Melbourne: seventh city of the Empire. Artist: Percy Trompf
State Library of Victoria Image H2008.73/23. SLV dates this as c. 1930-c.1960
I put the term into Trove and the first mention of Melbourne being the seventh city was in 1888. It was in a discussion as to whether the Borough of Port Melbourne should join the City of Melbourne, Melbourne was about the seventh city in the Empire at the present time, and if she got Port Melbourne she would be about the fourth or fifth. (1) Which brings up the issue as to what constitutes Melbourne - in this case they are just referring to the City of Melbourne, but over the years I feel the term referred to Greater Melbourne.
In 1896 an article in the Herald said that as Melbourne was the seventh city that it should set an example to the world by closing all places of business on Saturday (2). The next year, 1897, the Weekly Times provided us with some more information on the status of Melbourne - Melbourne, in point of population, is the seventh city of the Empire. The six which stand before it are London, Calcutta, Bombay, Glasgow, Liverpool and Manchester. If the cities of the whole world are included, Melbourne has to be content with twenty-fifth place (3).
By the end of the nineteenth century it seems that it was established that we were the seventh city of the Empire, but it wasn't always that. In 1887 we were the fifth amongst the Capital cities of the Empire according to a report in The Age (4) and in 1891 we were listed as the fifth or sixth in the world with this colonialist and racist proviso Setting aside the mere collections of native population in India, Melbourne is to-day the principal city of the empire outside of the mother islands, and having achieved that position, the task will now be to maintain it (5).
We went into the 1900s firmly in seventh place - by 1906 The Argus reported that our population of 515,350 was less then the following cities of the Empire - London, Glasgow, Manchester, Liverpool, Birmingham and Sydney (6). Our seventh status was reported on in 1913 and 1927. However, there was one dissenting report in 1917 which put us at eighth spot behind London, Glasgow, Manchester, Birmingham, Liverpool, Sydney and Cairo (7).
In 1934, the centenary of Victoria' s European settlement we were still the seventh city, but a few papers did honestly report that we were the seventh largest city in the Empire containing a white population (8).
The claim to be the seventh largest city was repeated in 1942 in reports of the centenary of the incorporation of the City of Melbourne. However, a year later there were glowing reports that our status as the seventh city was based on pre-war populations and by virtue of a great increase in population in the last two years, it might now rank as the fourth city in the Empire, with a population greater than that of Bombay, Glasgow or Birmingham (9). The last mention I can find of our status as the seventh city of the Empire is in 1953 (10).
I love this poster, although I understand that the status of Melbourne as the seventh largest city of the British Empire can only be valid if the population of 'non white' cities such as those in India are ignored or dismissed. It's not as if these population figures were hard to come by - even in 1911, the rural newspaper, Mildura Cultivator, had a very comprehensive list of population figures of Australian and cities around the world. They listed the most populous cities of the British Empire (11)
Greater London - 7,252,963.
Calcutta - 1,031,206.
Bombay - 977,822.
Manchester, including Salford - 960,990.
Glasgow - 881,505.
Liverpool - 767,606.
Sydney - 617,102.
Melbourne - 591,830.
Birmingham - 570,113.
Montreal - 500,000.
The claim that Melbourne is the seventh city of the Empire is a product of the times and I think we just need to enjoy the image and graphics of the poster, which has both the Victorian Railways logo and the City of Melbourne logo on it, so it was clearly produced by the Government for tourism purposes.
The artist, Percy Trompf (1902-1964), was a commercial artist who produced many posters for the Australian National Travel Association and the Victorian Railways. He was born in Beaufort in Victoria, served in the Air Force in World War Two and while President of the Rotary Club of Camberwell he helped establish the Camberwell Art Show. You can read his entry in the Australian Dictionary of Biography, written by Kate Spearritt and Peter Spearritt, here.
As a postscript - the reference on this poster to Melbourne being the seventh city of the Empire reminds me of the claims over the past few years that Melbourne was the worlds 'most livable city', and I think it was Red Symons, back when he was on ABC radio, who said that Melbourne is the world's most self-congratulatory city and it clearly has been for at least 130 years.
Trove list - I have created a list of articles on Trove which have a reference to Melbourne being the Seventh City of the Empire, access it here.
Footnotes
(1) The Age May 29, 1888, see here.
(2) The Herald August 5, 1896, see here.
(3) Weekly Times February 13, 1897, see here.
(4) The Age June 18, 1887, see here.
(5) The Argus May 13, 1891, see here.
(6) The Argus May 1, 1906, see here.
(7) Corryong Courier, July 5 1917, see here.
(8) The Age July 19, 1934, see here.
(9) The Herald July 7, 1943, see here.
(10) The Age, January 9, 1953, see here.
(11) Mildura Cultivator, November 15, 1911, see here.
