For the uninitated, the Melbourne Cup is an important horse race in Australia.
In other parts of the world, you get a holiday for elections, national days,
important memorial days. In Melbourne, you get the day off for the Melbourne
Cup, always run on the first Tuesday in November.
For the fashion conscious, the event includes fashion shows, parades and
millinery contests. There is also a lot of fancy dress vaguely above the level
of men in nighties and women in sparkly hats...you know, the sort of thing worn
to distract people from the fact you will be paraletic drunk by race-time.
The big event takes place outside the course in the Members' Carpark where the
rich people have runners take bets in to the bookies as they drink champagne
and chicken from the trunks of their Rolls Royces.
Oh, there is also a horse race on the day.
The event has been going for about a century and a half. The first ever film
shot in Australia was at the 1896 Melbourne Cup, 15 short reels on events of
the day that obviously shows fashion worn by racegoers, particularly men. About
half of this footage has been lost although a seventh reel has been recently
uncovered, showing the wieghing-in process.
It is funny how this stuff always seems to be uncovered around Meobourne Cup
time but I suppose we all need to target our publicity, even film and sound
archivists!
Below are a couple of links to newspaper articles on the footage. If you can
find your way around the Australian Film & Sound Archives site, you may find
some of the footage,
-C.
http://www.news.com.au/adelaidenow/story/0,,24581615-12428,00.html
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,,24591077-2702,00.html
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