Edina Avenue
by David F Radcliffe
Edina Avenue is a short street, with just eight houses, on the western side of R.F Julier Reserve in the Fishermans Bend Estate.
It is named for the “Grand Old Lady of Port Phillip”, the S.S. Edina. Launched in May 1854 in Glasgow, she was something of a technological hybrid; an iron hulled, screw- powered steamship with yacht-like lines, three square rigged masts and an elegant clipper bow. By the time of her first retirement in 1938, she was hailed as Australia’s oldest steamship.[i]
Originally called the Edinburgh and operated by the Leith, Hull and Hamburg Steam Packet Company, her name was shortened to Edina when she came to Australian waters under sail in 1863.[ii] By then she had served in two wars; taking horses to Crimea and running the blockade during the American Civil War to bring Confederate cotton to Britain.
She made several trips to the western districts of Victoria before working on the trans-Tasman run during the mid-1860s. From the late 1860s to the mid-1870s, the Edina went back to serving the ports of Warrnambool and Portland, transporting dairy produce, livestock and bales of wool. She had a complete overhaul in 1870/71 including the addition of new passenger accommodation. With a change of owners, she spent a few years as a coastal trader in Queensland before returning to Victorian waters.
The Edina was reconfigured once again in the early 1880s, now with a single mast and reboilered, and began the long tenure on the Geelong to Melbourne run. She was popular with bay trippers in the years prior to the introduction of the paddle steamers. Although newer ships threatened to put her out of business, in 1917 the Edina was refitted once again, giving her a fresh look with a new mast, funnel, bridge and a promenade deck. By 1924, she had carried over a million passengers on the Geelong-Melbourne run.
Through the years, the Edina was involved in several major collisions. In 1898, she ran into the wooden steamer Manawatu near Williamstown. To save the Edina, the skipper beached her. The following year, in a heavy fog, the Edina struck the Excelsior on the port side. The Excelsior sunk but all her passengers were saved by taking to the lifeboats while some jumped onto the Edina’s bow. In 1931, the Edina collided with the tug, Hovell, which sank.[iii]
When the Edina was taken out of service in 1938, she was destined for the breakers-yard in Williamstown.[iv] However, the much loved ‘old lady’ gained a reprieve by being converted into a lighter and renamed the Dinah. Finally scrapped in 1957, the Edinburgh / Edina / Dinah had witnessed enormous social and technological changes in her century of maritime service.
[i] AUSTRALIA’S OLDEST STEAMSHIP, Shipping Wonders of the World, Vol 1 No 2, Part 44. https://www.shippingwondersoftheworld.com/edina.html
[ii] 1938 ‘VETERAN STEAMER EDINA ENTERS 85th YEAR OF SERVICE’, The Advertiser (Adelaide, SA : 1931 – 1954), 9 May, p. 14. , viewed 31 May 2025, http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article74384358
[iii] Crotty, D. (2011) SS Edina, Coastal Trader & Passenger Ship, 1853-1938 in Museums Victoria Collections https://collections.museumsvictoria.com.au/articles/6227 Accessed 31 May 2025
[iv] 1938 ‘REPRIEVE FOR THE “EDINA”‘, Record (Emerald Hill, Vic. : 1881 – 1954), 23 July, p. 2. , viewed 05 June 2025, http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article164494092
