People – Page 5 – Port Melbourne Historical and Preservation Society

Dulcie Smith – Queen of the Sunday School

Collection, People, Port Melbourne HistoryJune 10, 2022

by David Thompson Dulcie Smith, Queen of the Sunday School and her Court, Holy Trinity Carnival, November 1931. PMHPS Collection. For many years this photograph remained an uncatalogued item in the Society's archives but thanks to a plea for information on Facebook in May 2022 we now know that it is Dulcie Smith, Queen of the Sunday School and her court…

Pye Street

People, Places, Port Melbourne HistoryJune 3, 2022

Pye Street (highlighted). Robinson's Street Directory of Melbourne and Suburbs, Ed 3, c. 1950s. Pye Street is a short street running from Williamstown Road to Dunstan Parade in Garden City. It is named for former Victorian State politician, Henry Pye. Henry Pye was born on Christmas Day, 1873 to a farming family at Burnewang near Rochester, Victoria. At a young age…

Fred David: Designing Planes on the Bend

People, Port Melbourne HistoryMay 24, 2022

by David Radcliffe In early 1942, Australia urgently needed a fighter aircraft to defend against possible invasion. The result was the CA-12 Boomerang, designed by Fred David at the Commonwealth Aircraft Corporation in Fishermans Bend. Before coming to Australia, Fred David had worked for aircraft makers in Germany and Japan. This included helping to design the Aichi dive bomber used…

Memorial to George Sangster

People, Places, Port Melbourne HistoryMay 6, 2022

by Margaret Bride Sangster Memorial. Photo: Janet Bolitho. Sangster Reserve occupies the small triangular piece of land behind the Port Melbourne Bowling Club between Princes and Nott Streets. The area includes a children's playground and nearby there is an art deco style electrical substation. Just inside the Nott Street entrance is this monument commemorating the life of George Sangster, once a…

Prohasky Street

People, Places, Port Melbourne HistoryMarch 31, 2022

William Henry Prohasky served on the Port Melbourne Council from August 1885 to September 1893. He was Mayor from 1888 to 1889. His fellow councillors include Frederick Poolman, James Ker Beck Plummer, Henry Norval Edwards, Philip Melville Salmon, John Turnbull, and William Richardson Tarver. He lived at that time at 73 Evans St on the corner of Farrell…

Steel Castings Pty Ltd of Derham and Bertie Streets

People, Places, Port Melbourne HistoryMarch 4, 2022

by Jim West and David Radcliffe The premises of the Port Melbourne Engineering Works, built by Albert T Harman in Derham Street, Port Melbourne in 1902, included a foundry for casting components out of iron and brass.[1] In November 1934, this foundry was purchased by his son, Alfred Henry Harman, and James Robertson and registered as JV Robertson Pty Ltd.…

Cardie Visits a Port Pawnbroker

People, Port Melbourne HistoryNovember 19, 2021

Elephant Escapes Damage at Port Melbourne Aroused by a neighbour, who was on his way to work at an early hour yesterday morning, Mr M Rabinov, a pawnbroker of Bay Street, Port Melbourne, found that his back garden had been completely wrecked. There was a large gap in a wooden fence which separates the garden from a vacant allotment…

Smith Street and Smith Reserve

People, Places, Port Melbourne HistoryNovember 5, 2021

Two streets, one in Port and one in South Melbourne, as well as a section of Port Melbourne's Railway Reserves, bear the name Smith. And that doesn't take into account the curious occurrence of, what is now, Frangipani Court also being referred to as Smith Street in the Sand's & McDougall Directories from 1915 to 1974. But why are…

Working at Tom Piper

People, Port Melbourne HistoryOctober 21, 2021

Win May (nee Smith) and Janet Bolitho worked together on this interview during lockdown in August 2021. Where did you grow up? My parents moved into our house in Griffin Crescent when it was brand new. My mother, Mary, worked at Swallows before marrying. My father, Alex, was a waterside worker who worked in gang 48 as a winch driver. He would walk…

Alfred Harman & Sons: Engineers of Derham Street

People, Port Melbourne HistorySeptember 30, 2021

by David Radcliffe Twenty-one year old Alfred Harman is reported to have started his engineering business in 1885.1 He proudly advertised his services as an “engineer, blacksmith and brass-founder” offering “engines and machinery of every description made to order and repaired at lowest possible rates”.2 His firm, the Port Melbourne Engineering Works, which later became Alfred T Harman & Sons…

Acknowledgement of Traditional Custodians