Kaunas Guest House, Bairnsdale

The first Lithuanian guest house near the sea was owned by Vladas and Valentina Cižauskas.

Vladas Cižauskas was born in Liepāja on 15 May 1903. While still young, he returned to Lithuania, where he worked for the Bank of Lithuania in Kaunas, Tauragė, and Skuoda.

As war approached, Vladas fled to Germany and later migrated to Australia aboard the Castelbianco, arriving in Sydney on 19 November 1948. He was initially assigned to work on the construction of the Glenmaggie Dam in Victoria. Later, he moved to Bairnsdale, where he operated a small boarding house business. When his health began to decline, he sold the business and settled in Seaford near Frankston.

The guest house itself stood on the corner of Macleod and Buchanan Streets, directly opposite the railway station. Originally known as French’s Coffee Palace, it was a substantial two-storey brick building containing 16 accommodation rooms, with 21 rooms in total including bathrooms and kitchen facilities. The building also featured a spacious balcony and verandah extending along both street frontages.

French’s Coffee Palace opened in the latter half of 1890. Although it may have been constructed with French’s niece in mind, its first proprietors were Arthur and Annie Malone, formerly of the Paynesville Hotel and the Swan Hotel in Sale. During their two-year tenure, the establishment was known as both the “Bairnsdale Coffee Palace” and “Malone’s Coffee Palace.”

In 1901, the building reopened as the new premises for Bairnsdale College. By 1907, however, it had ceased operating as a college and was subsequently advertised for sale. Its use over the following decades is unclear, but by the 1950s it had become known as St Albans House and later as “The Open Door” Guest House. Many of its residents were single men who had come to Bairnsdale seeking work. In those days, with few owning motor cars, many arrived by train.

Under the ownership of the Cižauskas family, the establishment became known as the Kaunas Guest House, named after Lithuania’s city. The family advertised the guest house in Mūsų Pastogė as “a great place to spend the weekend near a great fishing river.”

Information from https://www.facebook.com/groups/gippslandhistory