South Bourke and Mornington Journal and the Motor Club Hotel, Cranbourne

Exciting news - Trove, the National Library of Australia digitised newspaper resource, has now added issues of the South Bourke and Mornington Journal to its content. It's a great resource and is currently on-line from 1872 to 1920. The Journal has lots of local news relevant to local and family historians in the Casey Cardinia region - its masthead boasts that it circulates throughout Dandenong, Berwick, Pakenham, Koo-Wee-Rup, Clyde, Lang Lang, Dalmore, Yannathan and Monomeith amongst other locations in the County of Mornington.

I came across some advertisements for the Motor Club Hotel in Cranbourne (or Kellys as it is more commonly known). The first Hotel on the site was the Mornington Hotel built around 1860 by Thomas and Elizabeth Gooch. The Cranbourne Road Board met in this building.

The Mornington Hotel, Cranbourne

Image: The Good Country: Cranbourne Shire by Niel Gunson

In The Good Country: Cranbourne Shire, Niel Gunson writes that Thomas Gooch was chief mate on the Sacramento. Elizabeth (nee Minister) had also been on the same ship, which was wrecked near the Heads, Port Phillip Bay. They both lost all of their possessions, but found true love and married each other in 1853. Elizabeth gave birth to nine children between 1855 and 1867. They were Thomas (1855), Alfred (1857), Susan Ellen (1859), Arthur (1860), Charlotte (1861), Walter Edward (1863), Harriet Beumont (1864), Frank Frederick (1865), Fanny Elizabeth (1867).

Thomas and Elizabeth Gooch

Image: Cranbourne Shire Historical Society

Application by John Taylor to change the name of the Mornington Hotel 

to the Motor Club Hotel

South Bourke & Mornington Journal  December 21, 1911. 

http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article66179793

Sometime in 1911, John Taylor took over the licence of the Mornington Hotel and in December 1911  he applied to have the name changed to the Motor Club Hotel and this was approved at a Licensing Court Hearing held December 14, 1911. This name  may have been related to the birth of the Royal Automobile Club of Victoria in Tooradin or may have reflected the fact that Cranbourne was a popular destination for early motor car excursions. John Taylor purchased the freehold of the hotel in 1912.

John Taylor advertises that he has purchased the freehold of the Motor Club Hotel, January 1912.

South Bourke and Mornington Journal, January 18, 1912  

http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article66179912

Julia O'Brien took over the licence of the Motor Club Hotel in February 1913, until March 1914. It was then operated by Gertrude and William Kilroy, until May 1918. Read more about the Kilroys, here. William James Taylor, then held the lease until Sarah Kelly, a member of the  Kelly family, who were also licensees of the Cranbourne Hotel (which was situated where Greg Clydesdale Square in High Street is now located) took over the license of the Motor Club Hotel in June 1919, as this article and advertisement in the South Bourke and Mornington Journal attests (see below).

Mrs Sarah Kelly takes over the lease of the Motor Club Hotel from Mr Taylor, in June 1919.

South Bourke and Mornington Journal, June 19, 1919

http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article66196239

This was the first advertisement from Mrs Kelly at the Motor Club Hotel, June 1919.

South Bourke and Mornington Journal, June 19, 1919  http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-page6365244

The existing Motor Club Hotel, was built around 1924. I am basing this on the valuation in the Cranbourne Shire Rate Books - in 1923/24 and 1924/25 the Net Annual Value was 240 pounds, in 1925/26 -it had leaped to 420 pounds and the next two years it was 400 pounds, so I believe the increase in rates was due to the erection of the new building. As the Local Government year used to run from October 1 to September 30 then the new building would have been erected between October 1924 and September 1925 to appear at the higher valuation in the 1925/26 year.  The building is listed on the City of Casey Heritage Database, which describes it as a prominent local land mark and of historical and social significance.

The Motor Club Hotel, taken in the late 1920s or 1930s.

Image: Cranbourne Shire Historical Society  

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