
This newsreel footage shows soprano Dame Nellie Melba, having arrived in Sydney from Vancouver on the passenger liner RMS Niagara after a world tour.
Dame Nellie Melba, born Helen Porter Mitchell on 19 May 1861, decided to become a professional opera singer in 1884. Only one year later, Dame Nellie Melba made her debut in Brussels and went on to become one of the most successful opera singers of her time, enjoying superstar status in Australia.
This brief newsreel shows her returning to Sydney after a world tour.
The National Film and Sound Archive of Australia acknowledges Australia’s Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples as the Traditional Custodians of the land on which we work and live and gives respect to their Elders both past and present.