A Brief History of the past 60 years of the Moyneyana Festival in Port Fairy's Historic Seaside Village.
Leading up to the 60th Celebration the brief history is below of some past activities has highlighted to the committee that despite many ups and downs the festival has endured where many have failed. The numbers have increased immensely and the event continues to attract visitors to our beautiful and historic seaside town of Port Fairy .
Port Fairy's Moyneyana Festival commenced on the 31st of December 1948 when a competition was conducted for the best decorated cars to take part in a procession of vehicles down the main street of the town. The background to the procession was that an “ugly man competition” was being conducted in aid of the local hospital and the organising committee came up with the idea of a procession of decorated vehicles and bicycles as a means of inducing the local community to take part in New Year activities in the main street. Whilst the decorated vehicles were in the street, a collection was taken up for the hospital.
The following year saw the same idea, of a procession of decorated vehicles appearing in the main street of Port Fairy on New Year's Eve, only on this occasion spinning wheels and other methods of fund raising were introduced.
In the intervening years the Festival has progressively grown from a one night function to a program that covers six weeks from Christmas Eve to the Australia Day weekend. This has been achieved by the festival committee asking a wide range of organisations to promote events over the summer holiday period. The local service clubs together with the sporting clubs and other non profit organisations have in recent years arranged a variety of holiday activities.
In the early years of the Festival the number of people who came to the town's camping grounds amounted to no more than a few hundred visitors and the majority of these people camped in Southcombe Park on the westerly side of James Street . The first major indication of Port Fairy's leap forward as a holiday resort was shown over the 1960-61 summer season when the Council's income from camping virtually doubled from $3,700 which were the fees for the previous year, to a total of $7,400.
One of the features that the Festival committee has promoted in recent years has been the provision of free entertainment in the streets. It has been most noticeable in the various camping grounds, that Port Fairy has been attracting a large proportion of family groups whereas the holiday towns closer to Melbourne attract the teenage groups. The committee continues to arrange attractions to entertain family groups in the centre of town.
The feature event of the whole Festival is undoubtedly the New Year's procession of floats and decorated vehicles. From a modest start in 1948, the New Year's Eve festivities at Port Fairy have developed into one of the main tourist attractions of the western district. Crowds of up to twenty thousand people converge on the streets of Port Fairy for the annual procession of vehicles, as well as brass and pipe bands. Side shows, spinning wheel stalls, open air stage shows and fireworks, are all apart of the gala New Year at Port Fairy.
The town's many sporting organisations such as the bowling club, yacht club, golf club, cycling club and many others, all provide an attractive program of events over the summer holiday season for visitors. The Historical Society and the Port Fairy Branch of the National Trust assist in promoting the many historic buildings, which are popular attractions in the town.
With historic buildings being identified with a plaque as part of the town's “Historic Walk”,
Port Fairy is confident of a substantial increase in the number of people who will be interested to see the buildings that formed part of the town in its boom times of the 1850's and 1860's.
The Moyneyana Festival at Port Fairy is unique in country Victoria in that no other festival has such a long history of success. Each year a large band of voluntary workers give an enormous amount of time to the festival, both in the preparation and implementation of the program.
The proceeds of many past Moyneyana Festivals have been directed to the Port Fairy Hospital, (Moyne Health Services) where the funds have been used to finance very extensive building programs which included a maternity wing, a nurses' home, a medical and surgical wing, an out-patient centre, operating theatre wing, a twenty-five bed elderly people's home and a day care centre which cost well in excess of $1,000.000.
This week Chairman of the Moyneyana Festival Mr Reg Harry issued an invitation to the management of Aston's Circus to visit Port Fairy for the town's 60th anniversary New Year's Eve Parade. Mr Doug Ashton aged 89 years told Reg that unfortunately the circus would be unable to accept the invitation as they were currently performing in Perth W.A. and would not be coming back to the eastern states prior to the end of the year. Mr Ashton told Reg that he had fond memories of his visits to Port Fairy and the big crowds that turned out on past occasions for the New Year's Eve parade.
In particular he referred to the year when the Mayor of Port Fairy, the late Sam Ryan riding on the back of elephant, challenged the local Member of Parliament Mr. George Gibbs to an elephant race down the length of Sackville Street . The race attracted extensive publicity with each of the metropolitan newspapers featuring photographic displays of the event. In a close finish the Mayor of Port Fairy was declared the winner.
This year's committee is now in the final stages of formulating a program full of excitement and numerous free activities. Everyone is encouraged to watch out for the FREE program, available early December and join with us in creating history attending this the 60 th Moyneyana Festival.
Further information contact:
Chairman Reg Harry 0438 681 237
