by Haynes, Jim
In 1971, Foster’s was introduced to England through Barry Humphries’ highly successful cartoon strip in the magazine Private Eye. The strip was used as the basis for two very successful movies, The Adventures of Barry McKenzie and Bazza Holds His Own.
The hero of the cartoon strip and movies was rarely seen without a can of Foster’s in his hand and Foster’s took off in Britain, where lager-style, cold beer was just taking over the beer market from the more traditional styles of beer and ale.
Foster’s then launched into the USA in 1972 where it was marketed along with sport. Foster’s sponsored the 1972 America’s Cup challenge and tennis championships and was the official Olympic beer for Australia at the 1984 Los Angeles Olympics.
For over a decade from 1985, the Melbourne Cup was known as the Foster’s Melbourne Cup.
John Newcombe claimed in advertisements that he drank five cans after each tennis match and Paul Hogan was brought in to the advertising campaign. Hoge’s first Foster’s commercial script was this:
G’day. They’ve asked me over from Oz to introduce youse all to Foster’s Draught, here it is. Cripes! I’d better start with the basics. It’s a light, golden liquid, like, except for the white bit on top, the head, and it’s brewed from malt, yeast and hops. Technical term is lager. That’s L-A-G-E-R. But everyone calls it Foster’s. Ahhhh, ripper! Tastes like an angel cryin’ on yer tongue. Foster’s.
Of course, the famous Aussie Foster’s lager marketed to Poms and Yanks is also brewed locally—not here in Australia. Foster’s is brewed in eight countries, including China, Spain and Sweden. It is sold in 135 countries.
Australians living in the USA and Britain in the 1980s spent a lot of their time telling the locals they didn’t drink Foster’s! After all, it’s an American invention!
JH
CARLTON UNITED AND CASTLEMAINE
Carlton United Breweries was formed in 1908 when the Melbourne brewers Carlton, McCracken’s, Castlemaine, Shamrock and Foster’s combined to create a massive company with economies of scale unmatched by any other brewer in Australia.
Their famous ad was an old bushie at a bar saying, ‘I allus has wan at eleven’—but the full verse was:
I allus has wan at eleven
It’s a duty that has to be done
If I don’t have wan at eleven
I must have eleven at wan!
Castlemaine Brewery had been founded by two Irish Fitzgerald brothers. They migrated from Galway in 1859 and began their brewing business at Castlemaine in Victoria. In 1875, they established a brewery in South Melbourne and, in 1877, they also set up in Brisbane where, from 1878, they brewed the famous Castlemaine Ale that became associated with Queensland—although it was named after a town in Victoria!
The beer became Castlemaine XXXX in 1916 and ever since that time the joke has been that it’s called XXXX because Queenslanders can’t spell ‘beer’.
If you are wondering what 4X was called before 1916—cease wondering. From 1878 to 1916 it was known as Castlemaine XXX Sparkling Ale in other words—3X!
JH
CRAWLIWIGS
TRADITIONAL/JIM HAYNES
Reginald Cadwallider, scientifically inclined,
Always had taxidermy firmly on his mind.
Crawliwigs and crows and creepers, gathered far and wide,
Reggie stuffed and mounted ’em, and others, too, beside.
Far afield he found fine fishes, finches, frogs and fleas,
Killed and skinned and stuffed and mounted birds and bugs and bees.
One day afield he met a swaggie, trudging down the track,
His old black billy swinging and his swag upon his back.
‘Pardon me,’ said Reggie, ‘If you live round about
Can you help me find the kind of fauna I am seeking out?
See, I’m a taxidermist and I’m seeking creatures rare,
Reptiles, creepicrawlies, have you seen some anywhere?’
‘I have,’ replied the swaggie, ‘reptiles, snakes and lizards, too!
I can tell you where there’s heaps of ’em! A squirming, bloomin’ zoo!
Pink and blue and spotted ones, I’ve seen thousands, mate!
Crimson rats and yeller frogs, I’ll give it to you straight!
‘Red-haired beetles chasin’ spotted spiders all about,
Blue-nosed toads with purple stripes and waistcoats inside-out!’
‘Heavens, man!’ cried Reggie, ‘Where are they? In the scrub?’
‘No!’ the swaggie told him, ‘Down the track, at Casey’s Pub!
‘Underneath the v’randah, sometimes crawling through the floor!
If you can spare a bloke two-bob—I’ll go and see some more!’
Reginald Cadwallider, scientifically inclined,
Sadly headed home and left the ‘specimens’ behind!
PUB NAMES
In Australia, pubs originally were often named patriotically—after royalty, like the King’s Head or The Crown. This was very much in the British tradition; The Crown is the most common pub name in Britain.
Sadly, the quirkier British pub names rarely appeared here.
Among my favourites from Pommyland are the very common Drum and Monkey which probably derives from early Victorian times when pubs used ‘drumming monkeys’ from the colonies as novelties to attract customers, and the Swan with Two Necks, which is a corruption of ‘the swan with two nicks’.
Due to an old, odd tradition, all swans in Britain were owned by noble families or by various ancient guilds of merchants. Ownership was distinguished by a pattern of cuts in the beak of each bird. Most swans were owned (and still are) by the king or queen, who could claim all unmarked adult birds.
The swans owned by the guild of wine and beer merchants were marked with two nicks in the beak, thus the name was associated with pubs.
The very odd Elephant and Castle, which is a suburb of South London as well as a common pub name, has had some weird and wonderful stories invented to explain its origin.
Among the more ridiculous of these is the story that it was the cockney version of ‘Infanta de Castille’ (little princess of Castille), the Spanish princess who became Henry VIII’s first wife, Catherine, mother of Mary Tudor. Sadly, the story breaks down when you realise that Catherine was a Princess of Aragon, not the nearby province of Castille.
The elephant and castle was in fact the symbol of the cutlery factory that originally occupied the site of the first pub called Elephant and Castle. Because the factory made cutlery with ivory handles, it used the image of an elephant with a ‘howdah’ or covered shelter, vaguely reminiscent in shape of a castle tower, on its back. This image was used on the sign hanging outside the pub that replaced the factory.
But, back to Aussie pub history.
As time went by in colonial Australia, the pubs were named rather more prosaically than their British counterparts, though many copied British pub names that can still be found here, like the White Horse, the Black Lion, and the Rose, Shamrock and Thistle. Others, like the Macquarie Arms and Surveyor General, seem to have been named in thanks to those who granted the land or the licence.
Some were simply named after their owners, like the famous Young and Jacksons in Melbourne, but many more were named from their clientele.
The Sailors Arms, Ship Inn, and First and Last are all found near the wharves. The Woolpack was a common name, and those pubs would be found where teamsters rested their horses and bullocks, usually near a ford or bridge. The Commercial was often the middle-class pub in any country town and had accommodation and smoking rooms designed for commercial travellers.
The Railway, or sometimes the Locomotive, which was always near the station and catered to passengers and railway workers, often became the ‘blood house’ or rough pub, while the more up-market pubs, like the Imperial, The Royal and The Squatters Arms, catered to the landed gentry and more conservative drinkers.
Labor voters were more likely to be found drinking at The Austr
alian, The Southern Cross, the Workers Arms or the Railway, while the Tattersall’s, Sportsman Arms, Bat and Ball and Cricketers Arms catered for sportsmen and gamblers.
Many pubs simply took the name of the closest landmark and were known by such dull names as The Pier, The Bridge and The Lakes.
There are a few pubs that used history to brand themselves as patriotic. Most of these date from colonial times and celebrate British History, such as The Hero of Waterloo, The Wellington and The Iron Duke—all named after the same bloke!
Sydney also has The Trafalgar and the Lord Nelson but there are some local heroes too, if you want to count the Captain Cook, the Joseph Banks and the Endeavour as representing Aussie history, rather than British.
Pub names come and go and often lose touch with their original clientele and history. The historic suburb of Botany, in Sydney, is a perfect case in point.
Botany has a mix of historic and matter-of-fact pub names. It has the rather obvious Botany Bay and Pier, although the actual pier ‘disa-pier-ed’ decades ago. Botany also has the local historic connection with the patriotic Joseph Banks and Captain Cook.
Until recently, Botany also had the Endeavour, but that pub has recently been renovated and reverted to its original name, the Waterworks. It was the pub where the workers from the Botany waterworks and pumping station drank when the nearby Millpond, previously known as the Botany Swamp, was Sydney’s water supply from 1860 to 1888.
It’s nice to see some accurate history restored. The crew of the Endeavour certainly never drank there. They were too busy drinking Captain Cook’s potent fruit punch to prevent scurvy!
JH
BOOZE AND SPORT
Drinking and sport have been linked in our history since the earliest colonial times.
Early sporting events were often organised by publicans in order to boost sales of alcohol. Horseracing, foot racing and various novelty events were used to attract crowds to the field beside the pub. Or at the very least, the finish line was at the pub!
Sydney’s first official race meeting in Hyde Park in 1810 caused widespread drinking and became a three-day holiday for the entire colony.
On 15 October 1810, officers of the 73rd Regiment organised a three-day race meeting in Hyde Park. Of course, there had been unofficial meetings before that—often at pubs in outlying areas.
The records tell us that Captain Ritchie’s grey gelding, Chase, won the very first race. The horses raced clockwise as the course design suited that direction due to the position of the afternoon sun. The finishing line was where Market Street meets Elizabeth Street today.
The three-day meeting caused massive drinking and rowdiness and a stray dog brought down D’Arcy Wentworth’s good horse, Gig, during a race on the final day. The jockey, incidentally, was D’Arcy’s nineteen-year-old son William Charles Wentworth.
Luckily uninjured, W.C. Wentworth went on to become one of our greatest and most famous political activists and statesmen.
All in all, the 1810 meeting was deemed to be a huge success and it became a part of the Sydney social calendar until 1814 when the 73rd Regiment was transferred to Ceylon and the colony lost its race committee.
Racing lapsed into unofficial match races and was banned for a time by Governor Macquarie until a brief revival at Hyde Park was followed by a further ban under Governor Brisbane.
In 1825, the Sydney Turf Club was formed and began racing at Captain Piper’s racecourse at Bellevue Hill under the patronage of Governor Brisbane, who was happy to see some sort of organised racing replace the mayhem and drunkenness of unofficial meetings around the old dilapidated course at Hyde Park.
Alcohol-fuelled riots were not unusual at football matches in Melbourne throughout the latter half of the nineteenth century, and foot racing, boxing, cycling and wresting were commonly held at pubs, as was cock fighting.
Champagne and rum drinking were common at race meetings, and still are to a certain degree, but, since refrigeration came along in the late 1880s, beer and most sports just seem to go together quite naturally in Australia.
The gentle game of cricket, which stopped for lunch and tea breaks, is now perhaps the worst example of sport and booze being mixed unwisely by large groups of spectators. Journalist Rory Gibson once wrote of a match he remembered from the 1970s, when cans were still allowed at major grounds like the Gabba.
Apparently a poor Pom paraded on the hill with a huge Union Jack draped around his shoulders. Of course, all the Aussies immediately began using him for target practice and hundreds of beer cans rained down from further up the hill. He attempted to run but that was only further incentive for the locals to pick up the thousands of empties lying around and pelt them at him.
When he eventually crouched down and covered his head with his hands, a very unsympathetic Aussie fan picked up one of the forty-four-gallon drum garbage tins full of empties and poured the lot over him. The crowd cheered as the police arrived and the poor Pom was arrested for ‘inciting the crowd’.
Evidently he was smiling and everyone was happy—just another day at the cricket.
Sponsorship is a serious business and the famous competition between Foster’s and Lion Nathan for Spring Carnival sponsorship rights in Melbourne is just one example of the importance of booze in the world of sport.
It’s a serious matter for players, too. Rory Gibson reminds us that former North Queensland Cowboys rugby league player Ian Russell was twice fined by his club, once $5000 and then $10,000 for being seen by team officials publically drinking a can of VB, when the team was sponsored by XXXX. That’s an expensive can of beer!
Wendy Green, the Darwin schoolteacher whose horse, Rogan Josh, won the 1999 Melbourne Cup, tells a great yarn about driving back to Darwin after the Cup and stopping at Tennant Creek to celebrate with some of the locals who were having a party. She was recognised and soon joined the festivities, which became a celebration of her Cup win.
Towards the end of the celebration, a local mum asked her to christen her new baby boy. Wendy explained that she wasn’t qualified and had no holy water handy, but suggested the captain of the tourist bus which had pulled in to join the fun might be qualified in the same way as a ship’s captain.
The bus driver was reluctant but agreed to do the job, no doubt realising he’d be a thousand miles away in two days’ time.
When the mum said the name was to be ‘Rogan Josh’ and offered a can of VB to be used instead of holy water, Wendy protested. She pointed out that Foster’s was the official sponsor of the Melbourne Cup and it didn’t seem right. So, she offered the French champagne she had in her car and everyone was happy with that.
When Wendy asked the mother if she was sure about the name, she was told that it was fine, in fact it was almost traditional as there was another distant relative who’d been christened Phar Lap Dixon.
JH
A FRIENDLY GAME OF FOOTBALL
EDWARD DYSON
We were challenged by the Dingoes, they’re the pride of Squatter’s Gap,
To a friendly game of football on the flat by Devil’s Trap,
So, we went along on horses, sworn to triumph in the game,
For the honour of Gyp’s Digging, and the glory of the same.
And we took the challenge with us, it was beautiful to see,
With its lovely, curly letters and its pretty filigree.
It was very gently worded and it made us all feel good,
For it breathed the sweetest sentiments of peace and brotherhood.
We had Chang and Trucker Hogan, and the man who licked The Plug,
Also Heggarty, and Houlahan, and Peter Scott, the pug;
And we wore our knuckle-dusters and we took a keg on tap
To our friendly game of football with the Dingoes at The Gap.
All the fellows came to meet us and we spoke like brothers dear,
They’d a tip-dray full of tucker and a wagon load of beer,
And some lint done up in bundles, so we reckoned t
here’d be fun
’ere our friendly game of football with the Dingo Club was done.
Their umpire was a homely man, a stranger to the push,
With a sweet, deceitful calmness, and the flavour of the bush.
He declared he didn’t know the game, but promised, on his oath,
To see fair and square between the teams, or paralyse them both.
Then we bounced the ball and started, and for twenty minutes quite
We observed a proper courtesy and a heavenly sense of right,
But Fitzpatrick tipped McDougal in a handy patch of mud,
And the hero rose up chewing dirt and famishing for blood.
The umpire dragged them from the ruck, pegged out a little patch.
And let them settle it politely with a proper boxing match.
You could hardly wish to come across a fairer-minded chap,
For a friendly game of football, than that umpire at The Gap.
Then young Magee took on a local chap named Bent,
And four others started fighting to avoid an argument.
Tim Hogan hit the umpire and was promptly put to bed
’Neath the ammunition wagon, with a bolus on his head.
Sixty seconds later, twenty couples held the floor
And the air was full of whiskers and the grass was tinged with gore,
And the umpire kept good order in the interests of peace,
While spectators, to oblige him, sat severely on the p’lice.
Well, we fought the friendly game out, but I couldn’t say who won;
We were all flat out on stretchers when the glorious day was done.
Both the constables had vanished, one was carried off to bunk,
And the umpire was exhausted and the populace was drunk.
So, we’ve written out a paper, with good Father Feeley’s aid,
Breathing brotherly affection, and a challenge is conveyed
