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In Bendigo assisting with the Labor Party’s campaign for the May 1973 Victorian state elections, Gough Whitlam opens the 2nd Eaglehawk Dahlia and Arts Festival.
Curator’s notes
Only a few months into his term as Prime Minister, Gough Whitlam visited Bendigo to assist with the Victorian Labor Party’s campaign for the May 1973 state elections. One of his tasks was to open the 2nd Eaglehawk Dahlia and Arts Festival. The large Bendigo-Eaglehawk crowd he addressed, which included the notorious Bendigo YMCA Vikings, was very representative of 1973 Australia – a place ripe for the fundamental reforms the Whitlam government was determined to implement, and to do so without delay.
