Signed studio portrait of George W. Kelly. Melbourne, 1910.

Gelatin silver print photograph, Paris Panel format, 180 x 130 mm (oval), on its original card mount with the imprint of ‘T. Humphrey & Co., / Melbourne’; inscribed and dated by the sitter lower right: ‘With best wishes, Geo. W. Kelly, 2/8.10’; the print is in excellent condition; the mount has some very light foxing.

A fine portrait by Tom Humphrey (husband of photographer Alice Mills) of George William Kelly, one of the proprietors of the prominent Melbourne engineering firm Kelly & Lewis Ltd., which Kelly co-founded in 1899 in partnership with Edward Powell Lewis. The business had its headquarters in Little Bourke Street and initially focused on custom-designed machinery such as steam engines, boilers, and centrifugal pumps; during the 1914-18 conflict it expanded into defence manufacturing and munitions to aid the war effort.