An interesting Vanished Victoria story has been published on the State Library of Victoria (SLV) blog - The unsolved mystery of the ‘Pride of Australia’ written by Sarah Matthews -
Found near Wedderburn in 1981, the ‘Pride of Australia‘ was the largest Victorian gold nugget on display in Australia. Its name was a tribute to its malformed shape, which was said to resemble the continent of Australia (albeit without Tasmania). In 1985, the State Bank Victoria forked out $250,000 to purchase the nugget to stop it falling into the hands of overseas collectors. The nugget was displayed at the bank’s Bourke Street headquarters until it was borrowed by the Museum of Victoria for a bicentennial exhibition....Once the exhibition finished, the bank agreed the museum could have the nugget on permanent loan. It was moved to the Stawell Gallery (now the Library’s Cowen Gallery) to form part of an exhibition called ‘The Story of Victoria’....The nugget remained on display in the gallery for several years until one winter’s night in 1991, a daring raid was conducted on the museum and the Pride of Australia gold nugget was stolen on Friday August 30, 1991 and has not been seen since. Read the full story here.
The Age had the following report on September 1, 1991 -
