The club began with a series of informal meetings in 1868 held at the office of Frederick William Haddon in Spring Street, Melbourne.
Among its earliest members were Marcus Clarke and Hamilton MacKinnon (his literary executor), Adam Lindsay Gordon, James E. Neild, John Shillinglaw and George Arthur Walstab (1834–1909), author of Looking Back (1864), Julian Thomas ("The Vagabond"), barrister William McKinley, journalist Malcolm Stark, and James Duerdin, who served as secretary.
[2] Later members included Henry Kendall, George Gordon McCrae, editor Edward Thomas Fricker[3] and the poet Patrick Moloney (1843–1904).
[6] The club, which started as a lively, boisterous affair, developed into a respectable institution and expanded its criteria to admit men in the professions.
A "Yorick Club" of amateur thespians was formed in Adelaide in 1883,[8] which produced a few stage plays at the Academy of Music[9] in Rundle Street and Garner's Theatre,[10] and toured major country towns, but failed to thrive.