Global True Lithuania Encyclopedia of Lithuanian heritage worldwide

Canberra

Australia's capital Canberra is a small city (~400 000) and it lacks the massive Lithuanian communities of Sydney or Melbourne.

Being the capital, however, Canberra was chosen as a site for numerous Lithuanian monuments and artworks.

Eglė the Queen of Serpents monument

Lithuanian monuments of Canberra

Central Canberra's Glebe Park has a sculpture for Eglė the Queen of Serpents, a girl from a Lithuanian folktale who was seduced and married by the King of Sea Serpents against her family's wishes. Her family then managed to kill the king, but was turned into trees as a result - and so was Eglė herself.

Close-up of Eglė monument

The statue of Egle was gifted by the Australian Lithuanian community for Australia's bicentennial in 1988. It was the first statue to be erected in the city's Glebe Park (others have followed).

At the bottom of the sculpture, one could read an English synopsis of the Eglė legend, while the statue itself (author: Ieva Pocius) looks like a cross between a girl and a canopy-less tree. Another plaque on the bottom of the statue depicts a stylized Lithuanian coat of arms and two lines of the Lithuanian national anthem ("Tegul meilė Lietuvos dega mūsų širdyse" - "Let the love of Lithuania blossom in our hearts").

The tale of Eglė as retold on a monument plaque

Lithuanian anthem plaque on the Eglė monument

Dedication of the Eglė monument

Cockington Green Gardens of Canberra contains miniature copies of landmark buildings from ~30 countries. Each country and its migrant community are also briefly explained in the park plaque.

Among the miniatures, there is Trakai Island castle, built at 1:50 scale. It was created by a Lithuanian-Australian Mindaugas Mauragis, and funded by Canberra Lithuanian scouts, veterans, and other Canberra Lithuanians. Such enthusiast funding makes it somewhat unique, as many other Cockington Green miniatures had been funded by respective embassies. As of (early 2026) the castle of Trakai has been removed from display whilst arrangements for restoration work are addressed.

A copy of Trakai castle in Canberra (Cockington Green Gardens). Image ©Augustinas Žemaitis.

Lithuanian-Australian Club, Community HQ, and Embassy

The Canberra Lithuanian Community HQ (būstinė) is now located in the suburb of Holder. It operates in two rooms of rented premises and offers Lithuanian activities on some weekends.

Inside the Canberra Lithuanian Community HQ

However, back in 1963 (when the Canberra Lithuanian community was peaking at some 300-400 as more and more Lithuanian displaced persons who had fled Lithuania in 1944 were getting government jobs in the capital), Lithuanians built their own Lithuanian-Australian Club in Canberra. It was constructed through 3400 hours of voluntary labor and included a Lithuanian library, bar, and multiple halls. The clubhouse was further expanded in 1982. However, the club closed and was sold in 1999 due to changing laws, which would have required costly renovations, making further operation of the club untenable. The building was demolished by its new owners. Its former location on the corner of Hall and Wattle Streets is now occupied by a retirement community.

Picture of the original Canberran Lithuanian house, now held in the community HQ

The proceeds received from selling the clubhouse were invested, with returns used to rent smaller premises (Lithuanian HQs) that no longer have bars or gaming machines. The current Community HQ is the third such HQ as, over time, the HQ has moved to other, smaller premises.

The Lithuanian HQ hosts various details from the original Lithuanian Club, such as a plaque commemorating its 1982 expansion, a wall list of its founding members, entrance signs that used to mark its halls, old photos, Lithuanian-Australian artworks, etc.

Pictures in the Canberra Lithuanian HQ

The monument for those who died for Lithuanian freedom (which used to stand in front of the original Lithuanian Club and served as a focal point for various celebrations and commemorations) was, however, demolished when the clubhouse closed down.

Scale replica of the Canberra Monument for those who died for Lithuanian freedom (left). The replica is held in the Lithuanian Archives of Adelaide

Mementos from the old Lithuanian Club (now in the Lithuanian HQ)

While Lithuania became independent from the Soviet Union in 1990, it lacked an embassy in Canberra for decades after that. While Australia had a significant Lithuanian community, it arguably was simply too far for the fledgling country with many pressing needs to direct its diplomatic attention to. As Lithuania grew richer - and the dangers of renewed Russian expansionism (2010s-2020s) necessitated seeking as-wide-as-possible diplomatic support - a Lithuanian embassy was opened in Canberra in 2021. It is located in a regular building in central Canberra.

Lithuanian embassy in Canberra

Famous Lithuanians and their heritage in Canberra

One street in the Lyneham district is named after a Lithuanian painter Henry (Henrikas) Šalkauskas (1925-1979), making Canberra one of the very few capital cities that has a street named after a Lithuanian (Salkauskas Crescent). Šalkauskas's palette with many blacks and grays is claimed to be chosen because of his father's fate (Šalkauskas's father was among hundreds of thousands of Lithuanians murdered by the Soviets. He died in the Vorkuta Soviet concentration camp after Lithuania was occupied by the Soviets and a significant part of its population was deported. However, Henry Salkauskas learned about his father's fate as late as 1958.

Salkauskas Crescent in Canberra

The Lithuanian-Australian community has punched above its numbers in terms of famous artists, some of whom left their works in Canberra museums and public spaces.

A work by Henrikas Šalkauskas (and the top of a Lithuanian flag) in Canberra's Lithuanian HQ

In the Australian National University, Vincas Jomantas built a monumental fountain called "Pursuit of scientific knowledge" in 1962. The fountain is a part of the university's art collection and the campaign to beautify the campus with artworks celebrating the respective faculties; Jomantas' work is surrounded by buildings dedicated to physics. The monumental fountain is signed using the anglicised name Vincent Jomantas, but the plaque next to the monument lists the author as Vincas Jomantas and mentions that he was born in Lithuania in 1922 and arrived in Australia in 1949 (after Australia began accepting people from the Baltic States who were displaced by the Soviet occupation).

Jomantas's fountain

Plaque at the fountain

In 2025, one building of the Australian National University was named the Skaidrite Darius building. While Darius is a Lithuanian surname, Skaidrite Darius was a Latvian woman married to a Lithuanian man with the surname Darius. To Australians, she is best known for her achievements in the then-male-dominated IT and related fields. For Latvians and Lithuanians, however, her activities in perpetuating the Baltic culture in Australia left a bigger memory.

Skaidrite Darius building

Lithuanian relics in Cooma and the Snowy Hydro country

The town of Cooma, 117 km south of Canberra, is close enough by Australian standards for its Lithuanians to be considered part of the Canberra Lithuanian community.

While Canberra became the career pinnacle of Lithuanian immigrants (as, after having their diplomas unrecognized, they managed to score government jobs), Cooma, on the other hand, was one of the places where many Lithuanians started their new Australian lives ~1950.

According to the regulations of the time, immigrants had to work 2 years in workplaces designated by the government. The massive Snowy Hydro scheme of dams and hydroelectric power plants around Cooma that employed more than 100 000 people was one of the largest such workplaces. In the Centennial Park of Cooma, the Lithuanian community donated a flag of Lithuania that flies among other flags of the countries whose immigrants have contributed to building the Snowy Hydro.

Some of the flags in the Centennial Park

Lithuanian Community mark on the respective flagpole

Due to the Snowy Hydro scheme, the wreckage of the Southern Cloud aircraft that had mysteriously disappeared while flying the Sydney-to-Melbourne route in 1931 was accidentally discovered in 1958. A memorial for the victims of the disaster was built in 1962, designed by a Lithuanian Snowy Hydro engineer, Andrius Rimka. A small building reminiscent of wings includes various rediscovered parts of the crashed aircraft and documents related to its final journey. The journey and its aftermath are also recounted in a sound installation. A plaque at the center of the monument explains the story of the crash and also mentions that the engineer and architect Andrius Rimka came from Lithuania.

Southern Cloud Memorial

100 km further on from Cooma is Kosciuszko National Park that includes Mt. Kosciuszko - Australia's tallest mountain at 2228 m. The mountain is named after Tadeusz Kościuszko, who was a joint hero of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth - thanks to a Polish immigrant, Pawel Strzelecki.

Mount Kosciuszko chairlift