Daily Photo: The Phoenix Hotel on Brunswick Street

I doubt you’ll ever see this building in an advertisement for Melbourne. I came across it while wandering in drizzling rain along Brunswick Street in North Melbourne. Curious about its history, I did a quick Google search under an ageing veranda to shelter from the rain and discovered that the pub had been built in 1866 and was originally known as Austin’s Hotel. It was apparently named after a man called Thomas Austin, a local landowner who is famously remembered for importing 24 rabbits and releasing them onto his property so he would have something to shoot when he was bored.

It was a disastrous mistake. The rabbits multiplied, spread rapidly and caused enormous damage to the Australian landscape, creating a problem that Australia has been dealing with ever since. Their introduction is now regarded as one of Australia’s most damaging biological invasions. And here, quite unexpectedly, I had stumbled across a building apparently connected to the whole unfortunate episode.

The excitement wasn’t to last. On the way back to my accommodation, as I sat on a tram gently rocking from side to side, I discovered that Thomas Austin had absolutely no connection with the building. What I had found was nothing more than a piece of common folklore that had made its way into walking guides.

The building actually came into existence thanks to a man named William Austin, who was no relation to Thomas. He was a Melbourne property holder and publican who acquired the Sydney Road allotment in Brunswick in the early 1860s and built the hotel, opening it as Austin’s Hotel in 1866.

I was disappointed.