AUSTRALIA’S Top End has always lent itself to an excellent crocodile tale.
The last place you would expect an encounter with one of the Northern Territory’s deadly crocs would be at the bar of a pub. But this is Darwin, where legends are made and colourful tales are born and often told.
The Hotel Darwin officially opened for business on July 9 1940, replacing an older pub on the site, the Club Hotel (Established as the Palmerston Club Hotel in 1883).
The original Hotel Darwin was on the Esplanade in central Darwin and was commonly known as the “Grand Old Duchess”. Despite surviving the Bombing of Darwin during World War II and Cyclone Tracy in 1974, the hotel was controversially demolished in 1999.
A bar at the rear of the original site formerly known as the Hot & Cold Bar, at the corner of Herbert and Mitchell Streets, now trades under the name Hotel Darwin.
Many a character and colourful tale has come from the bars of the Hotel Darwin.
In 1948, Darwin taxi-driver Pat Wright was enjoying a drink in the pub’s saloon bar when he had a terrifying encounter with a crocodile.
Pat nearly severed the index finger of his right hand. This happened after he tugged on the tail of a five feet or just over 1.5 metre croc.
The owner had placed the crocodile on the bar counter. He was having a drink, while his pet lazily dozed on the bar; nothing out of the ordinary at the Hotel Darwin. Pat, either stupidly or with the help of a little lubrication from the bar, regrettably decided to pull its tail.
The Adelaide News reported on 26 October 1948 that it took four men to open the croc’s jaws and clamp them with an empty beer bottle!
Pat was given an injection to counteract poison from the decay behind the reptile’s inch-long teeth.
* More on the history of the Hotel Darwin at Wikipedia.
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Categories: animals, Darwin hotels, Northern Territory hotels
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