As Greg Dening (author of the above passage) reminds us, people make sense of and narrate the past in many different ways. Heather Sizer is one of my interviewees. As the author of Yet Still They Live: Wirrabara's Story (hereafter Wirrabara) and editor/ contributor to Run North Wild Dog: A History of the Murray Town District (hereafter Murray Town), Heather is also a historian. In this chapter I compare Heather's – and members of her family's – oral stories of George Cameron (particularly his interaction with Aboriginal people) with Heather's written ones, to illustrate two different ways through which George Cameron's descendants know, relate to and articulate stories of the past. There are important differences between the past known and related to through memory (which is subjective, emotional and which juxtaposes temporalities) and the past known and related to through history (which is objective, detached and which distances previous times from the present). At the same time, the relationship between these different ways of knowing the past is interactive and dynamic.

Scholars seeking to understand the absence of Aboriginal people in Australians’ historical consciousness have debated the respective influence and authority of written and oral histories. By learning whether and how stories of George Cameron's interactions with Aboriginal people are incorporated into Heather's written texts, I provide concrete and detailed examples through which to draw some conclusions and contribute to the debate. I show the varying degrees and depths to which stories about the past which Heather and her family absorbed through dwelling in place have been incorporated into Heather's written texts and, additionally, how information learned through historical research has become part of Heather's memory and taken- forgranted knowledge.