‘Always Ready To Row Himself to Exhaustion’

Competitive rowing events on the Birrarung, or Yarra River, in Melbourne began in 1860.  The annual regatta was a feature of the social calendar by the time this Grand Challenge cup was presented to Melbourne Rowing Club in 1868. The event attracted crowds of picknickers to the banks of the upper river to cheer the […]

Read More…

From Ostrich to Emu Eggs

In 1866, the Danish-born silversmith Christian Ludwig Qwist sent a silver-mounted emu egg jug and drinking cups, made in his Hunter Street shop in Sydney, to the Intercolonial Exhibition in Melbourne. Qwist arrived in Melbourne in 1853, in the early years of the gold rush. He’d worked as a photographer and silversmith in the boom […]

Read More…

Take Two Emu Eggs

Two emu eggs to make a ‘bachelor tea set’ – one for the teapot, one half for the sugar bowl and the other for the cream jug. Was the cream jug ever used? It’s not likely. The fashion for goblets and cups made from silver mounted emu eggs reached its height in the second half […]

Read More…