Rolls Royce Owners Club of Canberra

CLUB History

The Origins of our Club

By Peter Hyland

The Rolls-Royce Owners’ Club of Australia was formed in 1956 in Sydney with a foundation membership of 19. Today the Club has Clubs in every State and Territory. The primary purposes of the Club are threefold:

to encourage ownership, maintenance and restoration of those motor cars manufactured by the various Rolls-Royce and post-1931 Bentley companies;
to promote practical motoring, safety and courtesy on the roads; and
to encourage social and community activities among the members.

The beginnings of the ACT Club

The association of Rolls-Royce cars within Canberra is long standing. The visits of early Silver Ghosts to Duntroon House before the First World War are recorded and many more of the cars were used for offcial functions during the inter-war period, particularly with Vice-Regal and Royal visit duties.

One of the earliest and most notable enthusiasts was Trevor Shores who at the time, was the Sergeant Bootmaker at the Royal Military College, Duntroon. Upon his retirement and departure from Canberra, he left with his two sons, two Phantom Is and a uniquely-bodied Silver Wraith.

The late Dr Russell-Jones owned two Bentley Mk VIs in the late ’60s but it was Bob McCulloch and Ian Irwin who were probably the frst new enthusiasts after Trevor Shores, to arrive in the post-war period.

Ian Irwin purchased one of the Palfreyman Silver Ghost chassis from a sale of 28 conducted by George Sevenoaks, while Bob McCulloch emigrated from England with a Hooper-bodied Silver Dawn.

To digress a little, the 12th Federal Rally was held in Canberra in June 1970. Perhaps, because of the interest it generated at the time, thoughts of a separate ACT Club were triggered. At that Rally, over 400 members in 112 cars attended in the depths of a Canberra winter!

Rally HQ was the Canberra Rex Hotel on Northboune Avenue with the Concours being held at the local Racecourse in what was then known simply as north Canberra. Martin & Manuela Bennett were known attendees (PRAECLARUM 5-10 p.5742).

Then again in June 1980, the NSW Club hosted the 22nd Federal Rally in Canberra.

David Neely’s book In the Rear View Mirror (p.83) provides a good account of the early attempts to form an ACT Club.

NSW members who lived in Canberra or nearby areas wanted a local Club but it took them 10 years from 1972 for a Club to be formed in the ACT. In a city used to bureaucracy, the red tape encountered during the early attempts to form the Club was unbelievable – mainly due to the encumbrances contained in the Club’s Federal Constitution.

Ian Irwin who instigated moves to create the Club in 1972 had been a NSW member since 1970. As a Canberra resident, it was diffcult for him to become more involved in the NSW Club activities and so, he thought if a small Club could be formed in the ACT, it would provide occasional meetings and outings for the local enthusiasts.

After discussions with local NSW members and other enthusiasts, Ian organised a meeting in May 1972 in the St Luke’s Church Hall at Deakin. The NSW Club was asked to send a representative also. Those invited to attend included:

Faris Palfreyman

Harry & Elsie Ganter

Clement Cummings

Jack Wilkinson

Peter Treacy

Trevor Shores

Robert McCulloch

Brian Andrea

Reg MacDonald

Grp-Capt. Frank Carey

Nig Morrow (Wagga Wagga)

David Pockley (Tarago)

Dai Davies (Tumut)

Allen Kelly (Albury)

George Sevenoaks (N.S.W. Branch)

Ian Irwin addressed the meeting before handing over to George Sevenoaks. The bombshell that there was a Constitutional problem was dropped to the total surprise of everyone present.

The problem was that the ACT was not mentioned in the Federal Constitution’s 1971 Clause 8a as being a “State of the Commonwealth or the Northern Territory” in which Clubs could be formed. – i.e., the ACT was excluded.

In the November 2002 Capital Letter, Ian Irwin scribed his recollections of the formation of this ACT Club and so, they can be read in the 2000–2005 chapter of The History of the ACT Club.

In 1972 Bill Coburn returned to Canberra and purchased a partially dismantled Silver Dawn. Bill teamed up with a fellow long term devotee, John Baker. Between them, they offered to enhance the NSW Club Newsletter – London & Derby which had at that time fallen to almost extinction and was one of the few journals in Australia dealing with the marque. Their efforts famously became the “Canberra Contribution” in the re-designed London & Derby magazine.

Bill Coburn, Ian Irwin, Bob McCulloch with Eric & May Goudie (owners of a 1960 Bentley S2, B413CT) approached the NSW Club to form either a sub-Club in Canberra or to develop some structure on which Canberra enthusiasts could build a nucleus for a future Club. Regrettably, this was unsuccessful.

A further meeting was held on 2nd December 1972 at the Deakin Inn and Bill Coburn in his frst “Canberra Contribution” in the N.S.W. London & Derby magazine, wrote that Canberra members met with the NSW President, Owen Bourke and other NSW members to discuss the activities of the members in the ACT.

Then at a NSW Club meeting on 15th February 1973, President Owen Burke advised that the Club’s Legal Advisor, Malcolm Johns had drawn up a suitable clause which would enable A.C.T. members to hold meetings until the Constitution was changed. That meeting resolved that the new Clause 15 be added to the Constitution. In May 1974 the Federal Council approved a landmark event by amending Clause 8a to read “any State of the Commonwealth or Territory thereof”.

This gave status to a Federal Executive to which Bill Coburn was elected Federal Secretary in 1976. During this time also, St John Herbert who was a Canberra owner of several Rolls Royce cars, commenced editing PRAECLARUM – so two contributors from Canberra.

A further impetus for the formation of a separate ACT Club came when the NSW Club hosted the 1980 Federal Rally in Canberra. Ian Dunn who had been lurking on a side-road, moved forcibly onto the few Canberra enthusiasts like Bob McCulloch and David Davis, and virtually demanded the formation of an ACT Club. So interest in a Club was building but it would be another year before a defnitive move was made to form the Club.

Penn Bradly arrived on the scene from Armidale and between he and Ian Dunn, an inaugural meeting of enthusiasts was held at Yarralumla coinciding with a fortuitous visit by Larry Yarwood in November 1982, then recently retired from Rolls-Royce Motors at Crewe; and so the ACT Club was formed as a de-facto organisation on 7th December 1982 – with 8 cars!

Funds were raised, members were sought and Ian Dunn took up the position of Secretary and later President. Eric Goudie performed the duties of Treasurer from the Club’s inception.

From those humble beginnings the club grew once potential owners could be assured that they could get help quickly with the technical side of the vehicles on an owner-to-owner basis; owning an example of the marque was not the fnancial abyss which it may have appeared.

Informal meetings commenced in the latter half of 1982. Following Ian Dunn’s presentation to the motion, this Club was formally recognised with unqualifed support at the Federal Council meeting in June 1983 at Berri, S.A. The formation of the new ACT Club had to be ratifed by all states but WA proved obstinate in doing so until November 1983, then allowing this Club to be offcially established.

Following the March 1983 monthly meeting Ian Dunn submitted an application to the ACT Corporate Affairs Commission on 28th March for a search as to the availability of the name – Rolls-Royce Owners’ Club of Australia ACT Branch Incorporated. The Commission replied on 20th April 1983 that the proposed name was available.

This procedure was repeated on 3rd July 1985, also stating that the Association had been active for three years but was an unincorporated body. (The Corporate Affairs Commission had mislaid our original March 1983 application!)

The ACT Club of the R.R.O.C.A. was fnally incorporated on 11th August 1989. There was a unanimous vote of thanks to Stephen Brown, our Legal Advisor who had provided hours of dedication to bring this to final fruition.