LOOKING Back is a collection of short stories and images of the northern Illawarra region of NSW, Australia, by author, blogger and journalist, Mick Roberts. Although focusing on the Bulli district, the blog also looks into the broader history of the Illawarra region, as well as the liquor industry, and pubs. If you enjoy the stories, please…
By Mick Roberts © THERE’S no trace of a narrow laneway, just north of the former Denmark Hotel at Bulli, where about a dozen single storey timber terrace apartments once existed. The terrace homes were located along an unsealed road known as Edward’s Lane. Later it was given the name, Bowyer’s Lane. Local residents handed…
THE skeletal remains of Herbert Halliday were found in the bush by several boys on the escarpment near Coledale in 1929. Halliday, who was 53 at the time, had gone missing on July 29 1925 while staying with his brother, Walter, at The Grove, Austinmer. The day after he left home Halliday was found asleep…
THE building presently located at 355 Prince Highway, Woonona was built as a motor garage by Clyde George Nott in 1921, meaning it is now over a century old. Nott, who also ran a rubber factory at Wollongong, had a petrol bowser pump placed on the footpath outside the garage in 1925. Nott died suddenly…
By Jack Devitt * THE railway line coming down from the South Bulli Colliery at Bellambi crossed the Princes Highway via a set of power operated gates (the control tower of the same preserved). The line ran parallel to Bellambi Lane, which was then only a lane, past the Bellambi pub and across the Government…
By Jack Devitt * THE bitumen road, built by the Main Roads Department, reached Bulli from Sutherland in 1928. Every road in the district at the time was either blue metal or a dirt track. The sealing of the main road was a huge undertaking; men camped along the route on the top of the…
By Phil Evans * A LITTLE known aspect of the Pacific War was the role that Bulli Woonona residents played in the welcoming of sailors from the British Pacific Fleet (BPF) in 1945. The British Pacific Fleet arrived in Australia on 4 February 1945; it comprised two battleships, four fleet carriers, three cruisers and accompanying…
By Jack Devitt * ALTHOUGH I always lived in Bulli, I had quite an association with Corrimal with their rugby league team. Due to some mismanagement of the Woonona team in 1935, the league disbanded the club and a number of us joined up with Corrimal in 1936 under a tough old playing coach named…
Down Memory Lane with Jack Devitt * AS motor vehicles became more numerous several garages began to appear in the Bulli Woonona area; with their hand operated petrol pumps, selling several brands such as Shell, Plume, Texaco, Union and a brand DPL a few pence per gallon cheaper on which my dad’s 1926 Superior K…
Pavel ‘Paul’ Yolkin came to live in Bulli with his partner Glad Polleski in 1923. After retiring, dusted from the Bulli colliery, Yolkin and Glad opened a fish shop on the highway opposite the Bulli Family Hotel. But it wasn’t his fish shop he was known for. He was known as a pioneer of the…
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INTERESTINGLY Sandon Point received its name from a cottage that existed for less than 25 years on what was originally known – and is still officially known – as Bulli Point. George Adams, founder of Tattersall’s [Tatts] Lottery, and who built his fortune from his business interests, including Bulli Colliery and nearby Coke Works, was…
Australian Town and Country Journal Wednesday 15 November 1911 BY B. A. C. “THE South Coast of this State abounds in beauty spots, and though in a trip as far as Bulli only the fringe of Illawarra — truly called the garden of New South Wales — might be said to be touched upon, or…
OBITUARY HARRY CAIGER South Coast Times Thursday 16 June 1949 WITH the death last Thursday of Mr. Harry Caiger, of 361 Main Road, Clifton, this district and particularly the northern section, has lost one who throughout his 50 years’ residence has given splendid public service and one whose place in the life of the community…
Looking Back 