There’s a photo that was displayed at my grandparents’ home for as long as I can remember. It was of my great-grandmother as a baby and appears in an old handmade frame which has been hand painted.

Born in 1901, she was known to her family as Noela. The thing about the photo is that it earned her ten shillings. That’s the equivalent of about $80 to $100 today. I have both the framed photo, and the letter Catherine Toms, nee Moss, my 2x great-grandmother, received. It’s written on official Arnott’s stationery, and dated 4 April 1902.

Arnott’s ‘Living Pictures’

Arnott’s Biscuits began in the 1860s, first in West Maitland, then moving to nearby Morpeth, which was the site of the Historic Arnott Bakehouse, and a couple of years later to the growing Newcastle.

Arnott’s Living Pictures was a campaign they ran which began three decades later, in 1892, and ran for sixty years.

The phrase, “Arnott’s Living Pictures,” has been applied for years past to the great number of children who are reared on the famous Milk Arrowroot Biscuits, and whose photographs are sent by their mothers to the firm of William Arnott, Limited. It is quite a fact of Australian economic history, the many thousands of testimonials that mothers have given, who have fed their children on these biscuits since the first few months of early infancy.

~ ‘Arnott’s Living Pictures’, The Dubbo Liberal and Macquarie Advocate, 12 February 1910, p. 3, http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article75299655, accessed 4 February 2026.

Over the course of the campaign, tens of thousands photos are believed to have been submitted. Some were printed in the newspaper, and some were produced as professional prints in a larger format, or on the cover of catalogues, postcards and other products.

As time progressed the pictures went from being drawn replicas to the actual photos. As well as testimonials, they were sometimes accompanied by recipes or instructions about ways the biscuits could be used, all championing the benefits of the Milk Arrowroot.

I’ve been searching for a printed version of my great-grandmother’s photo, but so far I’ve been unable to find one. If you find it, please let me know!

Selected references

The Tale of One of the Most Historic Families in NSW, Historic Arnott Bakehouse, https://historicarnottbakehouse.com.au/historic-families-in-nsw/, accessed 6 February 2026.

Ships Biscuits – The At Sea Necessity That Floated William Arnott’s Success, Pittwater Online News, https://www.pittwateronlinenews.com/ships-biscuits-at-sea-necessity-floated-arnotts.php, accessed 1 February 2026.

‘Arnott’s Living Pictures’, The Bulletin, volume 20, number 991 (11 February 1899), http://nla.gov.au/nla.obj-682813372, accessed 4 February 2026.

‘Arnott’s Living Pictures’, The Dubbo Liberal and Macquarie Advocate, 12 February 1910, p. 3, http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article75299655, accessed 4 February 2026.

Growing up on Arnott’s Milk Arrowroot biscuits, Now and Then, https://lynnwalsh.wordpress.com/tag/arnotts-living-pictures/, accessed 4 February 2026.

Arnott’s Milk Arrowroot Biscuits, Finding Family, https://ancestrysearch.wordpress.com/2011/12/29/arnotts-milk-arrowroot-biscuits/, accessed 4 February 2026.