DREAMY-EYED with ecstasy, wharfie Gus Girdler, of Stanmore, savours the delicate fragrance of a daffodil in the ‘Blue Room’ of the Harbour View Hotel [Millers Point Sydney]. His fellow flower-lovers are ex-middleweight-champion-now-wharfie Jack Haines (left) and George Olson, of Belmore. Watching the… Read More ›
SYDNEY’S oldest wharf laborer, who works at 91, attributes his long life and good health to “plenty work and plenty beer.” He is John ‘Scotty’ Steele, Dargnan-street, Glebe, who was born nine miles from Glasgow in 1855. He presents himself… Read More ›
Women favor later hours if they can drink in bars WANT TO SHARE HOTEL FACILITIES WITH MENFOLK Many Sydney women said this week they would vote for later hotel closing hours if they could share hotel facilities fully with their… Read More ›
“A kid of 14 painted a couple of trees on the way home from school, came here, and stuck the picture on the wall in the pub. It was there for months. He came in every day. ‘Have you sold… Read More ›
By MICK ROBERTS © A drifter, William Price did most odd jobs around the pubs where he worked in return for boarding and lodgings. He did jobs like tapping beer kegs or barrels, to collecting glasses, cleaning toilets, and emptying ashtrays…. Read More ›
LARGE signs in the bars of the Lismore Hotel, Pitt Street, Sydney now tell customers to move away from the bar after being served. The signs, 4ft by 3ft, have been erected by the licensee, Mrs Mary Keighery. Last week… Read More ›
THERE’S a modern looking pub trading at McMahon’s Point, North Sydney that gives no indication of its interesting connection with Colonial Sydney. John Blue was granted a license for a two-storey sandstone inn on March 7 1854. He named his… Read More ›
THE Waterworks Hotel at Botany will reach a significant milestone next year when it marks its 150 year anniversay. Named after the nearby Sydney Waterworks, which was established in 1858, the little pub at the corner of Bay Street and… Read More ›
DURING the 1940s, Sydney’s pubs experienced a huge problem with customers stealing beer glasses. In Sydney’s 600 hotels during 1944, the weekly loss of beer glasses by theft and breakages was estimated by the United Victuallers Association, the forerunner of… Read More ›
IN SHADOW OF PYLON AVOIDS AXE Standing in the shadow of the northern pylon of the Bridge is an old building, now known as the Imperial Hotel, which has a romantic as well as an historic connection with the great… Read More ›