A collection of photographs of Francis Birtles, travel across Australia, including photographs of the Brush, the first automobile to cross Australia from Fremantle to Sydney in 1912, driven by Syd Ferguson and navigated Francis Birtles. The collection also covers photographs taken during the trip to Northern Territory, Arnhem Land; Central Australia, Alice Springs; Queensland, Cape York; Gippsland, Victoria and some photographs of Aboriginal people.
In 1912 Birtles completed the first west-to-east crossing of the continent with Syd Ferguson and his terrier, Rex, in a single-cylinder Brush car. In 1914, with Frank Hurley as cameraman, he made 'Into Australia's unknown' and in 1915 he retraced their route and was responsible for the film 'Across Australia in the track of Burke and Wills. In 1919 he made 'Through Australian wilds', following by car the track of Sir Ross Smith. In 1926 he set motoring speed records from Melbourne to Darwin and Darwin to Sydney (seven days) in a Bean car named 'The Sundowner'. By mid 1927 he had completed more than seventy transcontinental crossings.
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