Harbour Bridge Opening
Cinesound's Sydney Harbour Bridge scoop
On 19 March 1932, Sydney was humming with excitement. Having watched with awe as the bridge was built over the past eight years, 600,000 people gathered to witness the opening (half of Sydney's population at the time).
The new bridge had attracted its share of controversy – from design tussles to political power struggles and concerns over its cost. But the bridge’s most famous scandal unfolded on the day of the opening, and the Cinesound Productions newsreel got the scoop.
Right-wing paramilitary group the New Guard had been vocal in its opposition to fiery Premier Jack Lang dispensing with tradition and opening the bridge himself instead of sending for a representative of the British royal family.
Major Francis De Groot (pictured) – a leader of the New Guard – had secreted himself behind the Cinesound newsreel van on his horse. Before Lang had a chance to cut the ribbon he rode out and slashed it with his sword, shouting ‘In the name of common decency I declare this bridge open!’.
Cinesound Productions got the footage of De Groot, with a rival newsreel produced by Paramount Film Services not even mentioning the surprise upset.
Ken G Hall, head of Cinesound, recalled with glee in his autobiography:
I've never seen anything quite as funny as those press boys falling, scrambling, jumping out of that box, dropping their cameras, yelling abuse, swearing dreadfully, but getting there too late. We had the only pictures and the newspapers and wire services came smartly knocking on our door. We made duplicates and gave them out for free.
We're celebrating the Sydney Harbour Bridge with a curated collection.
You can see footage of the construction of the bridge, newsreels capturing the opening and home movie footage of a walk across the bridge in 1932.
There are songs about the bridge from the 1930s and news footage about Bridge Climb and the Olympic torch run in 2000.
The crew that captured the opening of the Sydney Harbour Bridge outside the Cinesound Productions studio.
More to explore
Sydney Harbour Bridge
'The Coathanger', as the bridge is affectionately known, opened on 19 March 1932.
Sydney time capsule
See Sydney in all its shiny magnificence, from Australia's first recorded moving image filmed at Prince Alfred Park in 1896 to contemporary colour footage.
Newsreels - Cinesound Movietone
The Cinesound Movietone Australian Newsreel Collection held at the NFSA comprises 4,000 newsreels from 1929 to 1975.