities were restricted, and she had to be home at a certain hour, her father walting up. His attitude was one of continual, unex- pressed reproach, stated the letter. "Loyalty to her father prevented her from expressing her true feelings, which, I feel sure, were almost of horror of her home environment," the letter stated.

"She was a brilliant graduate in Arts, with considerable distinction, and was appointed to the University library. "I can only assume that my almost violent demands that the girl should live with other University girls in some hostel, rather than remain home, were completely ignored by her father."

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