Four months ago, Bill Duff, the egg man of Richmond’s Gleadell Street Market, handed over the egg stall he ran for 65 years to his son, Scott.
Over 30 years, the two men have bonded at this Saturday morning pop-up market in a small street off Bridge Road over their shared love of AFL club Hawthorn, and they’ll rake over the coals of each match. And next month the City of Yarra is celebrating 150 years of markets in the precinct around Richmond Town Hall, including at Gleadell Street.In 1873 in nearby Church Street, where today’s Richmond Police station is, the council set up an indoor market similar to today’s Prahran Market.
“Everyone tried to get the best buys they could and the stallholders wanted to clear their stock. You certainly got some bargains then.” Stallholders would be spruiking to crowds loudly all day. Vegetable sellers would shout: “Honeymoon salad: Lettuce alone” and “Picked by the angels, eaten by the sinners” and Duff, the chook seller, would yell, “Don’t go home without your lunch.”