The Dictionary of Sydney was archived in 2021.
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Late night history (updated)
On Tuesday night on ABC Radio National’s Late Night Live, Mark St Leon will be talking about his book Circus: The Australian Story, published by Melbourne Books. Mark is a Dictionary author and recently joined the Dictionary of Sydney Trust…
History of the future
'The end of the book' by J. Brooks Thornley, 1896, State Library of Victoria H96.160/480 If you're a history lover with internet access you should have discovered London Lives, an amazing resource for discovering ordinary Londoners of the past. Tim Hitchcock is…
Watching the clock
Daylight saving starts again in New South Wales this long weekend which means on Sunday at 2am it will be time to synchronise our watches... so, that's forward, right? Departures indicator board above entry barriers at Wynyard Railway Station, 27 August…
Going on ahead
One of the many joys of working on the Dictionary of Sydney is the opportunity/excuse to revisit favourite pictures and collections as we look for the right images to illustrate an entry. Another is following up the unexpected stories and…
A smorgasbord of delights
History Week is nearly upon us, and what a feast it promises to be! Presented by the History Council of NSW, with the theme of EAT History, History Week has something for everyone to savour. Oyster farmers David Corstorphine of Tuncurry, aged…
Bridging the gap
The Sydney Morning Herald, or its columnist Peter FitzSimons, has recently been fascinated by the story of Nellie Bishop, a Sydney woman who tried to jump off the cliff at the Gap in 1923, but was miraculously saved by a…
Cambodian memories
Cambodian New Year, Khmer Temple, Canley Vale April 2010, photo by kind permission of James White Sydney has a small but cohesive Cambodian community, centred in Fairfield City local government area. Ashley Carruthers and Sarithya Tuy wrote about them for the…
Unguarded Moments
Millers Point is currently referred to in more than 20 entries on the Dictionary as well as Shirley Fitzgerald's fascinating entry about the area's history, so we were excited to hear about Unguarded Moments, one of the projects which the…
Moving pictures
Sometimes it's hard to convey the excitement we all feel about working on this project, with its huge potential. So we asked the clever people at Black Jelly Films, who made us this film. [youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FcUJ8rgYpTc] And we were very thrilled. What do…
Ker-ching
As Australia's currency soars to unprecedented heights, we thought we'd remind readers that currency used to be much more of a do-it-yourself arrangement. When the first fleet arrived in 1788, currency was the least of their worries -- supplies came…