Historic Sunraysia

13/12/2024

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This week, we lost a young soul, Anish Deuja, an international student from Nepal curre… kusum lama needs your support for Help to Repatriate Late Anish Deuja

07/08/2024

What a great photo from the Back To Merbein Street Parade, as supplied by Jan Fisher, she says "Fishers float in the Back to Merbein 1959 celebrations. Bill Fisher running alongside in the far right.."

06/05/2024

14/04/2024

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100 years ago today - the first overseas shipment of Red Cliffs dried sultanas, and what was probably the first overseas shipment of Red Cliffs table grapes, both leave Melbourne for London.

The Sunraysia Daily reported:

"The first overseas shipment of Red Cliffs sultanas, consisting of 83 tons, left Melbourne on Tuesday, April 15 by the Jervis Bay, consigned to Messrs. Freeman and Co., the Red Cliffs Co-operative Society's London agents. A second shipment of 28 tons, making an actual total of 112 tons, will leave on Saturday [April 26] by the s.s. Aeneas."

The Argus in Melbourne reported:

"By the Commonwealth liner Jervis Bay, which left Melbourne several days ago for London, 2,000 cases of Ohanez grapes from the Red Cliffs and Merbein irrigation settlements were sent to Great Britain. They were carefully packed in cork filings, and should reach the London market in time for the spring trade. A further consignment will he sent on the Largs Bay, which will leave for London on May 7...

The chairman of the Water Commission (Mr. Cattanach) said that... While it was gratifying to find the growers extending their exporting operations to Britain, he thought there was a profitable market in the East, and he hoped that with the new shipping facilities that seemed nearer realisation the Eastern trade would become one of the most important outlets for Australian fruit. In this respect Australia had the great advantage of producing the fruit at the reverse season from other supplying countries and it was geographically nearer than a number of the countries which had already worked up a most profitable trade."

While a private company had organised the dried sultanas to be exported, the table grape consignment was exported by the Victorian Department of Agriculture.

The Sunraysia Daily also reported:

"Up to Easter Saturday [April 19] the deliveries to the Red Cliffs packing-shed were as follows: Sultanas, 159 tons; currants; 17 tons; and lexias, 40 tons. The deliveries of currants are understood to be finished, but about 60 tons of sultanas are expected to be brought to the shed.

The bad drying weather has affected the deliveries of lexias to the shed, and owing to the big proportion of the gordo crop being still on the racks, an estimate of the probable lexia returns cannot be obtained."

The picture is of the Jervis Bay leaving Melbourne on April 15. It is from the Sun News-Pictorial.

You can read more about Red Cliffs' grape-growing history in a number of sources, including the book "Red Cliffs Recollections", available from the Red Cliffs Newsagency and the Red Cliffs and District Historical Society.

04/04/2024

We will have a selection of photos of Mildura (and a few other local towns) for sale at the RED CLIFFS COUNTRY MARKET this Sunday. Ranging in price from $2 for unframed photos to $5 for framed photos.
Damian will have them on his Sunny Pop Culture stall.

29/12/2023

'River Murray at Mildura'
Australian National Maritime Museum Collection
This card was sent by Irish immigrant Edward Telford, to his friend in England in 1914. Edward notes that the weather in Mildura was ‘101 in the shade’.
Merry Christmas to all our Lost Mildura and Sunraysia followers. Do your family a favour and introduce them to our page!
Peter Matthews and Family.

29/12/2023

'Building Lock 11/Mildura Weir, Murray River, Mildura, Victoria, circa 1927.'
Museums Victoria Collections.
Description: 'This photograph is from a set of 81 images mainly depicting life in and around Mildura in the 1920s and 1930s, shared by Donnie Byrne. The donor's ancestors migrated from Germany and settled in Mildura in 1880s. Many of the photographs were taken by August Müller. This image shows the construction of the Mildura Weir which began in August 1923 as part of an irrigation initiative by Commonwealth, Victoria, New South Wales and South Australian governments to manage the Murray River's waters. The water level and water pressure were raised by building locks, weirs and storage areas, combined with the irrigation pumps at Mildura and Red Cliffs. Lock 11 was completed in 1927.'

02/11/2023

"Riverside Golf Club Mildura. 1930s??
Postcard courtesy of the extensive Wimmera Historic Photographs page: a wonderful collection of images to browse through!
GOLF - Sunraysia Daily Friday 5 April 1935, page 7
The New Course RIVERSIDE "LINKS A Beautiful Situation
Situated three and a half miles from the Mildura post office, at a picturesque bend of the river, is a beautiful natural park, intersected by a running creek and a charming billabong. It is a park which is destined to become not only a centre of great interest to the people of this district but famous throughout the State - as a perfect golf course and recreation area. The idea of forming a golf links originated when Mr. Dunstan, now Premier oi' Victoria, who was at the time Minisler for Lands and Water Supply, in company with Mr. Allnutt, Crs. Lochhead, Henshilwood, Chislett. Gooch and Maichbank, visited this delightful spot in August, 1932. Mr. Dunstan was so seized with the idea of converting it into a 'recreation' park, that he wrote Mr. Allnutt soon after his return to Melbourne, advising him that the Ministry had decided that the area should be reserved for recreation purposes under the control of the Shire of Mildura, and it was gazetted as a reserve on November 2, 1932. Part of the land was promptly made available to the Boy Scouts as a camping ground. An accommodation hut was erected by the council staff with material donated by various people.'
The full article - with much more information, can be read at https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/265852837