The Melbourne Press Club has reprinted Melbourne’s first newspaper as part of the establishment of the Victorian Media Hall of Fame.

A facsimile of the first issue of John Pascoe Fawkner’s Melbourne Advertiser was distributed at the third foundation dinner of the Hall of Fame on 10 October.

The paper, handwritten in ink, was published on 1 January 1838. It promised to “throw the resplendent light of publicity upon all the affairs of this new colony”.
It also included what must have been the first crime story published in Melbourne.

The paper reported: “Cummerfield the Murderer who was sent from Sydney to point out where the 7 men were said to be murdered has killed the two constables and one soldier who had him in charge and is now at large in the bush well mounted and armed. A party of volunteers are gone in pursuit.”.

Read a typed version of the four-page paper