Life Under A Shadow: John Harry Grainger, architect and civil engineer

John Grainger, Grainger Museum Collection

The Grainger Museum at the University of Melbourne is currently presenting an exhibition that investigates the many achievements of John Harry Grainger, the gifted architect and engineer whose life was largely overshadowed by that of his son, composer and performer, Percy Aldridge Grainger.

Trained in London, J.H. Grainger travelled to Australia in 1877 to take up the humble position of a draftsman with the South Australian Public Works Department. An ambitious young man, Grainger entered into competitions for private commissions with great success. At 25 he won commissions for two bridges: the intricately engineered swing bridge at Sale in Gippsland; and most significantly, Princes Bridge over the Yarra River in Melbourne. The Princes Bridge design was an enormous achievement – a task that would have challenged a practitioner twice his age. It became a major landmark then, as it is now.

Notable structures that were the result of Grainger’s creative vision were the well-loved ‘Georges’ building in Collins Street, Melbourne and the State Savings Bank and Masonic Hall also in Melbourne (the latter two no longer exist). The impressive French Renaissance Revival style public library and municipal offices in Auckland, as well as the Fremantle Town Hall in Perth, are fine examples of Grainger’s public building commissions.

This exhibition includes a selection of artefacts from the Grainger Museum Collection which show aspects of Grainger’s life, as well as photographs, architectural and engineering drawings, and artworks. The displays include correspondence and ephemera relating to his relationship with his son Percy. It will give Museum visitors a more detailed understanding of Percy Grainger’s early family life and the often forgotten influences of his father.

Grainger Museum opening hours are Tuesday to Friday and Sunday from 1.00pm to 4.30pm, and Mondays during semester from 12noon to 3.30pm when there is a performance in Melba Hall.

Adventure & Art

Exhibition: ‘Adventure & Art: the fine press book from 1450 to 2011’, Leigh Scott Gallery, 1st floor, Baillieu Library, University of Melbourne, 1 March to 27 May 2012

Adventure & Art, curated by poet and fine press printer Alan Loney, is about the printer’s craft, evidenced from the first printed books in the 15th century, and given a hugely influential impetus by William Morris and the Arts & Craft movement at the end of the 19th century. This exhibition shows how a number of technologies that are obsolete in commercial terms are still current in creative and craft terms in the 21st century. Exhibited are books from the Baillieu Library’s Special Collections from Europe, North America, New Zealand and Australia.

Ned Kelly Goes Online

A new collection item at University of Melbourne Archives, a letter by Superintendant Francis Augusts Hare, reflects on the demise of the Kelly gang. The letter was penned by Hare on 21 July 1880 from Rupertswood, Sunbury where he recuperated from a shot to the arm inflicted less than a month earlier during the capture of Ned Kelly and the destruction of the Kelly gang at Glenrowan. This letter joins the remarkable correspondence associated with Hare which is now available online, along with other digital collections from the UMA:

http://library.unimelb.edu.au/digitalcollections/cultural_and_special_collections.

This new acquisition was made possible by the University Library Endowment Fund.

Edna Walling Designs

A garden design within the Bates Smart Collection of architectural materials has been confirmed as being by renowned designer, Edna Walling.

The watercolour sheet shows the final design for a garden to complement a residence built in Upper Heidelberg Road, Heidelberg in 1927 for Mrs J.J. Woolcock, however the designer of the garden is not identified on any of the plans or drawings. Comparison with several preliminary drawings held at the State Library of Victoria for a garden at this address confirms that the design held at University of Melbourne Archives is by Walling. The final garden plan, with some pencil annotations (possibly by the builder) varies from the drawings at SLV, in that a proposed pool is not shown on the final plan.

University of Melbourne Archives holds another watercolour final design by Walling, for a residence built for Mrs. M.A. Cuming, in Kooyong Rd, Toorak in 1938. This design came from the Cuming family along with business records deposited at UMA. Both designs demonstrate Walling’s characteristic colour palette, and feature favoured plantings and garden elements.

University of Melbourne Archives, Bates Smart McCutcheon collection, 1968.0013 and Cuming Smith & Company Limited 1996.0073
State Library of Victoria, H97.270/102; H97.270/62; H40612/1

A.G.M. Michell

Above: A.G.M. Michell, Ronald East collection 1975.0084, box 2, University of Melbourne Archives.

In the 150th year of Engineering at the University of Melbourne, the University of Melbourne Archives has received a significant donation of papers relating to one of the School’s most distinguished graduates, A.G.M. Michell.

Anthony George Michell (1870-1959) studied civil and mining engineering at the University, graduating with first-class honours (BCE 1895, MCE 1899). He is most renowned for his brilliant invention of the tilting pad thrust bearing, which allowed for the development of larger, faster and more powerful ships and is still the standard used in shipping today, over one hundred years later.

The Victoria Branch of the Institute of Marine Engineering, Science and Technology (IMarEST) made the recent donation in recognition of the importance of Michell’s contribution to their profession. The material was in the possession of their member Alan H Taylor OAM, a pre-eminent Australian marine engineer and the first non-British President of the international body since it was established in 1889.

The University of Melbourne Archives was selected as the place of deposit because of the existing Michell collections and because of Michell’s lasting association with the University and Melbourne. This association extends to the creation of the Michell Hydraulic Laboratory and permanent exhibition in the School of Engineering and the awarding of the Michell Prize in Engineering.

The donation consists of a box of correspondence, technical data and original blueprints of thrust and journal bearings. The blueprints are of obvious significance, but the correspondence is the first cache of correspondence from Michell that has been donated to a public archive anywhere in the world, as his papers are widely thought to have been destroyed.

(This extract is from an article first published on the University’s Melbourne School of Engineering 150th anniversary blog and was written by Katie Wood from the Unviersity of Melbourne Archives.)

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