Varsity Ragge

Abstract

The student newspaper, the Varsity Ragge, was published between June 26 1929 and August 1934 before dying out, according to its successor On Dit, from apathy.

The first issues were published by the Student Christian Movement; subsequently by the University Students' Council from June 26 1929 to December 1930; and then by the University Men's Union (which took over activities from the Union Club) from March 1931 to December 1931, before the University Students' Council published a single issue as Vol. 1 no. 1 [new series] in August 1934, by the "A.U. Screamer's Club."

The first issue had no title - bearing the banner "Have you a name for this? If so send it in." The newspaper was initially published fortnightly during term, then irregularly from volume 2 (1928), at first subsidised by the Students' Council to the sum of 5 Pounds.

Varsity Ragge contains reports on University sports, clubs and societies, colleges, Union and University matters, and the Adelaide Teachers' College; it later included letters to the editor, theatre reviews, poems and humour.

Student matters covered include: 1928 - change in University sports colours, the establishment of a Student Union and the place of the Students' Council, Adelaide Unemployed Relief Appeal, the raising of 'varsity spirit'. 1929 - the first meeting of the Students Union, report of the B.A.M.A. Conversazione (held near Wirth's Circus), several accounts of Mawson and Madigan's geology class excursion, poem dedicated to sailing of Mawson and Harvey Johnstone to Antarctica.

1930-31 - whether to allow alcohol on campus, the founding of the Footlights Club, Men's Union taking over activities of the Union Club, the Russian menace and disarmament