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The Hogarth Club was started in June of 1973 by Mike Norman, who was at the time manager of Chesser Cellars which was the home of the club until July of 2012. The original idea was to gather together, on the third Thursday of every month, seven Gentlemen all of different professions so that they would not 'talk shop' and eat and drink merrily together. Each Gentleman was to bring a guest so that the fourteen in all would match the number of seats around the historic old oaken table.

The seven founding members were: Mike Norman, Malcolm Elliott, Keith Conlon, John Mitchell, Sandy McLeay, Don Riddell and Rod Wicks.

The upstairs room at the Chesser Cellars was known as the Hogarth Room, due to the excellent set of Hogarth prints adorning the walls. Many of these were removed some twenty years ago by an ex Lord Mayor of Adelaide, who believed them to be his. The truth of this claim remains a mystery, at least to me. The long oak table around which the Gentlemen sat came from Manoah, the stately home of State parliamentarian Sir Josiah Symon**, at Upper Sturt in the Adelaide Hills. Much of the Australian Constitution was hammered out by numerous of our political forebears gathered around it a hundred or so years ago.

The Hogarth Club, though it was started in a light-hearted way, has endured, with almost never a month being cancelled due to lack of attendance. There are very few rules:

1. If a person is brought three times as a guest by a member, then that person is automatically a member.

2. No Gentleman may leave until he is asked to leave.

3. Keith Conlon must be asked to leave at 3.15.

4. Edmund Pegge is never allowed to attend again. Ever.

5. W. Anthoney must never be served port wine again.

These rules have lapsed.

I was not one of the original seven, but was taken as a guest to the second luncheon, ie July 1973, by Keith Conlon, and have never looked back. For me, the delights of attending the club, in addition to the food, were the company of old friends and the climb up the lovely oaken staircase into that elegant old room in another world.

Believing our fortieth anniversary to be in May of 2013 we gathered together in large numbers at our new headquarters, Jolley's Boathouse. However in the time between the invitations going out and  the event we found that the actual anniversary was June 2013. The evidence is in a letter from Mike Norman to founding member Malcolm Elliot, reproduced hereunder.

Having moved to the Boathouse in  September of 2012 we will endeavour to recapture feeling and spirit of the club at Jolley's.

Wayne Anthoney

June 2013

** Sir Josiah Symon - lawyer, politician and co-framer of the Australian Constitution - has been described as a 'classic nouveau riche' whose egocentricity made him less than popular. He built a mansion at Upper Sturt which he called "Manoah", and the kind of attention and money he lavished on it can be judged from the fact that he engaged Hans Heysen to decorate the ceilings. It is now a religious retreat centre.