George Duncan Guthrie

Bendigo Victoria

George Duncan Guthrie was born in 1828. He was indomitable Glaswegian who, having arrived penniless on the South Australian shore following a shipwreck, tried his luck in the goldfields. He failed to find gold but discovered instead a deposit of fine white clay. Having had been an apprentice potter by age 12 he then started one of Australia’s most illustrious potteries, Bendigo Pottery, in 1857 and by 1888 11 kilns were in operation and the site employed 130 people until. Guthrie ran the pottery until his death in 1910.