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Transport Collection
Image: Grip Car - Cable Tram Model, Collingwood & Clifton Hill Route
Source: Museum Victoria
Transport has played a key role in the settlement and development of Victoria, helping to shape the form of our urban and rural landscapes and impacting on the everyday life of all Victorians for over 175 years.
The Museum's Transport collection aims to document historical developments in the types of transport used both within Victoria and between Victoria and other Australian or overseas locations. In particular it focuses on the nature of technological change, as well as the social impact and context of changing modes of transport. A particular emphasis of the collection is to record aspects of our transport heritage that are distinctively Victorian.
The collection commenced with ship models originally displayed in the 19th century international exhibitions. Through the 20th century the Industrial & Technological Museum and then the Science Museum acquired historically significant aircraft and vehicles with a strong Victorian provenance, including horse-drawn and early motor vehicles. A series of models was commissioned documenting the development of locomotives and rollingstock of the Victorian Railways. Many of the larger items also document significant milestones in Australian innovation or manufacture.
Significant items:
- Flight Memory (Black Box) Flight Recorder prototype.
- Duigan biplane, the first Australian-built aeroplane to achieve a successful powered flight.
- Aubrey Lock aero engine (1910), the 2nd oldest Australian aero engine; Gipsy Major aero engine (serial no.1, by GMH, Fisherman's Bend, circa 1939), the first aero engine mass-produced in Australia.
- Pre-1925 British, French and American aero engines.
- Wirraway aircraft.
- Prototype Victa Air Tourer.
- Gerald & Lorna Dee collection of railway locomotive and rollingstock builders' plates: an internationally significant collection of over 350 plates.
- Eric Quinlan Collection of over 100 locomotive plates.
- Victorian Railways uniforms, badges, equipment, union testimonials, watches and other memorabilia.
- 1/3 scale model of Victorian Railways C-class steam locomotive (built by apprentices).
- Polly tank locomotive Z-526: first steam locomotive built at Newport Railway Workshops (1893).
- Cable Tram No. 1 (1880), Melbourne's first cable tram, and related cable tram archives and artefacts.
- Nationally significant locally manufactured automobiles: including Thomson steam car (1898), Haines & Grut (circa 1909), Deliverette prototype (1947), Holden 48-215 (1950), Hartnett (1950) & Ilinga prototype sports car (1972). Also letter books and other archival material relating to Thomson Motor Co.'s attempts to manufacture cars in Melbourne (circa 1900-1903).
- Horse-drawn vehicles, including Abbott & Downing Concord Coach (1867), Hooper & Co. State Landau & State Coach (1890s), Melbourne-built Albert Car (1860s), Baillieu Brougham (1880s) and Victorian-built Cobb & Co Coach (circa 1880).
- Significant examples of 19th and 20th century bicycles: including Malvern Star Collection of 12 bicycles from the best-known Australian manufacturer; Sir Hubert Opperman racing bicycles and memorabilia.
- Ship models, including examples of important late 19th and early 20th century immigrant ships, coastal Australian shipping and the Port Phillip Bay steamers Edina, Weeroona, Hygeia and Ozone.
- Cowley traction engine (1916), Cowley steam roller (1930s), McDonald Super Diesel Roller (1925) and Super Sentinel Steam Waggon (circa 1925).
- Morris Commerical Bullion Van (circa 1935) used by the Reserve Bank.
Items per page: 10 50 (showing 1201 - 1210) 1268 items
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Newsclipping - Herald Sun, Weg Cartoon, 22 Jun 1957
Cartoon by WEG (William Ellis Green), published in the Herald Sun, dated 22 June 1957. The cartoon shows a man with just arrived woman with bag over her head and her hands tied. The wom ...
From: Melbourne, Australia Images: 2 -
Newsclipping - The Age, 'Liner Brings 1400 from Europe; to Take 1200 Back', 11 May 1957
Newsclipping from the Age, dated 11 May 1957. It contains an article about the arrival of over 1300 Hungarians in Melbourne, and the strains these numbers placed on customs and immigrat ...
From: Melbourne, Australia Images: 2 -
Leaflet - You Can Help Someone Become an Australian Citizen, Department of Immigration, 19 ...
Leaflet 'You Can Help Someone Become an Australian Citizen' issued by the Department of Immigration, 1950s. It is part of a collection of migration material collected by Margaret Wood a ...
From: Canberra, Australia Images: 4 -
Envelope - P&O Lines, Embarkation Notice, circa 1950s
Large pale blue document envelope used for embarkation notice, labels etc. It is part of a collection of shipboard souvenirs collected by Margaret Wood an officer in the Department of I ...
From: London, United Kingdom Images: 4 -
Leaflet - Application for British Passport, Department of Immigration, 1950s
Leaflet detailing items needed for the processing of a British Passport Application. It was probably an internal Department of Immigration administrative list. It is part of a collectio ...
From: Melbourne, Australia Images: 2 -
Leaflet - Bring Out A Briton Campaign, Commonwealth of Australia, 1957
Leaflet from Minister of Immigration, Athol Townley, to his fellow Australians. The letter explains the 'Bring out a Briton' campaign which was launched in 1957 in an attempt to bolster ...
From: Canberra, Australia Images: 4 -
Magazine - L'Angelo della Famiglia, Advocate Press, Oct-Nov 1951
Magazine 'L'Angelo della Famiglia: Mensile Religioso Italiano' (Angel of the family: Italian Religious Monthly), October to November 1951, published by Advocate Press, Melbourne. This m ...
From: Melbourne, Australia Images: 4 -
Magazine - Oikoreneia: The Family Magazine, No 73, 1957
Magazine 'Oikoreneia' (The Family Magazine), No 73, 1957. This magazine would have been picked up by Margaret either in the community or perhaps lying around on a table at work, as it w ...
From: Melbourne, Australia Images: 4 -
Leaflet - British Migration, Department of Immigration, 1950s
Two papers on British Migration policy issued by the Department of Immigration to staff. The papers outline the affirmative British migration policy, categories and other migration stre ...
From: Melbourne, Australia Images: 2 -
Leaflet - Red Cross Volunteer Duties, 1950s
Informal notes written by Margaret Wood in the 1950s to describe the duties of a volunteer Red Cross aide for a talk she gave. Margaret describes the aide as 'invariably female', and th ...
From: Melbourne, Australia Images: 2
