These vintage photographs are from July 6 1946 issue of Australian magazine PIX. Taken by Ray Olson they are illustrating an article about teenagers entitled “Where Is Youth Heading?” A year after the end of World War Two the magazine was in a reflective mood about the future of Australia:

“We are the fortunate people of the earth. The future is ours. We are strong in the midst of our unharmed land, while great countries of the world still reel from the crash of war, the cruelty, partings and heartbreaks heaped upon their privations.Evan as they erase their heads in first relief from tyranny there is little faith and little hope in the eyes of our fellow-men. For them, wrecked homes, scorched fields, and yet more hunger lead from reeking war into restless peace. For us, war was a black cloud, but never a deluge. It lifts, and there lies before us our Australia with everything at hand for peace and plenty if we have the spirit, the will, the energy to use it. We should indeed be humbly proud, and very grateful. The future is ours. Nothing stands in our way – but ourselves.”