I am sorry folks, but this is one page I must add for all those idiots out there whom haven't studied the Kelly story in depth much at all, so sit back and read my comments which are in red.

ADDED 16/04/02 ISSUE FOUR - this was told to me by a teacher of mine when he saw a picture of Ned Kelly's helmet on my note book with written underneath the republic of north eastern Victoria. In whose name I will not un-cover but these were his exact words - once again folks, I feel ill!

"My family grew up in Benalla, in north eastern Victoria" My teacher cautiously points to a map I know all too well, " One morning, Ned and Dan Kelly and a couple of mates - couldn't even name the gang phew.. rode down to his relatives house, and, "demanded" food. the "poor" - what a load of crap! farmers said, they didn't have any, so he said that Ned and the gang destroyed their fine crops - what in the name of Moses where on earth did he pull that one from??? and rode away"

He later added "He was a mongrel, and they call him a hero" - where's his evidence? what a fair dinkum dickhead, he has no sense at all, so what was the date he read Ian Jones a short life?  when was last he even read about Kelly, it is teachers like these in our schooling system, that make our children unable to see the truth behind our National heroes. This teacher would support folks like, Mr Warby who killed thousand of innocent Aboriginals, he would call him one of our national heroes, fair dinkum folks, this bloke is real moron! we need to kick these teachers out their arses! - MIKE webmaster

ADDED 4/4/02 ISSUE THREE - this has to be the most idiotic simply dickheaded insertion I have ever come across, I am purely disgusted in this piece of supposed "literature" 

Look what they are teaching our children!! 

Read the passage and then complete the exercise that follows. - I feel ill.....

His whole family was on the wrong side of the law - who is this? which members of his family? you idiot!. His parents were sent to Australia on a convict ship for committing petty crimes - Ned's mother came as a free immigrant you bloody moron!. Ned's criminal career began at a young age in country Victoria. In 1874 he was jailed for stealing a horse. - When was that? Ellen Kelly , his mother, was jailed in 1878 for wounding a policeman. - Supposedly... 

In 1880 they took over the Glenrowan hotel and took many of the town's residents hostage. They made armour of thick steel to protect themselves from police bullets. Unfortunately the heavy armour made them clumsy. Ned was eventually captured and his brother Dan died in a fire when the Glenrowan hotel was burnt down. - What about Joe and Steve????

ADDED 3/4/02 ISSUE TWO 

Postcard From Glenrowan

Ned Kelly's Last Stand

ADDED: 3/02/02 ISSUE ONE 

There’s usually a sign up somewhere, on the outskirts, telling you to tune in to the local tourist radio station. And if you bother tuning in it’s usually worthwhile. The recording will probably be out of date. I’ve heard recordings still being broadcast that are fifteen years out of date. But a lot of the places I’ve been to don’t get that many tourists.

Benalla doesn’t have much to recommend it, tourist-wise. It’s been bypassed by the highway to start with. And there’s not much to say about it except that it’s there. We had decided to go to Benalla for fairly obscure reasons: I went to school with a guy called Dave who was from Benalla. That was how he introduced himself to people: I’m Dave from Benalla. It was a matter of civic pride. My father would have said that Dave was a bit of a thinker. Meaning he wasn’t too bright.

We didn’t address Dave by his proper name. We called him Duh-ave. And he’d smile. He was very sweet-natured. So when I saw Benalla on the map, I knew I had to go there. Just so I could find out exactly what it was that had made Dave the sort of guy that he was.

Benalla was flat. That could be good or bad. But the tourist radio station promised much more. This was Kelly Country, and if Ned Kelly had pissed in the street in Benalla there would be a marker on the spot to commemorate it.

Ned Kelly is an Australian hero, in the Australian tradition. Which means he was like Dave, a bit of a thinker. In America, a hero is someone, just an average nobody, who works hard and strives and struggles and through sheer force of will succeeds and becomes famous for their achievements. That’s the American Dream. An Australian hero is just an average nobody, who works hard and strives and struggles and, while attempting to do something exceptional and extraordinary, fails miserably and dies. you fair dinkum idiot!

The whole Ned Kelly thing had always been a mystery to me, but the Benalla tourist radio broadcast really helped me to understand it. Apparently, there had been two people born in Benalla worth mentioning: Sir Edward Weary Dunlop and Red Kelly, Ned Kelly’s father. Ned's father was born in Ireland! 

Weary Dunlop had been a war hero, of course. He was a surgeon, and he had volunteered to serve his country during World War Two. After he had been captured he had been tortured and repeatedly put his own life before that of his injured patients. And after the war, he forgave his captors and became an advocate for furthering Asian-Australian relations.

But according to the local tourist radio station, Weary Dunlop’s achievements were a poor second to Ned Kelly’s. Not only was Ned’s father, Red Kelly, born in Benalla arghhh!

But Ned’s first criminal activities, which involved riding his horse on the footpath and assaulting and robbing an Asian called Ah Foong, Ah Fook moron! and he was not robbed! were committed in Benalla, the sort of actions which later cemented Ned’s reputation as a true Australian Hero.

And then we heard about the cummerbund. On Mair Street, the broadcast told us, at the Tourist Information Centre, there was a Costume and Pioneer Museum. And on display was Ned Kelly’s cummerbund. Kris and I laughed Why?. It was the stupidest thing either of us had ever heard. So we had to see it, Fair Dinkum!!!

Ned had been wearing the cummerbund when he was captured, underneath his armour. Which is a strange image to start with: a bushranger with a fondness for formal wear what can you say folks?. The story was that he had been given the cummerbund for rescuing a drowning kid when he was himself young, before he started his life of crime. Does that sound far-fetched? Even that it had still fit him?

But first we went to see a house that Ned Kelly had hidden in to elude the police. The radio said it was now a hairdresser, It was a struggle in the shop not hiding from the police!. We drove from one end of the street to the other looking for it. Finally we found the house, but now it was a gift shop selling candles and handmade greeting cards and it was closed. The radio broadcast was obviously out of date.

We didn’t even get out of the car, we just drove to the Costume and Pioneer Museum. I think Kris was bored of Benalla all ready. I think I was too. The Museum had the usual array of pamphlets and the usual retired female volunteer manning the desk. It was going to cost six bucks to see the cummerbund and we almost didn’t do it. But there wasn’t much else for us to do either, so we forked over the money gee that would have difficult!

The cummerbund was in a glass case. It was made of dark green satin. It had blotches on it, which looked like rust stains. They could have been blood stains, I suppose. And we looked at it for a while, trying to get our six dollar’s worth. Then that got boring and we left Benalla for good.

 Next part is on Glenrowan.

Part Two: Glenrowan

I don’t think Glenrowan really counts as a town. Nobody seems to live there. There’s a servo, advertising the best food on the Hume Highway, except that Glenrowan isn’t on the Hume any more and the servo’s closed down. Then there’s a couple of tourist traps and that’s it. The only thing keeping Glenrowan alive is the distant memory of Ned Kelly’s capture in the vicinity. Although nobody is even sure of the exact location The exact location is behind the old police station, if you had the patience and curtesy, you may have seen the huge sign which MARKS WHERE NED KELLY WAS CAPTURED!!. Let’s just call Glenrowan a convenient fiction.

So there’s a six metre tall statue of Ned Kelly, badly proportioned, outside of Kate Kelly’s Tea House. I think Kate was Ned’s Mum Sister. Then there’s a replica of Ned Kelly’s home, a wooden shack with a museum and a gift shop. And then there’s the animatronic show called Ned Kelly’s Last Stand, the signage obviously ripped off from the Indiana Jones series of movies. It’s a two and a half million dollar, forty-minute spectacular telling the history of Ned Kelly and his final shoot-out with the police.

There’s a big watch face with movable hands outside, advertising when the next show is scheduled to start. When we saw it was going to cost fifteen bucks each we decided not to go in. I know it’s research, but we baulked. I can watch Arnie perform for ninety minutes in a hundred million dollar spectacular at the movies. I can watch Mick Jagger play Ned Kelly on video for a couple of bucks. I know bad value when I see it.

We walked back to the tea rooms and the statue of Ned. His head was too small. I noticed that the statue was attached to the base with large bolts. And how else do you suggest they staged this spectacular piece? Theoretically, he was detachable. I thought about pushing him over. Will you get your little kicks out of that??

All that was left for us to do was visit the museum. The gift shop was free, but you had to pay two dollars to go out the back, which we did. And I started to get that feeling of rising hysteria. I kept reading labels on the exhibits, and they’d say something like: ‘a washing machine of the type commonly in use when Ned Kelly was alive’ or ‘furniture reportedly built by one of Ned’s brothers’. There was a cage with a cockatoo out the back, and a paddock with a horse in it. I don’t know why, but they were there. I started to panic. It was all rubbish, bits and pieces of junk thrown together and pretending to be educational. It was all fake. It was worse then Benalla. Doubtful you arghhhh!

There were some newspaper clippings on a board, and I started reading one of them. It was from the Benalla Sentinel. The article said that the most important historical find since the discovery of Pompeii had been made: the discovery of Ned Kelly’s cummerbund, the only object still in existence that had once been owned by Ned Kelly.

And it all clicked. The cummerbund wasn’t pissy at all. The cummerbund was the Turin Shroud of the whole Ned Kelly industry. Everything else was tawdry junk and false idolatory.

Kris and I went back out into the gift shop. There was a huge range of Kelly crap, from tea towels to plush figures. In the background there was a tape playing, telling the story of Ned Kelly’s life. I presumed the guy behind the counter owned the place. I think he’d heard us laughing while we were out back in the museum. I don’t think he liked us. Wonder Why!

So I went through the motion of buying some film. I’d run out, taking photos of the closed down servo gee your a real comedian!. The narrator on the background tape said: ‘The police finally arrested Ned Kelly’s father and had their way with him.’

So I said to the guy: ‘Ooh-err’, as I gave him the money for the film. He rolled his eyes at me. Again what a comedy man!

Then Kris said: ‘I suppose that’s why they called him Red Kelly.’

And I burst out laughing in this guy’s face. I probably managed to get some spit on him. He didn’t say anything and we left. That man which he laughed and then spat on his face is damn utterly rude this line is one the reason's I had to add this bloke to my Moron's Page, that Guy is Rod Gerrett who he laughed in his face, a great man and would do anything to help others. I can not believe there would be such a rude, arrogant pig out there as much as this bloke.

Check his website click here