LEGENDARY bushranger Ned Kelly enjoyed a beer as much as any man.
Quick escape: the tunnel entrance in the cellar allegedly used by Ned Kelly.
And one of his favoured watering holes was, according to local folklore, the Vine Hotel at North Wangaratta.
Stories handed down among local families tell of Kelly using a tunnel from the hotel's underground cellar to enter and leave the pub.
The tunnel once ran from the large cellar under the road, past the blacksmith's shop, to nearby Reedy Creek.
Although now blocked, the tunnel entrance is still visible in the Vine's cellar-cum-museum.
The Vine has a colourful history, having been built as a store by Henry Parfitt in 1861 and later becoming a licensed hotel in 1864.
Parfitt had arrived in Sydney from London as a 13-year-old aboard the ship, Mary, and overlanded cattle through the Wangaratta district to Melbourne in 1840.
After being shipwrecked in the tropics, he returned to Australia and was working as a teamster when he bought a 22ha block at North Wangaratta in 1856.
Fire completely destroyed the pub in 1883, with a second hotel opened in 1884 by Charles Sandford.
It too, was burnt down in 1895 and replaced by a 14-room brick building.
The Vine has long been the centre of a diverse farming community, producing wine grapes, crops, cattle, sheep, dairy cattle and pigs.
A century ago, its paddocks were used by drovers and stock agents to hold stock overnight, before they were sold at the Wangaratta market.
Saleyards were built at the site in 1926 but later fell into disuse.
A racecourse also straddled the Vine's paddocks, hosting regular race meetings up until the 1930s.
Locals still recall flamboyant publican Veronica Walsh, a Tivoli dancer who ran the Vine from 1941 to 1989.
Veronica had won the Australian ballroom dancing championship and, with her husband, Jack, sold a Buick to buy the Vine.
Beef and sheep producer Rick Hourigan recalls lively nights staged by Veronica in the 1970s.
"Every Wednesday night there would be bands and half of Wang would be out here," Rick said.
He has visited the hotel for a yarn and a drink several times a week for the past 35 years.
"They mention that Ned Kelly used the underground cellar," Rick said.
"If Kelly actually did everything he was supposed to have done, he would have died at 106.
"One minute he was in Jerilderie, and the next in Beechworth - all on horseback."
Rick remembers the near-misses when the old Hume Highway ran past the pub.
"There were numerous semi-trailer rollovers and a truck hit the pub veranda once," he said.
Derek said the Vine was a pub that welcomed families.
Chiltern residents Ian "Ocker" Ladgrove and his wife Cathy bought the Vine in July, 2008.
"I was looking at my career prospects over the next 10 years and couldn't see myself working for other people," Ian said.
"We spent 18 months looking for a hotel - we knew the area and saw this pub as a good opportunity to have a crack at it."
