The Family File

In early 1965 at age thirteen, Mark Aarons came under the ‘adverse notice’ of ASIO, which opened volume one of his nine-volume security file. Mark was following in the footsteps of his father, Laurie Aarons, whose 85-volume file commenced in the early 1930s when he was fourteen.

For four generations the Aarons family were ‘subversive revolutionaries’, avowed communists who challenged the established constitutional order.

Having obtained access to his family’s ASIO files – the largest coll...