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Australia Today: Lucky strike at Larkinville
Title:
Australia Today: Lucky strike at Larkinville
NFSA ID
1364
Year
1938
Courtesy
Enterprise Film Co.
Western Australia, 1932. Two gold prospectors – Jimmy Eastwood and Jack Hogan – along with their dog, Spot, strike gold at Larkinville. For Spot, this is more a ‘comedy of fleas than a saga of riches’, but for the two men, gold means ‘rest and reasonable comfort, security, a visit to the city… hope…’.
Like many of Rupert Kathner’s Australia Today newsreels, Lucky Strike at Larkinville melds fact and fiction to re-create a dramatic news story. This clip recounts a fictional story of gold prospectors in Larkinville, but could easily be the story of any of the thousands of people who flocked to the Western Australian town after the true discovery of the largest gold nugget found in Australia in the 20th Century. The nugget – named the Golden Eagle and weighing over 35 kilograms – was uncovered by 16-year-old Jim Larcombe in 1931.
The narration in this newsreel, along with the presence of Spot the dog, creates a light-hearted humour which helps identification with the main characters and their struggle for a better future. Jimmy and Jack are painted as true Aussie battlers – honest, hard workers, the ‘real Australians’ – deserving of their find.
The National Film and Sound Archive of Australia acknowledges Australia’s Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples as the Traditional Custodians of the land on which we work and live and gives respect to their Elders both past and present.