Frederick Seager
Frederick Seager, a civil servant with a strong background in the welfare industry was described as ‘a good and kind man’ and with his second wife, Ada, sister of his first wife Rosa, they embarked on joint Caring Roles at the New Town Charitable Institution. It would be more correct to describe Ada as a supportive and hands-on carer, to her ‘administrator’ husband, who was appointed the Superintendent of the New Town Charitable Institution in 1879. It was described as a live-in role, but following the death of his friend, Thomas White, Seager bought Lebrina from the estate of Thomas White, and was able to live, at least part of the time, close to the New Town Charitable Institution which was housed at St John’s Park.
St John's Park is the name given to the large, picturesque site in New Town containing St John's Anglican church and a range of health and welfare services. Historically the site was home to the Queen’s Orphan Schools, where boys and girls from poor, often convict families, and stolen Aboriginal children were held in harsh and overcrowded conditions between 1833 and 1879. The orphanages were part of the convict system in Tasmania which saw high mortality rates and much suffering in the form of poverty, sickness, trauma, family breakdown and stigma.
istorically had several government institutions for social welfare, most notably the St Johns Park site, which is currently being redeveloped into a modern health and wellbeing precinct. The term "welfare zone" is not a formal designation, but the site's history and current redevelopment reflect a long-standing government role in providing care and services.
The New Town Charitable Institution emerged from the closure of the Queen's Orphan School in 1879. The school's buildings were repurposed to house the Male Division of the Institution, which accommodated the poor, aged, and those with disabilities, effectively acting as an "invalid depot". Initially, it also housed the Boys' Training School and the Neglected Children's Department.
Government thinking changed about the purpose of welfare and the relationship between poverty and depravity, when it was accepted that individuals were not to blame for their poverty; governments assumed responsibility for those unable to care for themselves, the beginning of modern welfare thinking.
His role at the New Town Charitable Institution was an excellent match for a man of FW Seager’s disposition and training, an Administrator and public servant of considerable experience, who was described as a ‘good and kind’ man, an industrious man with a heart.
After receiving 10 girls from the Queen’s Orphan Asylum when it closed in 1879, the Hobart Girls Industrial School offered a basic education taught by a school mistress. The girls also attended Church and received religious instruction from a Minister. For their last two years at the School, they were apprenticed to the Matron who taught them laundry work, needlework, cooking, and general housework. All the girls did laundry and needlework to support the School.
The Committee women believed that the School offered better training than foster care and that the Secretary of the Neglected Children’s Department, F.R. Seager, should send more girls to it. In 1909, the Committee resolved that all girls who were wards of state should spend the last year before their apprenticeships as domestic servants in an industrial school. Seager refused, stating that the schools fell ‘far short of the requirements of childhood’ and that the ‘motherly interest’ of the foster mothers provided much better training.
Here we see the care and concern of Frederick and Ada Seager in operation, both enthusiastic supporters of the Foster Care System. Following the death of Frederick in 1913, it seems Ada continued to be involved in welfare, with her second husband, James White at locations close to Lebrina. The Hobart Girls Industrial School, whose work Frederick Seager had originally opposed, had opened as the Hobart Town Female Refuge in 1862. It was for girls considered to be neglected. In 1945, the Salvation Army took the School over and renamed it the Maylands Salvation Army Home for Girls, in Pirie Street, very close to Lebrina.
Historically, New Town has had several government institutions for social welfare, most notably the St Johns Park site, which is currently being redeveloped into a modern health and wellbeing precinct. The term "welfare zone" is not a formal designation, but the site's history and current redevelopment reflect a long-standing government role in providing care and services.
Additionally, with many large houses and grounds located within New Town, welfare operations, both fostering and school based, were easily fitted into these buildings in the era before specialist welfare facilities were built, and prior to the 21st century re-discovery of the liveablility of New Town, its renewed ‘gentrification,’ and modernization of historic homes. James and Nellie White took up residence with Nellie’s sister, Ada Seager, following Frederick’s death in 1913, and no doubt supported her charitable and welfare work.
The grounds of New Town Park, originally part of the Thomas Hayes’ 1805 ‘One Hundred Acre Grant,’ and where Thomas White built Swanston House, were subdivided over time, helping to create the residential suburb of New Town and another Charitable/Welfare zone, at the centre of which is the former 1957 Hospital and Nurses Home at 33 Tower Road. The Catholic Archdiocese Office of Hobart, and Catholic Care are now located on this site, as well as a number of luxury townhouses.
The building at 33 Tower Road in New Town was originally a post-war apartment complex built in the 1957, the Tower Apartments, (possibly a Nurses’ Home), before being converted to luxury townhouses. The conversion to luxury apartments, not townhouses, occurred in 2004 and was designed by Jamieson Allom at Jaws Architects.
St John’s Park continues as a Modern Welfare Zone, with many organizations based there. The Seagers would have welcomed this continuation of their work.