The answer depends on your flavour of “first.” The earliest locally built effort was the Shearer steam carriage in South Australia, circa 1897—more hissing kettle than hot hatch.
If you mean the first petrol-powered car, that’s the Tarrant from Melbourne in 1901, a proper pioneer job with plenty of pluck. And for the first mass-produced Aussie car, cue the 1948 Holden 48-215 (FX), the nation’s post-war hero. So: steam in the 1890s, petrol in 1901, and proper production by 1948—three firsts, one continent, and a lot of corrugated roads in between.
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