Summary

Graf & Stift (Sechs-zylinder Reise) SR3 model of 1923, with a 7,745 cc, six-cylinder, 75 horsepower engine. The chassis & engine no. is 2548. Imported without a body from Vienna, Austria, by the Australian Motor Co. for Melbourne businessman Mr James Loveridge in September 1923 at a cost of about 5,000 pounds.

In 1927 the Loveridges built a large house at Anglesea which they named 'Anglecrest' and the car was kept in a garage at this property The vehicle was fitted with an open touring body but a closed saloon body was subsequently constructed and fitted in about 1934 by motor bodybuilders Martin & King of High Street Malvern. The Loveridges employed a chauffeur, Mr W.J. Allan to drive the vehicle. Following the death of her husband in 1935, Mrs Bertha Loveridge kept the Graf & Stift at 'Anglecrest' but it was not driven after May 1936 when it was taken to Mt Gambier. Mrs Loveridge donated the car to the Museum in June 1938. 'Anglecrest' was donated to the Church of England in 1938 and then sold in 1944 but was destroyed in the 1983 Ash Wednesday bushfires. 'Loveridge's Lookout' at Anglesea still exists today. It was built with funds donated by Mrs Loveridge in memory of her husband.

Following its donation to the Industrial & Technological Museum in 1938, the car spent three decades in storage in the basement under the Swanston Street Museum, National Gallery & Public Library Building, because of a lack of display space. Finally after the National Gallery of Victoria left the Swanston Street site for its new building on St Kilda Road, the Graf & Stift was carefully inched out of the basement on 18th March 1970 and shortly afterwards went on display in the new Road Transport exhibition in Verdon Hall, where it remained for the next decade. In 1990, the car was refurbished mechanically by McDermott's, of South Melbourne, before being used during the 'Handing Over the Key Ceremony', at Scienceworks, in Spotswood, on 17th May 1991, during which the Victorian Premier Joan Kirner MLA, was chaffeured around the Scienceworks Arena. Subsequently the car was placed on public display at Scienceworks from March 1992 to around 2000.

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