Hidden treasures and stories from our collection
148 Insect model, queen bee, papier mache / metal, made by Dr Auzoux, Paris, France, 1883
If you’re in Maitland between 21 and 29 April, drop into Brough House in Church Street, to see some of the Powerhouse Museum’s beekeeping collection. It’s featuring in an exhibition called Amazing Bees, the contribution of JW and WS Pender to the Australasian Bee Industry.
Continue reading ‘Bee Delighted’
Powerhouse Museum Collection, Gift of the University of Sydney, 1954.
Professor Henry Barraclough was on a mission. He was visiting Europe in 1914 to find interesting engines for Sydney University, and there was one that he was particularly keen to acquire: an early Otto and Langen gas engine, the first commercially successful internal combustion engine.
40 years ago, Apollo 16 landed in the Descartes region of the central lunar highlands. Image Courtesy NASA
This might sound like the set-up for a joke, but there really is a connection between the museum, NASA’s Apollo 16 mission and the USSR’s Luna 20 lunar sample recovery mission.
Continue reading ‘What’s the link between Apollo 16, a Soviet Moon mission and the Powerhouse Museum?’
Drinking cup, used by James Calvert. on Leichhardt’s expedition from Brisbane to Port Essington,1844 -1845, Powerhouse Museum, NN10265
It may be hard to imagine now, but once this cup must have been one of the most important things in the life of James Snowden Calvert. Around 165 years ago this cup travelled with Calvert and Leichhardt on the first overland trip from Brisbane on the east coast of Australia to Port Essendon on the west coast. On this trip across the dry and dusty interior water was often in short supply and the ration handed out to Calvert in this cup must have been one of the highlights of each day. Perhaps this was the reason he kept the cup as a memento of the hardships they shared on this, the first of Leichhardt’s expeditions.
Continue reading ‘An Australian relic from Leichhardt’s exploration of the interior’
Showbag and contents, A Team Collection, 1983: Powerhouse Museum
Going to an Easter show is almost a childhood rite of passage for Sydneysiders. Apart from looking at a variety of animals, agricultural pavilions, side shows and competitions like wood chopping there was always the draw of the Show Bag Pavilion. Selecting which show bag, the lolly or TV show based one (or if you were lucky a couple of show bags) was part of the day’s excitement.
Continue reading ‘Sydney Royal Easter Show’
This is a portrait of Signor Edoardo Majeroni who, with his wife, presented stage performances in theatres across Australia in 1876 and the 1880s. In this image he is dressed in a Russian military costume for his acclaimed role in a one-act play entitled ‘The Old Corporal’ The play was performed in Sydney in 1876 and the photograph appears to have been taken by the Freeman Brothers Studio while the performances were fresh in the minds of Sydney-siders.
Continue reading ‘Edoardo Majeroni – Italian ‘red shirt’ and Australian actor’
2007/30/1-29/21 Christmas card, Phoebe, Wilfrid and Charlotte Rolfe to Dahl and Geoffrey Collings and family, paper/ink, Dahl and Geoffrey Collings, Killcare Heights, New South Wales, Australia, 1946
Saturday 31st March, 8:30-9:30 is Earth hour and it gives us a chance to turn off the lights and do things we may not normally do. More than 2 million individuals and 2,000 businesses in Sydney took part in the First Earth hour in 2007. Earth Hour has grown to millions of people in over 5000 cities across 135 countries.
Continue reading ‘Things to do in the dark, ideas for Earth Hour’
2007/50/64 Music magazine, 'Juke' Melbourne, used by Festival Records, Sydney, 1986. Collection: Powerhouse Museum
Vince Lovegrove was an Australian journalist, music manager, television producer, musician and AIDS awareness campaigner. Perhaps best known for his job as manager of rock group Divinyls and singer Jimmy Barnes. Lovegrove was a member of a 1960s band the Valentines sharing vocals with Bon Scott whom he later introduced to heavy rock group AC/DC.
Continue reading ‘Vince (Vincent) Lovegrove, 1948 – 2012′
Sandstone details Pirrama Rd, Pyrmont: Photography Jean - Francois Lanzarone
When I walk around Pyrmont I look for glimpses of sandstone. The material that once formed the distinctive cliffs and gulleys on the peninsula. Now it exists as the nearly invisible layers beneath the streets and buildings. My way of seeing this local landscape shifted after curating an exhibition that examined the changes in Pyrmont and Ultimo since white settlement.
Lightning strikes on the Sydney Harbour, 7 December, 1892. The photograph was exposed over four minutes giving an impression of five separate strikes. Government Astronomer H C Russell calculated the height of the Darling Harbour flash from the cloud to the water to be approximately 1540 feet.
Lieutenant William Dawes, who came out to Australia with the First Fleet, made the first recorded meteorological observations in Australia but the next set were probably made from Parramatta Observatory between October 1822 and March 1824.
Continue reading ‘World Meteorological Day – early meteorology in Australia’
While our digitisation project is well underway, with 80% of collection objects currently listed online, there is much more work to be done. Your donation will assist the Powerhouse to add high quality photographs and full background information for the 50% of online objects with incomplete listings.