Members list (carved 1934), book cover (carved 1950's), mirror (date carved unknown), Queen Mary Club, Hobart.
DB69, DB70, DB71
Queen Mary Club website.
The Queen Mary Club of Hobart was formed as a residential Social Club for Ladies on 1st July 1910 at 143 Macquarie Street, Hobart. The building was formerly the Bank of Australasia. The 100 original members leased the building from Hotelier Mr Hadley for 200 pounds per annum. The name “Queen Mary” was granted by Royal charter. Unfortunately the club have no records of the first 19 years of the Club’s existence, the first recorded minutes being dated Dec 4 1929. In 1935 the building was bought from the Hadley estate for 3,500 pounds.
“Ellen Nora Payne – Woodcarver of Tasmania” by Russell Atkinson, page 89
“One of her (Nellie’s) great interests was the Queen Mary Club in Hobart. This is a club for women formed by Mrs. Tetley Gant, Mrs. C. E. Webster, and Miss Rymer Maxwell. She had been one of the leading spirits in its early days, and afterwards she had carved and presented to it an ornamental mirror frame, a frame for a list of members, for which she had also done the lettering, and a handsome cover for the members’ book.
The club made her a life member at a special meeting and party in 1954. Her speech on that occasion, and her witty description of the club’s very first meeting at which the burning question for discussion was that of how members should dress for such meetings, was long remembered by those present. “