The Dictionary of Sydney was archived in 2021.
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2SER Radiothon
We love being part of the 2SER community and telling stories of Sydney's history to breakfast listeners each week. While the annual 2SER subscription and fundraising drive is happening, the Dictionary of Sydney segment with Alex on 2SER Breakfast will be…
Get on your dancing shoes
Band playing at a Popular Dance night at the Trocadero in early 1938, by Ivan Ive, Mitchell Library, State Library of NSW (ON 388/Box 030/Item 121) Once the most glamorous dance hall in Sydney, the Trocadero on George Street hosted queens,…
Darlinghurst Gaol and the National Art School
Entrance to Darlinghurst Gaol 1887, Mitchell Library, State Library of NSW (SPF/169) Darlinghurst Gaol, on the hill at the top of Oxford Street, is one of the largest standing colonial projects left in Sydney, and yet, many Sydneysiders barely notice it…
The first woman hanged in Sydney
David Collins records the death of Ann Davis in An Account of the English Colony in New South Wales, 1798, p86 On 23 November 1789, Ann Davis became the first woman hanged in New South Wales. Listen to Rachel and Alex…
Seeing things in Black and White
An article, How to Begin as a Black-and-White Artist, by Lionel Lindsay in the Lone Hand, June 1911, had tips for aspiring artists, via Trove The Society of Australian Black and White Artists, now the Australian Cartoonists Association, is the world's…
Janet Lee, Fallen Among Reformers: Miles Franklin, Modernity, and the New Woman
Janet Lee, Fallen Among Reformers: Miles Franklin, Modernity, and the New Woman Sydney University Press, June 2020, 168 pp. (plus works cited and index), ISBN: 9781743326886, p/bk, AUS$45.00 In a new full-length work on Miles Franklin (1879–1954), Janet Lee, Professor of Women,…
Max Allen, Intoxicating: Ten Drinks that Shaped Australia
Max Allen, Intoxicating: Ten Drinks that Shaped Australia Thames & Hudson, July 2020, 242 pp. (plus a further reading list), ISBN: 9781760761004, p/bk, AUS$32.99 Well-regarded wine writer Max Allen takes readers on a grand tour of some of the most important drinks…
Condemned and Demolished!
Bowden's Corner, Hunter and Castlereagh streets Sydney, c1907, City of Sydney Archives (094145). Notice the tree growing through the building! The large Norfolk Pine grew through the middle of it, which was used as a coat rack for the hotel…
Happy History Week
This week organisations across the state are celebrating History Week 2020, the festival organised by the History Council of NSW. Listen to Mark and Alex on 2SER here The History Council of NSW was established in 1995 as an umbrella organisation…
Listening to the Great Depression
People have been asking me a lot lately about how the economic recession we are experiencing now compares to earlier times of economic instability. Unlike the situation we're all in at the moment, which has come about largely because of…