Lizzie's dreads

The ABC have posted an old Landline segment on 'Big Lizzie'.

 
Big Lizzie was built by Frank Bottrill, in Richmond, in 1915, with a 60hp Blackstone water-cooled crude oil engine and fitted with Bottrill's Dreadnought wheel, patented in 1906. Lizzie worked in the Mallee clearing fruit blocks, and traveled down through the Wimmera to Glendinning near Balmoral in 1924.
There she ended her days on a share-farm, pieces sold off and forgotten.
Then in the 1970s came the task of finding the fate of the huge chunk of machinery, and returning it to the Mallee and to Red Cliffs.

Big Lizzie

The State Library of Victoria is always adding to their collection, and have just highlighted the release of the images of amateur photographer Wilf Henty, who worked for the Victorian Railways and took photographs documenting life from 1901 through to 1940.

Wilf Henty, a collateral descendant of the Henty family who took up residence in the Portland district of Victoria in 1829. Wilf worked for the Victorian Railways, and his photographic work documents the life and interests ranging from Manangatang in the Mallee to the tall forests of East Gippsland around Bruthen.

See Wilf’s collection here

The two images here, are of Big Lizzie, and would have been taken between 1920 and 1924 when she was in the Mallee.

Big Lizzie with a man standing between the engine and trailer

 Big Lizzie was built by Frank Bottrill, in Richmond, in 1915, with a 60hp Blackstone water-cooled crude oil engine and fitted with Bottrill's Dreadnought wheel, patented in 1906. Lizzie worked in the Mallee clearing fruit blocks, and traveled down through the Wimmera to Glendinning near Balmoral in 1924.

 

Big Lizzie's trailer with 2 stationary engines