Timothy Bonyhady is a multi award winning Australian historian, curator and environmental lawyer. He is director of the "Australian Centre for Environmental Law" at the Australian National University and lives in Canberra. Bonyhady is a descendant of the Gallia family, his most recent book "Wohllebengasse – Die Geschichte meiner Familie" ("Wohllebengasse - The story of my family") was published by Zsolnay Verlag, Vienna, in 2013.

The Adolf Gallia House

The building which starts on Vienna’s Stubenring, stretches around the Lueger-Platz, and continues on the Biberstrasse, has always been known for its ground-floor cafe. When the celebrated cyclist Maxime Lurion opened this cafe following the building’s completion in 1903, a poster by the artist Emil Ranzenhofer promoted its “Cafe Grill”, Club Room, American Bar, Ladies Salon, Bowling Alley and Dance Floor which, the Neues Wiener Tagblatt reported, had all been fitted out with “exquisite luxury”. Since 1905, when Lurion moved to London and the cafe became the “Prückel”, it has grown ever more renowned and appreciated because so many other Ringstrasse cafes have closed. Yet for me its building has very different associations and significance as the home of my great-great uncle, Adolf Gallia, and his wife Ida.

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from: 1865, 2015. 150 years of Vienna's Ringstrasse. Thirteen observations.
192 pages, Metroverlag, Vienna 2014 (ISBN 978-3-99300-175-9), €19.90