Historical information

Man in top hat standing beside the car is most probably the Reverend John P. Carney (born 1880 Ballaghaderreen, Country Mayo, Ireland - ordained at All Hallows College, Dublin, Ireland) who spent all his years as a priest in the Melbourne Archdiocese, arriving in Melbourne in 1902. He was appointed Assistant priest at St Francis Melbourne then at Castlemaine and Gordon. He left Gordon to the pastor of the new mission at Diamond Creek where he spent about five years before moving to Footscray and later Yarraville. The automobile has been identified as a Unic Taxi built in the United Kingdom about 1908 though the actual date of this particular vehicle is unclear. The registration number 7788 was issued prior to 1910 at which point they changed to numerals only of the form nnn-nnn.

Reproduced on p93 of 'Pioneers & Painters'.

Significance

This photo forms part of a collection of photographs gathered by the Shire of Eltham for their centenary project book,"Pioneers and Painters: 100 years of the Shire of Eltham" by Alan Marshall (1971). The collection of over 500 images is held in partnership between Eltham District Historical Society and Yarra Plenty Regional Library (Eltham Library) and is now formally known as 'The Shire of Eltham Pioneers Photograph Collection'. It is significant in being the first community sourced collection representing the places and people of the Shire's first one hundred years.

Physical description

Digital image
120 format B&W negative
Original sepia coloured postcard (10 x 15 cm) with cracking
Black and white photograph duplicate (16.5 x 25 cm) with some corrections to mask cracks

Inscriptions & markings

Inscribed on reverse 'R.C. Parish Priest, Eltham'