The Geelong College by Victor Cobb, circa 1931.
Artist, printer and illustrator, Victor Cobb was born at Footscray to John Frederick Cobb, a surgeon and his wife Mary Anne Elizabeth nee King.
He was first educated in Warragul, Victoria before attending Melbourne Grammar School from 1891 to 1893. He became a student at the National Gallery School where he probably developed his interest in etching and print making. After a period in South Africa where he fought in the Anglo-Boer war he returned to Melbourne in about 1905. He struggled financially doing some commercial work while working in a succession of unrewarding jobs until employed by the National Museum of Australian Zoology in 1920 to produce detailed anatomical drawings.
Like Austin Platt, he produced a great number of etchings of institutional subjects, including schools and commercial buildings which he printed for sale in limited editions. This illustration of the College was dated 1931 and is one of several held by the School Archives. It depicts the original public or northern entry of the School. The plantings in front of the entrance were removed when Norman Morrison Hall was remodelled.
Sources: R H Croll. The Etched Work of Victor Cobb; Obituary, Argus (Melb) 3 December 1945; R E Nott. Australian Dictionary of Biography.