23 September 2025
The 8 Hours Monument sits on a bit of land on the corner of Russell and Victoria Streets, and perhaps should be better known / prominent than it is.
It commemorates, of all things, the 8 hour day; but average working days back in the early 19thC were far longer than that, so the success of the labour reform movement for ‘8 hours work, 8 hours rest, 8 hours recreation’ was worth celebrating. An 8 hour day was first granted here in 1856 for stonemasons (working on that damned tough bluestone), and (very) slowly spread to other workers, spurred by unions and Labour Day parades.
A committee was formed in the 1880s to commemorate it with a monument, but they only raised funds for the base, and not the planned statuary by Percival Ball (the design in pic 4 is a submission by Charles Summers in 1889). Eventually Ball designed a pylon topped by a golden globe instead, with the words ‘Labour, Recreation, Peace’, which was unveiled in 1903 in Gordon Square near Parliament House.
Nobody knows why, but it was moved in 1924 to its current spot, which is diagonally opposite Trades Hall, so quite appropriate really. There’s a great painting from 1947 by Alan Sumner featuring it.
Storey of Melbourne 