- Title
- Not going quietly: The Royal on the Move Procession: place, history, memory and community-based performance
- Creator
- Schaefer, Kerrie; Watt, David
- Relation
- About Performance Issue 7, p. 117-131
- Relation
- http://sydney.edu.au/arts/performance/research/publications.shtml#7
- Publisher
- University of Sydney, Department of Performance Studies
- Resource Type
- journal article
- Date
- 2007
- Description
- In April 2006 the Royal Newcastle Hospital (RNH), one of the oldest hospitals in Australia and the second oldest in NSW, was closed and remaining health services were transferred to new, purpose-built facilities in the Hunter region. The controversial decision to close the RNH was taken by the Hunter Area Health Service (HAHS) in 1999 after a decade of crisis in the public hospital system, the beginning of which coincided with an earthquake centred in Newcastle on 28 December 1989. Damage to RNH buildings in the earthquake presented the opportunity to close the hospital as part of a broad restructure of health services in the Hunter region driven, largely, by federal and state government attempts to rein in the escalating costs of public health, and the burgeoning real estate value of the hospital’s seaside location. The “Royal on the Move” Procession was one of many events held in the lead up to the hospital’s closure to mark the passing of a local, regional and national ‘icon’. The iconic status of the RNH derives, first, from its extraordinary geographical location and physical setting, second, from its historical development in the crucible of a unique local and regional community and, third, from its innovative and radical approach to medicine and the provision of public health care, particularly in the mid-twentieth century. The Procession was created to commemorate the ‘sense of place’ of the hospital and the people who laboured to create a “true community hospital” revered as an icon of health care in Australia and internationally.
- Subject
- Royal Newcastle Hospital (N.S.W.); health services; Royal on the Move; community; place
- Identifier
- http://hdl.handle.net/1959.13/926783
- Identifier
- uon:9942
- Identifier
- ISSN:1324-6089
- Language
- eng
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