“Some bastard had ‘borrowed’ mine,” Hawke wrote and as a punishment he was “sconced”, forced to beat the “sconcemaster” in drinking from a pewter pot – equivalent to a yard glass – or face a fine.
“I was too broke for the fine and necessity became the mother of ingestion. I downed the contents of the pot in eleven seconds, left the sconcemaster floundering, and entered the Guinness Book of Records with the fastest time ever recorded,” he wrote.
The Turf Tavern’s manager, Bev Vanstone, said while the pub had a history dating back centuries to its use as a malt house and epicentre of illegal gambling, one of its proudest boasts was the link to Hawke’s famous feat. She said the plaque, which is on behalf of “past, present and future Australian Oxonians”, and yard glass would be displayed at the front bar.
“It’s lovely to now have something we can show people who come into the Turf, not just Australians but everyone who visits,” she said.
Get a note directly from our foreign correspondents on what’s making headlines around the world. Sign up for the weekly What in the World newsletter here.
Discussion about this post