Hotels - Northcote - Commercial Hotel (1854 - )Place
Description:
In December 1854 a liquor licence was issued for a hotel in High Street Northcote, to be named the Shannon Hotel. For the next forty years it operated under a variety of publicans, with Denis Hayes being the most prominent. Times were tough for the hotel in the late 1850s with both Denis Hayes and Henry Drowley becoming insolvent whilst running the hotel. By the 1890s the hotel was in a poor state of repair and the Northcote Council condemned the building, forcing its demolition. The hotel was reborn in 1894 as the Commercial Hotel. The exterior of the building remains much as it was in 1894. In 1923 the hotel came to the notice of the local magistrates when publican Ellen Jones was charged with "...having persons on the premises during prohibited hours." Constable Dunn reported that he saw ten men leaving the rear of the hotel after hours. Shortly afterwards another twenty five men were seen leaving. Dunn entered the hotel and saw empty beer glasses and Jones and her daughters clearing up. There were no men in the hotel when the police entered and Jones denied serving alcohol after hours. The magistrate dismissed the case. In 2005 the hotel changed its name to the Northcote Social Club.
Sources:
Edge, Gary. Surviving the six o’clock swill: a history of Darebin’s hotels. Melbourne. Darebin Libraries. 2004. R. K. Cole collection of hotel records: surname records. Compiled by Eric Tetlow. State Library of Victoria, 2000 Sands and McDougall’s Melbourne and Suburban Directory. Melbourne: Sands & McDougall, 1864- 1974.
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