Summary

Part of a group of six photographs depicting the Rolfe family of Elsternwick on camping holidays with the pop-up caravan trailer built by motor body builder Charles W. Rolfe.

Charles William Rolfe was born at Maryborough, central Victoria, on the 8th September 1878. After schooling he trained as a apprentice coachbuilder with the local firm of Martin, Millgate & Cosstick, who had opened a coachworks in High Street, Maryborough, in 1890. As part of his training, C.W. Rolfe built a detailed scale model of a horse-drawn dog cart or buggy (now held in the Museum Victoria collections - ST 023999 ), which he exhibited at several local agricultural shows, between 1898 and 1902.

Charles moved to Melbourne in the early 1900s and found work as a motor body trimmer with a firm in South Melbourne. He married Mabel Tassell in 1913, and they settled in Elsternwick, raising two children - Mabel Dorie (born 1913) and Victor Charles (born 1919). Charles later established his own motor body building business that operated at Elsternwick and Richmond from 1923 to 1938.

Aside from his business activities, Charles turned his skills to a variety of domestic projects, building a large timber sideboard and a radiogram entertainment unit for their home. In the mid 1920s, he designed and built a camping trailer, which in many ways was a prelude to modern camper trailer designs, incorporating such features as a pop-up roof and two foldout beds that could be extended on either side of the trailer. The family used the camping trailer for family holidays to places throughout Victoria. Charles purchased a DeSoto car that was used for towing the camper van and built a wooden boat that fitted neatly on top of the van.

Description of Content

Members of the Rolfe family and friends taken during an annual camping holiday on the Tambo River in Gippsland over the Christmas break in 1938. The campsite is situated beneath the overhanging bough of a large gum tree and in the background is a cleared hillside covered in grass and a few scattered scrubs. A group of eleven people are seated and standing in front of a tent and a pop-up camping trailer/caravan built by Charles W. Rolfe in the mid 1920s. On the left a young man is seated on the running board of a motor car, with a young woman standing beside him. In the centre an older woman - probably Mabel, the wife of Charles W. Rolfe - is standing in front of an A-frame tent. In front of her several young men and women are seated on the ground. One man is reclining in a deck chair. In front of the open doorway of the camper trailer an older slightly balding man - probably Charles W. Rolfe - is standing with a young girl standing on his right. To his left is standing another young man wearing a cowboy style hat and a kerchief tied around his neck, with a rifle slung under his right arm. Possibly Dowler family on right (sister of Mabel).

Physical Description

Digital copy of a photograph.

More Information