Antiquarian Print Gallery

25/04/2026

Dame Nellie Melba's WWI Giftbook had a famous rollcall of literary royalty as contributors, who also contributed their work so "The Entire Profits from the Sale of this book will be devoted by Nellie Melba to the Belgian Relief Fund"

A Timeless Voice from Australia’s Past

I’ve always loved classical music, but after spending most of this afternoon listening to Dame Nellie Melba, I’ve gained a whole new appreciation for her extraordinary voice. There’s something about it that feels deeply nostalgic, as though it stirs memories from another time. Perhaps I heard her music as a child, because her singing evokes such a warm, familiar feeling that’s hard to explain. It’s easy to understand why audiences around the world were captivated by her.

Dame Nellie Melba, born Helen Porter Mitchell in Melbourne in 1861, became one of the most famous sopranos of her time. She was the eldest surviving child of builder David Mitchell and Isabella Dow, and she got her father’s determination and her mother’s love of music. Although she wasn’t seen as a child prodigy, her remarkable voice soon stood out, and she studied singing and piano at Melbourne’s Presbyterian Ladies’ College.

Melba married Charles Armstrong in Brisbane in 1882 and had a son, but she left an unhappy marriage in Mackay to start a professional singing career in Melbourne. With help from her teacher Pietro Cecchi, she made her debut at Melbourne Town Hall in 1884 and quickly stood out for her talent. In 1886, she went to Europe, where the well-known vocal teacher Mathilde Marchesi helped her improve her technique and suggested she use the stage name “Melba,” after her home city.

Melba’s big break came in Brussels in 1887 when she sang Gilda in Rigoletto. She found more success in Paris and London, especially at the Royal Opera House, where she became one of Covent Garden’s top stars. She also performed at La Scala and in New York, singing for royalty and world leaders across Europe. Melba was famous for roles like Mimi in La Bohème, Lucia in Lucia di Lammermoor, and Gilda, and she was known for the purity, range, and beauty of her voice.

Away from the stage, Melba was glamorous, ambitious, and very protective of her reputation. Her personal life often made headlines, especially her relationship with Philippe, Duke of Orleans, which sparked a well-known divorce scandal. Even though some parts of the press criticised her, Australians welcomed her home in 1902 as a national icon when she embarked on a very successful concert tour.

In the early 1900s, Melba stayed at the top of the opera world and grew closer to Australia. She toured remote towns, set up Coombe Cottage near Melbourne as her home, and got very involved in music education. By supporting the Albert Street Conservatorium, later called the Melba Memorial Conservatorium, she helped train a new generation of Australian singers. She also published The Melba Method in 1926.

During World War I, Melba raised substantial funds for war charities by giving concerts and embarking on fundraising tours. Even as her voice aged, she stayed very popular and gave farewell performances throughout the 1920s in Europe and Australia. Her last opera performances in Australia were in 1928.

Melba died in Sydney in 1931 from septicaemia after surgery complications.

If you’re curious and would like to listen to Dame Nellie Melba, check out the link below:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s_NCWLKPKmg

The original of the enhanced photograph was taken circa 1922, and it is sourced from the State Library of South Australia (PRG 280/1/30/162). The image has been enhanced using AI and Photoshop; it was colourised in Photoshop.

https://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/melba-dame-nellie-7551

https://collections.slsa.sa.gov.au/resource/PRG+280/1/30/162

Sources: With thanks to the State Library of South Australia, Jim Davidson, 'Melba, Dame Nellie (1861–1931)', Australian Dictionary of Biography, National Centre of Biography, Australian National University, https://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/melba-dame-nellie-7551/text13175, published first in hardcopy 1986, accessed online 23 April 2026, and YouTube, Opera Buff

Edited and colourised by Kelly Bonato of A Colourful History

Copyright © Kelly Bonato 2026. All image editing, enhancement, and colourisation is subject to copyright. You are welcome to share this post, but the image alone cannot be copied or shared without permission.

14/04/2026

On 14th April 1912, the unthinkable happened, The sinking of the Titanic. On the 20th the Daily Mirror printed this tribute naming but a few of the 1500 that lost their lives:

On 15 April 1912 the Titanic sank. Daily Mirror published a tribute to Captain Smith, the Crew Members and luminaries among the 1600 who perished.

15/03/2026

We may hae Easter...but we also have SA History Month...and Thistle Anderson is my favorite snobby stirrer-upper of the newly-minted Edwardian Era! This State Library Lecture will be a WOOT!

Before Lady Whistledown, there was Thistle Anderson… Writer and actress Thistle Anderson, better known as Mrs Herbert Fisher, was one of Australia’s most talked-about women at the turn of the twentieth century. She delighted in rattling high society. From Melbourne to London, her scandals filled...

09/03/2026

Framed! European picture frames from the Johnson Collection, an exhibition at the Philadelphia Museum of Art: Framed! https://theframeblog.com/2025/02/24/framed-european-picture-frames-from-the-johnson-collection-an-exhibition-at-the-philadelphia-museum-of-art/?fbclid=IwY2xjawQbd4tleHRuA2FlbQIxMQBzcnRjBmFwcF9pZBAyMjIwMzkxNzg4MjAwODkyAAEed7mU-Xx2yZGyviaTXq3o-aKNcNVgtJUrDrn6LUCTfrf7xjkZz53DPrnpVQY_aem_nU4P1l8o1vLROrRTprwksg

Curator’s introduction A picture frame can be a work of art in its own right. This installation explores how European frames changed from the 1500s to the 1800s, focusing on examples from the John …

27/07/2025

This wood engraving of Klemzig appeared in the SA Register in 1845. Certainly the early German colonist interviewed paints a promising word picture also. https://www.facebook.com/photo/?fbid=1184416367046796&set=a.462729295882177

🗞"GERMAN EMIGRATION.

Letters of the most satisfactory kind have been received by the relatives of the Germans who immigrated into this Colony per the George Washington.
They were pleased with the vessel, with the passage, with their reception in South Australia, with the country itself, and with their own prospects. The natural consequence of this has been a confirmation of the desire previously felt, in many districts of the Prussian dominions, to emigrate to this "inviting" land.

The owner of the George Washington has been so far encouraged as to despatch another of his vessels (the Herjobhoy Rustomjee Pattell) to Port Adelaide, and she was intended to sail in March last. Two hundred emigrants may be expected in this ship, and many more are anxious to have an opportunity of following their countrymen. As a specimen of the accounts transmitted by the German immigrants, we subjoin an extract from a letter written by a respectable German gentleman, who arrived in this Colony nearly two years ago. The letter is addressed to the son of the Senior Burgomaster in Bremen, from Adelaide, under date September 10, 1844.

"This place pleases me much, I may say, better every day that I remain here. I do not at all regret having emigrated hither. The mines are now in full work, and appear to be very rich. There are at present 60O tons of ore lying here, and before the end of the year the quantity is expected to reach 3000 tons. Two ships have just left us with full cargoes, and a third is laid on for London, which is loading with copper ore, bark, gum, oil, whalebone and wool. We shall then be ill off with our accumulation of produce, unless we have a further arrival of vessels. The land here is admirably adapted for agricultural purposes, and whoever has a desire to work is sure to get on; but he must work, and must not be over nice in respect to provisions. I may just add here that quicksilver is said to have been found in some places."

The Captain of the George Washington had written to the owner in a still more gratifying strain; describing his trips into the inlterior, and stating how much he was pleased with the country, and with the harbour of Port Adelaide.

The two hundred emigrants who had been appointed to sail for this Province in the Herjobhoy Rustomjee Pattell, [sic] were chiefly of the labouring classes, but not exclusively so. One very intelligent gentleman accompanies the expedition, who is described as well acquainted with the process of smelting, and assaying ores, and with the construction of furnaces on the most approved principles, -in short, a talented and scientific gentleman, possessing a high degree of practical knowledge and a large experience; and one from whom great services may be expected in contributing to develop the mineral riches of South Australia, as well as in turning to the most profitable account the discoveries already made.

In further proof of the spirited manner in which the Germans are prosecuting, and contemplate prosecuting emigration, to South Australia, it is stated, that there is a probability of a literary gentleman arriving by the same ship, for the purpose of establishing a weekly newspaper in Adelaide, to be published ia German and English. The Germans in South Australia in general had found the change of country so beneficial, as to have strongly urged their relations and acquaintances to follow them to "the Land of Goshen"— and so numerous had been the applications for passage, per the Herjobhoy Rustomjee Pattell,[sic]that very many had been disappointed—and her owner, who is also that of the George Washington, had determined to lay her on again for Port Adelaide on her arrival from India : — so that she would in all probability be ready to take her departure for this Colony on or about the Ist July.

Since writing the above we have been put in possession of extracts of the latest advices received in this Colony, which not only confirm but surpass those from which we have just quoted. The substance of these extracts we now subjoin : — The Herjobhoy Rustomjee Pattell,[sic] Captain Laun was still, on the 18th March, frozen up in the Weser but would leave Bremen as soon as the weather broke up, her passengers, about two hundred and fifty in number, being ready for embarkation. The George Washington, Captain Probst, had not yet arrived from Batavia, but was already advertized to sail from Bremen for South Australia in all July, with a full complement of emigrants, the greater part of whom had already engaged their passages.

South Australia is exciting very considerable attention throughout Germany, and there is every reason to anticipate, that a large and constant accession of both labour and capital from the Continent of Europe to this highly favoured Colony will be the result of the judicious and zealous activity, with which correct information respecting it is now being systematically disseminated, throughout the length and breadth of Germany."🗞

South Australian Register, Saturday 26 July 1845, page 2
https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/27450633 #



📷"'Klemzig, German village on the Torrens', South Australia; a photographic reproduction of the sketch by F.R. Nixon." Circa 1845. SLSA. Enhanced by PASA.

27/07/2025

Charles II, in 1675, authorized the building of the Royal Observatory at Greenwich. The Age of Enlightenment had begun, that in turn fostered a search for knowledge: https://www.facebook.com/share/v/16zhFmSFDU/

04/05/2025

What was the writing surface in Europe prior to Gutenberg's Press invented in c.1452? Parchment: https://www.facebook.com/watch/?v=586738403817627&rdid=q8kr6yKWgsLwCOOJ

30/04/2025

Electricity-The Unrestrained Demon circa 1900 cartoon; https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=1003984075217933&set=a.426151079667905&type=3&rdid=nwIGjJUjKMIxjcl4&share_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.facebook.com%2Fshare%2F1BBJXnjLbc%2F #

Anti-electricity cartoon from 1900. The artwork is entitled “The Unrestrained Demon”, referring to the electricity itself. Unknown creator.

09/04/2025

A FAB example of what two crazy CREATIVE Nuremburg inhabitants have poste to the future from 1491: https://www.facebook.com/photo?fbid=1074089454758726&set=a.595856329248710

: In 1491, two German merchants came together upon a crazy idea: to commission an illustrated encyclopedia documenting the history of the world. Two years and 300-odd pages later, the Nuremberg Chronicle was complete. It’s a vibrant, florid thing that carries the reader in great style out of Nuremberg’s red roofed skyline, beneath Florence’s Duomo, through the streets of Paris and Constantinople, and into the murky world beyond.

A first edition of the 15th century’s most illustrated book is traveling to the 65th New York International Antiquarian Book Fair, courtesy of Marshall Rare Books—a useful reminder in our age of instant information of the book’s longstanding power to transport. And where visitors to the fair might be teleported is anyone’s guess. Across the more than 200 exhibitions packed into Manhattan’s Park Avenue Armory from April 3 to 6 there are purveyors of niche patents, Hollywood memorabilia, political letters, historical artifacts, and much more besides.

Read more: https://bit.ly/3Yn9Obg

Article by Richard Whiddington

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Pictured: The Nuremberg Chronicle has more than 1,800 woodcut illustrations. Photo: courtesy Marshall Rare Books.

02/04/2025

Back to the Future. Satirists & Caricaturists have been paying the bills with the old "The Consequence of Power/Money/Ego" trope since before the printing press was invented... https://www.facebook.com/reel/1145394323645312