Pyrmont | The Dictionary of Sydney

City of Sydney Council

Governing body of the City of Sydney, incorporated as a city in 1842. Boundaries of the city have changed over the years, although it has always focused on the old centre of Sydney.

City of Sydney local government area

Area governed by the City of Sydney Council. Boundaries have changed over time to include or exclude some inner-city suburbs, but have always encompassed the area of first European settlement at Sydney Cove, on the land of the Cadigal people.

Pyrmont

Home to the Gommerigal people until the 1830s, Pyrmont peninsula remained undeveloped until the 1840s despite its proximity to Sydney Town. Quarrying the Pyrmont sandstone became a major industry, changing the natural features of the place. Wharves, factories and haulage provided work for the people who moved in, until the industry moved out, and another transformation began in the 1980s.

Fitzgerald, Shirley

Shirley Fitzgerald is a historian. She was City Historian for the City of Sydney between 1987-2009

Cockle Bay, now Darling Harbour c1819-20

View from Sydney of the Haunted Mill in Cockle Bay 1832

Millers Point c1845

Plan shewing the situation of Mr William's property at Glebe Island, WH Wells, surveyor July 11th 1844

Patent slip belonging to the Australian Steam Navigation Co c1855

Pyrmont Bridge 1858

Pyrmont 1868

Pyrmont, showing cattle in a field with sandstone boulders c1871

View of Sydney from Pyrmont, New South Wales c1880

Pyrmont quarries c1900

Pyrmont Quarry 1893

The collapse of the old Glebe Island Bridge, August 1899

Panorama of Darling Island and Harbour, looking towards the city December 1903

Birds eye view of general wharfage scheme west of Dawes Point as it will appear when completed, published 1913

Tug St Aristell at Pyrmont c1947

Pyrmont Bridge 2003

Sandstone in Pirrama Road, Pyrmont 2006

Star City Casino 2009

Annandale

Part of the traditional lands of the Eora people, Annandale was farmed for much of the nineteenth century, before being subdivided into a Victorian townscape. The suburb catered for the well-to-do and the working classes, and from mid-twentieth century has also housed new migrants, and the returning middle class residents who value its heritage buildings and proximity to the city.

Blaxcell, Garnham

Arriving in 1802, Garnham Blaxcell found success in public service and in private business under Governor King, becoming a rich man. He was ousted by Governor Bligh and took part in the overthrow of Bligh known as the Rum Rebellion. With his business partner John Macarthur and others, he helped build Sydney Hospital, but fell into debt and left the colony in 1817.

Cazneaux, Harold

Born in New Zealand and raised in Adelaide, Harold Cazneaux became one of Sydney's pre-eminent photographers, documenting its changing face and different moods.

Central Railway Station

Central Railway Station was Sydney's third terminus, replacing the original 1855 station further south in Redfern and a later upgraded station built in the 1870s.

Chippendale

Chippendale's progress from Gadigal forest and wetland, to farm and nursery, was followed by industrial development that made it a polluted and deprived suburb. Community, charity and religion helped inhabitants, but poor drainage and unplanned development persisted until the end of the nineteenth century. As the number of factories grew, population fell, and recent migrants moved in. From the 1970s, as the factories closed, Chippendale again became an attractive place to live, drawing students, artists and others who wanted an inner-city life.

Coal lumpers

Coal lumpers were crucial to coal-powered shipping, hauling giant quantities of fuel from ship to ship in appalling conditions. With the disappearance of steam power, a whole occupation, with its own skills, lore and traditions as well as hazards and dangers, faded into history.

Colonial Sugar Refining Co Ltd

Founded in 1855, CSR had refineries in Canterbury, Chippendale, Pyrmont and later around Australia. It became a large and influential industrial company, with city offices and diversified business interests.

East Circular Quay

The area that is now East Circular Quay was quickly seen as the governor's side of Sydney Cove after colonisation in 1788. The first house built on the point belonged to Bennelong. When the semi-circular quay was constructed from 1837, the eastern side of the bay was used as a quarry. From the 1860s, wool stores and warehouses were built that dominated the landscape until after World War II, when taller buildings were allowed.

Economy

With the arrival of Europeans, the traditional economy of Aboriginal clans was disrupted, and gave way to the convict economy of the Commissariat and government stores. But this closed economy was soon opened by free settlement, whaling and sealing, shipping and farming success, making Sydney the port for a vast hinterland. Depressions and booms alternated, bringing poverty and prosperity to the city. Sydney's growth and diversity mean that regional economies now exist within the Sydney region.

Gay men

Long demonised and persecuted, gay men have been part of Sydney life since first settlement. Two centuries have seen attitudes and perceptions change dramatically.

General Post Office

From convict beginnings, the General Post Office was to re-emerge in the 1860s in Italian Renaissance grandeur when James Barnet created an enduring centrepiece for Sydney.

Glebe Island

From abattoir to shipping terminal, Glebe Island has been an intrinsic part of the development of industrial Sydney.

Glebe Island bridge

Since 1857 Glebe Island bridge has facilitated development in the western and northern suburbs. The third bridge to have been constructed on the site, the Anzac Bridge is an icon of Sydney engineering.

Goldsbrough Mort & Co

By 1838 wool was Australia's main export, and auctioneer Thomas Mort's wool stores grew rapidly as a major presence in Ultimo and Pyrmont.

Government House

From a modest cottage on Sydney Cove to an elaborate sandstone structure in Gothic Revival style, Government House, now in The Domain, has served as both home and host to official life in Sydney.

Millers Point

Called Ta-Ra by its first inhabitants, the Cadigal, Millers Point was named for the windmills that were built on its heights, and their owner, John Leighton, known as Jack the Miller. By the 1850s Millers Point was a maritime enclave, with almost all residents and employers focused on the wharves and the trade they brought. Through plague, depression and war, the community at Millers Point retained its cohesion, but the changes brought by gentrification are harder to predict.

Planning

From an accidental city without a plan, Sydney has become a city with many plans. The early town grew without controls, but later governments tried to regulate building and development, and keep up with necessary services and infrastructure. From 1900, resumptions, zoning and regulation were used to shape the city and its suburbs.

Stace, Arthur

A former drunk who was converted to Christianity, Arthur Stace spent the rest of his life spreading the Gospel, and unobtrusively writing Eternity in chalk on pavements all over Sydney. The identity of the Eternity Man was a mystery for over twenty years. Eternity has since become part of Sydney's mythology and iconography.

Sydney in 1858

In 1858, Sydney had become a bustling prosperous town, with a university, commercial centre, restaurants and fine town houses. As in London, though, these amenities existed side by side with poverty and misery for some citizens.

Tram deaths

Trams, like other forms of transport, can be dangerous.

Transport

Sydney's transport has been shaped by the geography of the city, changing economic and social needs, technological limitations and advances, and political considerations. From walking tracks and animal haulage to the commuting city of today, transport has also shaped the city itself, opening up new areas and choking others. Carts, ferries, trains, trams, buses and cars have all figured in Sydney's transport history.

Ultimo

Originally the country of the Gommerigal people, the Ultimo estate of surgeon Harris was a rural retreat until the 1840s when industry gradually encroached and subdivision in the 1860s. Quarries and woolstores provided work, but life was hard for Ultimo's residents. Postwar economic changes took away the manual work, and like other inner-city neighbourhoods, Ultimo has become a wealthier area, with rich cultural and educational institutions.

18-footers

The image of an 18-footer in a north-east sea breeze has become synonymous with Sydney Harbour. The first 18-footers had developed from open boats that competed in matches from the early nineteenth century. Today, they are a high performance international class that has been likened to the 'Formula 1' of sailing.

Sydney Technical College

From its beginnings as an adjunct to the Sydney Mechanics' School of Arts, Sydney Technical College provided the technical skills needed for Sydney's industrial development, as well as accessible and affordable higher and further education for Sydney's working people.

Sailing

Sydney's first European colonists clung to the coastline and looked to the harbour and the sea for survival. Early recreational sailing was a product of the city's function as a seaport town. Sailing has since adapted to reflect and contribute Sydney's changing culture and customs.

Rozelle

Late to be subdivided, Rozelle became a suburb of workers' cottages, allowing inhabitants to live near their work in the various industries along the harbour shore. During the twentieth century, rapid deindustrialisation, and the growing value of proximity to the city and the harbour changed the suburb and its people greatly.

Flood, Edward

Born the illegitimate son of a convict, Edward Flood rose to be rich and successful through his own efforts in business and was both Mayor of Sydney and a minister in the colonial government.

Sydney

Founded by Europeans as a social experiment, Sydney's beginnings brought death and dispossession to the original inhabitants of the place, as well as surprising freedom and prosperity to many of the convicts. Over its history, the city's growth has been shaped by factors that are common to many cities, but also by unique forces. In the twenty-first century, for the first time, the idea of sustainable progress is itself in doubt.

Green Bans movement

When builders labourers, organised by their union, refused to work on projects they found socially or environmentally undesirable, in Sydney in the 1970s, they started a new form of environmental activism. The Green Bans were to change the way Sydney developed

Tourism

Shaped by tourism from its earliest days as a town, Sydney has catered to tourists from overseas, other parts of Australia and the New South Wales hinterland, becoming one of the world's favourite travel destinations.

New Year's Eve

Now one of Sydney's favourite public occasions, New Year's Eve was hardly celebrated before the late nineteenth century, when reliable lighting made outdoor night time revelry safer and more inviting. Sydney's celebrations have moved about the city and taken different forms over time.

Sydney Harbour: A Cultural Landscape

Known worldwide for its beauty, Sydney Harbour has been a source of inspiration for thousands of years. First Aboriginal, then European peoples settled the shores, naming and renaming the coves, headlands and points. Artists and writers have explored the harbour's people, landscape, animals and plants. As Sydney has grown and changed, the harbour surrounding the city has evolved from a working waterway into a one of leisure and entertainment. Parts of the old working waterfront, once dismissed as redundant, have become case studies of adaptive reuse with vibrant cultural precincts emerging along the harbour foreshore.

Islands of Sydney Harbour

Sydney Harbour once had 14 islands. These were outcrops and the peaks of steep hills left uncovered as the sea level rose, between 10,000 and 6,000 years ago, flooding an ancient river valley and forming the harbour that exists today

War Memorials for World War I

The shocking losses of Australian servicemen and women in the Great War prompted communities across Australia to find ways to memorialise those who died, and honour those who served. As no centralised authority drove or coordinated this task, the form of each memorial reflects the community that raised the funds to build it. Balmain was the first suburb in Australia to erect a war memorial, but in time, the towns, suburbs, workplaces and institutions of Sydney found a way to fulfil the covenant 'we will remember them.'

Returned Soldiers on the Ultimo Presbyterian Church Roll of Honour

The Ultimo Presbyterian Church Roll of Honour, now housed in the Ultimo Community Centre, lists the names of 36 men who served in World War I. We can only be sure 22 came home but their stories reveal the hardships of war service, larrikin behaviour, heroism and injuries that must have been a terrible burden to returned soldiers.

The Fallen on the Ultimo Presbyterian Church Roll of Honour

The Ultimo Presbyterian Church Roll of Honour, now housed in the Ultimo Community Centre, lists the names of 36 men. Four of those men died as a result of their war service and were lost to their families and friends - people who openly grieved their passing. Their grief is a reminder of the true cost of war, for the fallen and for their family, friends, and community.

The Railways of Sydney: Shaping the City and its Commerce

Across the world, steam railways and electric tramways facilitated the expansion of the small cities of pre-industrial times into vast metropolises. This essay explores the role of railways in shaping the Sydney metropolis we know today.

Windmills of Sydney

In the late eighteenth century, and well into the nineteenth century, the tallest structures around Sydney Cove were windmills. They left few physical remains, yet their presence left a lasting legacy in early colonial landscape art and the minds and hearts of many contemporaries.

University of Sydney

Legislation to incorporate and endow the University of Sydney was passed in 1850 with the first professors arriving in 1852 followed by a cohort of 24 candidates later that year. In 2016, the university has more than 53,000 students, supported by more than 3,500 academic staff in 16 faculties, and boasts the largest university library in the southern hemisphere.

Sydney's Metropolitan Goods Lines

The Metropolitan Goods Lines, which spread throughout the Sydney suburbs from 1916 onwards, have played a key role in the industrialization of the city and the development of many suburbs. While some of these lines have become disused, others have been repurposed as light rail for the contemporary city.

Sydney Flour Mills before 1850

Wheat was a staple European food and the British brought it to Australia in 1788 expecting it be the basis of their diet. Before it could be consumed, however, the grain needed to be ground into flour, so flour milling became an immediate and necessary secondary industry in the colony.