Citation: C. Hayden (2023). “Cousin Jack and His Economic Niche” in More than Miners (J. Lokan & P. Payton Eds), Wakefield Press, Mile End, South Australia, pp. 221-232. Cousin Jack and his Economic Niche Cheryl Hayden Introduction In 2001, as a part of my Cornish Studies research (University of Exeter), I surveyed the members of Australian Cornish associations in an attempt to understand how and why a culture made almost invisible by its absorption into the white Anglo-Celtic majority was today being celebrated so enthusiastically. Who, I wanted to know, was behind it and what drove their passion? I sent bundles of surveys to Australia’s Cornish associations, all of which encouraged their members to participate. Of my surveys, 190 (23 percent) were returned, representing 13 percent of total estimated Cornish association membership and providing me with statistically sufficient quantitative and qualitative data from which to extract data and draw conclusions (Hayden, 2002). One of the key findings, although not surprising, was the power of Cornish mining as a precursor to attracting 21 st Century Australians to their Cornish identity, often over and above other (and arguably more dominant) ethnicities appearing on their family trees. What was quite unexpected was the apparent role of the female descendants of these miners in passing on an interest in the almost exclusively masculine part of our heritage. This chapter presents that part of the research project that relates directly to this finding and the theory that endeavours to explain it. 1 The Survey Findings and snapshot