Fast women of the West Australian Goldfields

Many people with an interest in the history of Australian cycling know that the West Australian goldfields saw not only a gold rush but a bike rush during the 1890s. With the modern safety bicycle and pneumatic tyres proving themselves as the fastest, most resilient and reliable transport mode in the final decade of the 19C, not to mention the cheapest after the initial investment was made, it did not take long for the new machines to find their way to the Goldfields. Jim Fitzpatrick’s Wheeling Matilda. The Story of Australian Cycling details the goldfields bicycle boom.

Bicycles didn’t need expensive feeding or watering, could take advantage of the network of camel pads throughout the goldfields region, and provide fast reliable communications in an industry where fortunes could hang it.

Kalgoorlie, Western Australia 1895. Photo Western Australia Newspapers Limited

With new settlements popping up overnight in response to new finds, and post offices taking their time to catch up, bicycle messenger companies became ubiquitous in the Goldfields. At a time when the eastern states were still suffering the effects of the depression, riders with a reputation for being fast over the distance could find work in Kalgoorlie, Coolgardie and beyond amongst the many courier companies that sprung into existence to service the booming goldfields. As more and more people took to bicycles to get around the network of camel pads quickly developed into an even bigger network of bicycle paths. The biggest network of bicycle paths in the world at the time and certainly bigger than any existing network in Australia today.

Goldfield’s newspapers advertised the services of bicycle express riders during the 1890s.

Just as everywhere else women were quick to seize the freedom and opportunity that bicycles provided. The first woman to ride a bicycle on the Goldfields we are told was Cissie Colreavy.

Cissie Colreavy’s family owned the Shamrock Hotel at Coolgardie and her father had been one of the discoverers of the Southern Cross mine. The Shamrock Hotel became the centre of a cycling community, with not only Cissie riding, but also her brother Jack and sister Hannah. Many of the men in the miners lodgings out the back were keen cyclists and competed regularly locally. Cissie’s mother Katherine Colreavy even hosted some events and was often called upon to present prizes at local cycle races. The famous overlander Percy Armstrong was also in Coolgardie, working as a cycle messenger, secretary to the local cycling club and later owning a bicycle shop. Mrs Colreavy took a keen interest in the overlander’s adventures, she also held handicap races for her boarders.

Colreavy’s Shamrock Hotel at Coolgardie in 1895. Mrs Colreavy is the woman in the centre standing next to a man.

Women moving to the Goldfields from Melbourne were also keen to take a bicycle with them. In 1896 the Australian Cyclist reported that when a “well known Melbourne lady” made the move to Coolgardie, “Horses cost £1 per day over there, and the lady considers a cycle will prove much cheaper.” One of the women who made the move west was the competitor with the fastest time in the Melbourne Women’s Road Race of 1896, Miss A O’Meagher. Just like men, many women were not content just to ride to get from A to B, but soon discovered the joy of riding faster and faster, and competing against others to do so.

For women interested in speed it was usually necessary to invest in a man’s bicycle, and with it the practical clothing that would enable a diamond-framed bicycle to be ridden. While women riding bicycles gradually gathered acceptance throughout the 1890s in Australia, women riding men’s machines in rational costume was a whole different kettle of fish. Again, Cissie Colreavy was the first to do this in the Goldfields, “her appearance in Bayley St in short skirts and bloomers creating a sensation after

“getting her whatsttheirnames finished first, Miss C. mounted her bike man-fashion, and scorched down Bayley-street to ringing cheers-and beers from the assortment of dishtwisters that lined the places where the footpaths were supposed to be.” 

The Misses Colreavy, one of them Cissie, published in Australian Cyclist in February 1897 which can be found at the State Library of Victoria.

Cissie went on to create more sensations, taking up racing. As her brother Jack and his mates in the miner’s lodging out the back were all keen racing cyclists it quite possible that she trained with them. According to one correspondent’s memories she trained not only with them but with Italian champion Porta, Percy Armstrong, Jack Underwood and others.

In January 1896 Cissie and her sister, Hannah took first and second at the Coolgardie New Year’s Day sports

In February 1897 Cissie went on to win the inaugural Western Australian Ladies Wheel Race at the Theatrical Carnival in Perth. So great was Cissie’s reputation that it was given as the reason that only two other competitors stepped up against her. The race was changed to a handicap to accomodate her reputation but even with the scratch position Cissie went on to lap her competitors and win by the proverbial mile.

When women raced in Melbourne reports were often dismissive, or even derisive, and local cycling organisations like the League of Victorian Wheelmen refused to sanction or recognise women’s racing. The reports in WA certainly have a nicer tone, even if there was no official sanction for the races.

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Riding bikes, not ponies.

Melbourne Cup Day; for some it’s all about the horses but for many of Melbourne’s cyclists, it’s an opportunity to enjoy a day out on the bike. An idea it seems, that goes right back to when bicycles first took hold of Melburnian’s hearts.

One hundred and twenty-five years ago Melburnians first organised a cycling event for Melbourne Cup Day. Cup Day has attracted a public holiday in Victoria, or the Colony of Victoria as it was then, since 1875. As the bicycling craze tightened its grip on Melbourne in the 1890s, the Melbourne Cup Day holiday soon presented itself as an opportunity to ride a bicycle that was too good to resist.

“Auraria’s Melbourne Cup, 1895, finish,” Monash Collections Online, accessed October 28, 2019, http://repository.monash.edu/items/show/14177

And what better bicycle ride than the then relatively new fad of a Century Run? Melbourne’s first Century Run, also claimed as Australia’s first, was held in Melbourne on Cup Day in 1895, inspired by reports of similar events in the United States.

Organised by a special committee set up for the purpose and months in the planning this first Century Run was anticipated by touring cyclists and club men alike. The Century Run was 100 miles, (160 kms) and designed to be at a social pace so that all cyclists could join in, not only cycling club members or those used to scorching. Accordingly twelve hours were allocated for the completion of the ride, ten hours of cycling with two hours of combined lunch and ten minute rest stops along the route.

“Don’t forget that the pace will be slow, and a few “ necessities of life ” strapped on to the handle bars will add to the general enjoyment of the outing. ” the East Melbourne Bicycle Club advised their members in a column in Australian Cyclist. While lunch would be provided at Woodend, participants were advised to bring their own tools and extra nourishment for the day.

From the Australasian Newspaper, October 1895

The route and times were published well in advance and the organising committee went out of their way to advise that “The run is open to all cyclists, ladies or gentleman”. As it was only one year since most women in Melbourne had taken up riding and public discussion about the wisdom of women exerting themselves on long bike rides was still energetic, this was no lightly made invitation. A cycling journalist noted in the Australian Cyclist that “Several ladies intend to join the century run on Cup Day, and have no fear of the distance, the road being familiar to them.”

Exactly one hundred riders set out from the Melbourne GPO (now H&M at the corner of Bourke and Elizabeth Sts) at 7am on a drizzly spring morning, Tuesday November 5th 1895. Two pacemakers set the pace, ensuring that riders would meet their time slots for each checkpoint and that the ride was conducted at a sociable pace. The rules forbade any riders from getting ahead of them. Amongst those riding was a lad of fifteen, a rider on an ancient hard-tyred safety and four or five women. The most popular bicycles on the Century Run were Raleighs, of which were counted sixteen in all, seven Humbers, five Sparkbrooks and four each of Swifts, Singers and New Rapids.

The ride progressed through Bulla and on to Lancefield with residents of Sunbury walking over to the cross roads at Bell’s to witness the run where the cyclists turned up the Lancefield-road. From Lancefield over the dirt roads of the colony, dusty, often rutted, maybe freshly metalled, to Woodend, where Dinner was served before finally turning back towards Melbourne via Gisborne and Essendon.

The ride was seen as a huge success, “The Cup Day Century run will do an immense amount of good to the pastime. It can be seen by the result that 100 miles in a day of twelve hours is easily accomplished, and without distress” reported the Herald.

Some of the cyclists who participated in the 1895 Melbourne Cup Day Century Run including two women in rational dress. Australian Cyclist November 1895

Those riders who completed the ride within the allotted time received certificates with the above photograph on them. Amongst the finishers were two women, controversially, in rational dress. Australian Cyclist reported at the time “Indeed, the ladies looked splendid, and the dress they wore, besides being practical was most becoming.”, a supportive note for the women who more often attracted ridicule and abuse for adopting rational dress. It also described them as the “first ladies in the colonies to ride 100 miles in twelve hours” although both women had ridden a century or more on earlier occasions. Both women were presented with an especially made badge in addition to the finishers certificate for their plucky riding.

The Australasian noted that advancements in bicycle technology were what had made the run such a success; “The result of the century run in Melbourne on Cup day shows us pretty clearly how easy it is to ride long distances on the comfortably built bicycles of to-day. Seventy-Seven riders — many of them just ordinary wheelmen who had seldom or never taken a long spin before— covered 100 miles of hilly country roads in 12 hours, including an hour or two spent in rests. This run has given us the most practical demonstration of tho case of cycling that we have ever had. A dozen years ago tho Melbourne Bicycle Club gave gold medals to its members who rode 100 miles in 12 hours, and the task was so difficult very few medals were won,”

Indeed the Cup Day Century Run was such a success that it became a Melbourne tradition. In 1896 over a hundred and seventy riders started with over two hundred in each of the years after that until early in the Twentieth Century.

While the earliest organisers of the Century Run were proactive in encouraging women to ride at a time when many people thought women shouldn’t be exerting themselves, the fact that they were ahead of the times is borne out in reactions to subsequent runs. One correspondent in the Australian Cyclist of 1896 writes;

TO THE EDITOR. S i r , —Considering the great success century run, one hardly likes to find fault; but I would strongly recommend to the con­-sideration of Messrs. Broadbent, Dwyer and Co. the desirability of discouraging the attendance of ladies. From time to time efforts have been made in all branches of sports to organise races, tests of endurance, and record making for ladies, but so far without success. The perspiration, dust, and excessive fatigue in connection with a century run are evils incident to a vigorous manhood ; but to my mind are decidedly out of place where the fair sex are concerned. No one should object to ladies cycling in moderation, providing they are modestly attired, butI am sure everyone who has the interests of the sport at heart, and who has a proper respect for them, will hope that they will be conspicuous by their absence at our next century run. Probably the best way would be to reduce the time occupied in the run from fourteen hours to twelve.—

Century Runs continued into the new Century although no longer associated with Cup Day in Melbourne. Regional areas also took up the practice of hosting a Century Run as did other cities around Australia.

Going for a ride on Cup Day is still popular with Melbourne cyclists today, it being one of the few days of the year when cyclists can enjoy relatively low traffic conditions on roads. Maybe it’s time to bring back the tradition of a Century Run on Cup Day, or organise your own ride with friends and family and #ridebikesnotponies ?

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