GROWING up in northern Victoria, Chris Gerrett was immersed in tales of bushranger Ned Kelly.

"My dad would always tell me stories of Ned and he'd say, 'never go to a pub and bring up the subject of him because you never
know whether people were for or against'," Chris says.
 

So when she and husband, Rod, had the opportunity to buy a souvenir shop 25 years ago in Glenrowan, in the heart of Kelly country,
near the site of his last shootout, they jumped at it.
 

From the outset, Kate's Cottage Gifts, Souvenirs, Museum and Homestead was, she thinks, the largest shop to stock Ned Kelly
souvenirs and Australiana in the nation.
 

So it made sense to go one step further.
 

"It would have been the early '90s and a lot of big things were being erected around the country and so we had the idea to get our
own big Ned," she says.
 

Chris and Rod tracked down Sydney artist Kevin Thomas who, for three months, made the $14,000, six-metre high, 1.5-tonne
glass-fibre, steel-framed monolith.
 

In 1992 Big Ned Kelly was trucked from Sydney, rifle pointing in the air, and fitted into his concrete boots in the main street of
Glenrowan, near Kate's Cottage.
 

Chris says his arrival caused a stir in towns the length of his journey.
 

"He was even on the front page of the Herald Sun," she says.
 

At any one time Chris can look out to the street to see hordes of people taking Ned happy snaps - one time a fleet of army tanks posed with him,
while another time a group with cut-out buckets on their heads were taking shots.
 

"Some people might think it's kitsch, but it really has been the best promotion for us as a town. It's the most photographed thing in the whole area,"
Chris says.