Is it AA or A in Ballaarat?

Extract from the Heritage Victoria Register BMI statement of significance.

“The Ballaarat Mechanics’ Institute in Ballarat was built in two main stages, in 1860-61 and in 1869-70. The Institute had first met unofficially in 1854, with space provided for the first reading room in the Ballarat Fire Brigade building, but a site for a new Institute building was granted in Sturt Street in 1856. The institute was inaugurated by a public meeting in 1859, with the first president being JB Humffray (1824-1891), the Secretary of the Ballaarat Reform League, which had been founded by the diggers in 1854 and instigated the Eureka uprising.“

So, which is correct? Ballaarat or Ballarat. The answer is that both are correct, but Ballaarat is more correct than Ballarat, as far as the BMI is concerned, the registration shows ‘aa’ as the official spelling, but a single ‘a’ is listed under ‘other known names’ . 

The BMI has retained the ‘aa’ long after others in Ballaarat have reverted to ‘a’, as a casual reading of printed headings and advertising will show. 

The song, Ball-aa-rat has been sung with gusto since it was published, it could be heard repeated over and over on tourist radio by our own Frank Callahan and his one man band.

Listen to it here, just click on the little red arrow and try to get it out of your head in the next day or two.

Did you know…

The BMI has three book collections.

Lending library fiction, which comprises titles hot off the press today, right back to the era of Agatha Christie.

Lending library non-fiction that has an extensive coverage of local history, Australiana, war, biography and more, published from fifty years ago to today.

Heritage Collection. Not for loan, but the many thousands of titles are available to members for research and reading. Titles go back to 1580. Sub-categories within the Heritage Collection include, Mining, Ballarat, and Australiana.

Other collections include DVD’s for loan, and newspapers including the Ballarat Star, Ballarat Courier, Melbourne Argus, and the Australasian.

Sometimes an early book will be the basis for further publications. Here are three.

‘Records of a family of Engineers‘ by Robert Louis Stevenson (929STE heritage collection)) was the basis for ‘The lighthouse Stevensons‘ by Bell Bathurst (623.89BAT Lending library).

‘A Voyage around the World 1748 Lord George Anson (910ANS heritage collection) was mentioned in ‘Longtitude‘ by Dava Sobel 520SOB lending library.

‘A New English Dictionary‘ in twelve volumes plus index by James Murray in 1888 (420NEW heritage collection) was compiled in part by ‘The Surgeon of Crowthorne‘ the subject of a book by Simon Winchester 1998 (362.2092WIN Lending library)

Enquiries from members to our research assistants are welcome.

Did you Know?

Where are you?

You are not sure. Stand in the entry to the Ballarat Mechanics’ Institute and straight ahead is a long passage with five doors that could go anywhere. 

Open the double doors at the far end, you will find a room now called the Batten Room. 

It is the BMI lending library, named for Mr. Batten, who between him and his son, were the committee appointed managers of the Institute for a combined ninety years.

Depending on when you entered, it might have been called the Newspaper Reading Room, where daily papers, Australian, British and American were displayed on sloping benches for members to catch up on the latest news, although some of it could be three or four months old, depending when the last sailing ship arrived in Port Melbourne or Geelong. Later during the war in the Pacific, when frequent readers were from the US Marines stationed in Ballarat, they wanted news from home, and the room would be full.

Or perhaps if you arrived in the later part of the 20th. century it may have been called the (Queen) Victoria League Room, named for the group of Ballarat people who regularly met there.

Looking to the right, notice the ramp and opening into the Mining Exchange, with its mezzanine balcony. It was renamed the Old Mining Exchange when the more recent mining exchange was built in Lydiard street. It was also known as The Corner, where the shares for gold mining syndicates were bought and sold from share-broker offices facing Sturt street..

It became known as the Lending Library in 1935 when the Institute purchased the freehold and moved the lending library from the upstairs room to here. An entry was created into the main building and remained as such until 2008, when the library was moved into the newly renovated Batten Room.

The Old Mining Exchange is now known as the Heritage and Reading Centre.

“ Notice the archway behind the library desk. It leads to the Pound Room. The archway was bricked up but opened in 2008, as the room had been used as a photographic studio. It is named for Dr. J.R.Pound, a committee member from 1945 to 1967. The room is now used as a members research and computer area.”

Adjoining the Pound room is the Committee Room, where the business and committee meetings have taken place for 165 years.

Across the passage is the Hooper Room, a meeting room named after a long term and valuable secretary and member of the committee, Stan Hooper. Had you entered earlier, it may have been called the Smoking Room, or the Smokey Room, or the Chess Club Room, when it was fitted out with special Chess tables and equipment for the Ballarat Chess Club. 

Take the stairs to the Minerva Space, as named in 2013. This is the Great Hall, or Auditorium, built in 1859, used for dinners, displays, performances, entertainment and public events until it became a movie theatre called The Britannia Theatre in 1919 and remained until 1962, when it became the Odeon, and in 1965 became the Vegas 70 until 1981. It was the Lyric Theatre until 1993, and then the Sturt Cinema until 2004. Then it closed for renovations.

The internal stairs in the foyer outside the Minerva Space lead to the Humffray Room, named for the first president of the BMI, John Bassen Humffray. This room was the Lending Library from 1868 until relocated to the Old Mining Exchange in 1935. It was also known as The Blue Room,  After the library moved, the room was used as a ballet studio and the walls painted blue.

Immediately below is the Williamson Foyer, named for the benefactors, the Williamson Foundation, who generously funded restoration in this area of the building. Originally this was two rooms, separated by the intruding barrel ceiling of the ground floor entry foyer. you may recall it as the Milk Bar and Sweets Shop for the Britannia Theatre. 0r even earlier it was rented to the United Australia Organisation, a forerunner of the liberal Party. 

The top floor, presently tenanted, was the home of the BMI museum, a space dedicated to the display in glass cabinets of an extensive range of geological specimens, set up and managed by Professor Abel, a well known Austrian geologist. Later it became a Billiard Room, with four full size tables, then an Indoor Bowling area. Now it is known as the Henry Sutton Room, who was an avid and persistent inventor and is well remembered by his activities within the Institute.

So, if you are looking for the Smoking room, or the Blue Room, or the Victoria League Room, or more, now you know where to find them.