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Dictionary of Sydney

The Dictionary of Sydney
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Ultimo Power House chimney, August 1898

The Dictionary of Sydney was archived in 2021.

Ultimo Power House chimney, August 1898

Contributed By

State Archives & Records New South Wales

[ NRS-4481-2-[4/8645]-1218]

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Ultimo

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Construction Electricity Industrial building

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Ultimo power station

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Ultimo

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State Archives & Records New South Wales

Statutory body established by the State Records Act 1998. The Act provides for the creation, management and protection of the records of public offices of the State and for public access to those records.

Based at Kingswood, State Archives and Records NSW manage and provide access to the New South Wales State archives collection, a unique and irreplaceable part of Australia's cultural heritage dating back to 1788.

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.

Construction

Electricity

Industrial building

Ultimo power station

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The Ultimo Power House on the corner of Harris and William Henry Streets was built in 1898 'in the Italian Renaissance style of architecture' to supply Sydney's new electric tram system, and opened in 1899, producing choking clouds of coal dust over Ultimo. After the trams stopped in 1961, the building became redundant. In 1988 it was modified to house the Technological Museum and reopened as the Powerhouse Museum.

Ultimo

Western inner-city suburb named for surgeon John Harris's estate, densely populated by the end of the nineteenth century. In the twentieth century it became heavily industrialised, as well as a centre for technical education, and is now largely gentrified.

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