Dr Carol Liston OA will be the guest speaker on At the Podium this March

Dr Carol Liston AO is an Associate Professor in History at the University of Western Sydney. She has a professional interest in the early colonial history of Sydney, 1788-1860, while her particular interest is in the colonial development of the County of Cumberland (Greater Western Sydney). The female factory at Parramatta was built in the early years of settlement to house convict women, and it was called a factory because it manufactured cloth, including linen, wool and linsey woolsey, which was a coarse durable fabric used for such things as bed covers. The women who lived at the factory resented being there and sometimes rioted. It was closed in 1848.