.post-timestamp{display:none;}

Sydney, NSW, Photos: 1850s-2023


George Street, Sydney, NSW, in the 1850s

Millers Point - Parramatta River from the Flagstaff [1858] [Handcoloured view, looking across Millers Point to Lord Nelson Hotel on right, with Whalers Arms in centre and Albion House beyond] State Library of New South Wales
Views of Circular Quay, looking west, Sydney, NSW, Taken circa 1859, State Library of New South Wales
Campbell's Wharf, Sydney, NSW, Taken circa 1859, State Library of New South Wales

1860s

Blanket [Aboriginal man], ca. 1865-1866 / photograph by Morris & Billing London Saloon, 251 Pitt Street, Sydney, SLNSW
Wynyard Square, Sydney, NSW, 1862
Packhorse Hotel at 20 Campbell St, Sydney, NSW, in 1860s.
Bible Hall and Australian Mutual Provident Society, 87 Pitt Street Sydney, NSW, c 1860s. Demolished 1912. State Library NSW
Circular Quay, Sydney Harbour, NSW, c 1868, Australian National Maritime Museum on The Commons

1870s

A view in 1870s of Sydney, NSW, looking south towards Darling HarbourA view in 1870s of Sydney, looking south towards Darling Harbour
Macquarie Street, Sydney, NSW, in the 1870s. Taken from the corner of Albert Street, looking towards Circular Quay. SLNSW
Dawes Battery, Sydney, NSW c: 1870s, SLNSW
Rushcutters Bay, east view along New South Head Road with horse and cart at the tollgates. The Aboriginal settlement was behind the stone cottage centre left, 1870s, Sydney, NSW
Read about the Aboriginal settlements here 
Sydney University, Parramatta Rd, NSW, 1870s
The Albert Cricket Ground, Redfern, NSW, 1870s, SLNSW
Queens Theatre, York Street, Sydney 1870s, SLNSW
Broadway in Sydney, NSW, in the early 1870s.The Railway Family Hotel at 825 George St is in the background
Workmen assembled in front of P. N. Russell Engineering works, Sydney, NSW, c. 1872, State Library of New South Wales

1880s

George St, Sydney, NSW, 1880s
Sydney west side and Darling Harbour, NSW, in the 1880s
Chinese Hawker in Sydney, NSW, 1880s SLNSW (by Arthur Syer in Millers Point)
Bond St looking east (Sydney CBD), 1880s. SLNSW
George Street, Sydney, NSW, in the 1880s. This photo (taken apparently at 1PM) is looking towards Martin Place, NSWGOV
George Street near Hunter Street, Sydney, NSW,1880s, SLNSW
Group of nine Aboriginal people in their camp, Sydney Harbour, New South Wales [picture] / C. Bayliss, Created/Published [188-?] NLAUST
Sydney ferries METEOR and ROSE and COURIER at Circular Quay and Mort & Co Ltd wool store bewteen 1887 and 1889. Public Domain Image

1890s
Children in Street from Sydney, NSW, ca. 1885-1890 / photographed by Arthur K. Syer 
Elizabeth and King Streets Sydney, NSW, 1890s SLNSW
Staged corroboree, Sydney, 1892, Kerry, Charles H. (Charles Henry), 1858-1928 UQ
Blind musicians, Sydney, NSW, 1894, | State Library of NSW
File:Sydney Cricket Ground, Sydney, NSW, 1895.jpg - Wikimedia Commons
THE SYDNEY CONTINGENT PASSING ALONG GEORGE STREET, SYDNEY Australasian (Melbourne, Vic. : 1864 - 1946), Saturday 24 April 1897
Hunter Street, Sydney, NSW, Sydney Mail and New South Wales Advertiser (NSW : 1871 - 1912), Saturday 7 January 1899

1900s

St. Andrews and Town Hall Sydney, NSW, 1900s. NAA
George Street, Sydney, NSW, looking from The GPO in Martin Place.1900. SLNSW
HEAVY TRAFFIC IN CASTLEREAGH-STREET, NEAR THE KING-STREET CROSSING. Sydney, NSW, Sydney Mail and New South Wales Advertiser (NSW : 1871 - 1912), Saturday 28 December 1901
Sydney Female Refuge, Pitt Street Haymarket, Sydney, NSW, circa 1901. Special citation
The Sydney Female Refuge was established in 1848, providing shelter for thousands of ‘fallen’ women including abandoned mothers, sex workers and the homeless. It was hoped inmates would morally reform by working long hours in the laundry and through religious instruction. Of the 42 women admitted in 1900, 11 became domestic servants, 15 left willingly, 7 returned to their parents and 9 were sent to hospitals. City of Sydney
PITT AND KING STREKT8 CROSSING, WHERE IT IS PROPOSED TO HAVE A SUBWAY. Sydney Mail and New South Wales Advertiser (NSW : 1871 - 1912), Saturday 28 December 1901
DISCHARGING THE CARGO OF THE VENTURA AT CIRCULAR QUAY. .Sydney Mail and New South Wales Advertiser (NSW : 1871 - 1912), Saturday 19 October 1901
Chinese in Sydney, NSW, Sydney Mail and New South Wales Advertiser (NSW : 1871 - 1912), Wednesday 25 February 1903
Panorama of Circular Quay, Sydney, NSW, from a ship's mast, 1903, by Melvin Vaniman
Sydney Ladies' Cricket Team, Sydney Mail and New South Wales Advertiser (NSW : 1871 - 1912), Wednesday 12 October 1904
Manly Beach, NSW, 1905, Australian National Maritime Museum on The Commons
Municipal Baths (Domain baths) , c1908, City of Sydney, NSW (The first free public baths, known variously as the Domain Baths, Corporation Bath, or the Fig Tree Baths, were built here in 1858 by Sydney City Council, as a public health measure in the days before indoor plumbing. Although some people did swim, most patrons used the seawater baths to keep clean)

WWI

 Sydney Troops, NSW, Australasian (Melbourne, Vic. : 1864 - 1946), Saturday 5 June 1915
Troops returning to Sydney after World War I, c.1919,  Coffs Harbour Regional Museum

1920s

Children riding billycarts down a street, Sydney, NSW, ca. 1920s. NLA
Central Station in Sydney, NSW, Australia. 1920s.
Sun Herald newspapers being loaded onto lorries, O'Connell Street, Sydney, NSW, ca. 1920s
Sydney's trams at Circular Quay Sydney, NSW, 1920s
O'Connell Street, looking in the direction of Pitt Street, Sydney, NSW. 1920s, SLNSW.
Construction workers using a pulley during the construction of the Sun Newspaper Building, Elizabeth Street, Sydney, NSW, ca. 1929, SLNSW

1930s

Sydney Harbour Bridge under construction, NSW, 1930, NLAUST
Backyards full of washing in the slums, Sydney, NSW, ca. 1930. Fairfax Corporation
Slum area at the back of St. Vincents Hospital, Darlinghurst, Sydney, 7 December 1932, SLAUST
Unemployed man sitting outside a tent reading underneath drying washing during the Great Depression at Domain Park, Sydney, 1932, Fairfax
People and traffic in Martin Place, Sydney, NSW, ca. 1930s, NLA
Railway Square 1930s, Sydney, NSW, Sam Hood, SLNSW
George street looking South near Angel Place, Sydney, NSW, 1930s. City of Sydney
Aboriginal Australians from La Perouse at the Sydney Sports Ground, New South Wales, 1936, NLA
Aborigines day of mourning, Sydney, NSW, 26 January 1938, State Library of New South Wales
Douglas Grant, draughtsman and soldier, with his ornamental pond and Harbour Bridge, Callan Park, between 1932-1940 / photographer Sam Hood. Douglas Grant was orphaned in a tribal battle or some say, in punitive action. He had a good education and became a clever draughtsman. After working at Mort's dock he enlisted twice, because of bureaucratic rules for Aboriginal Australians and joined the 13th Battalion. He was taken prisoner at Bullecourt. He worked in several locations when he returned until the time of this photograph, when he was a clerk at Callan Park Hospital. He built the pond and bridge shown here as a war memorial to his fallen comrades. A popular member of his battalion, Grant had also impressed his German captors as a man of superior intellect; to his fellow prisoners he was aggressively Australian. His attainments included a wide knowledge of Shakespeare and poetry and considerable skill as an artist and bagpipe-player. He was an exceptional man.

1940s

March of the Second AIF through Sydney, NSW, Newcastle Morning Herald and Miners' Advocate (NSW : 1876 - 1954), Friday 5 January 1940
 PROUD of being a soldier. Private J. T. Patten', president of the Aborigines' Progress Association, who has joined the 2nd A.I.F., photographed in the Domain yesterday with his wife.Daily Telegraph (Sydney, NSW : 1931 - 1954), Monday 8 January 1940
Mid 1940s George Street, Broadway, NSW, showing the Australian Hotel which was constructed in 1937 and is still standing to this day. (City of Sydney Archives)
George Street, Sydney, NSW, 1940s
Maintenance worker Stan Giddings painting the Sydney Harbour Bridge. Sydney, NSW, Australia. 18 September 1945. Photographed by Alec Iverson
8 May 1945, when news of Germany's surrender reached Sydney, within a few minutes the air was filled with fluttering paper falling on Martin Place, Castlereagh and Pitt Streets, Sydney, NSW.
HIRE CAR DRIVER. Mrs. D. Calderwood has been driving hire cars for King's Cross firm for two years. Drives 400 miles a week, longest trip was 500 miles to Cobar. Husband, who drives taxi, says she's Sydney's best woman-driver. Daily Telegraph (Sydney, NSW : 1931 - 1954), Thursday 31 January 1946

1950s

 Aboriginal Becomes Tram Girl THE pretty 19 year old girl, Joan Byard pictured below, last Wednesday fulfilled her ambition by becoming the first aboriginal conductress on Sydney trams. Sunday Herald (Sydney, NSW : 1949 - 1953), Sunday 29 January 1950
 GREEK WAR HERO MEETS SYDNEY MAN HE RESCUED. A Greek hero and a Sydney ex-serviceman whom he harbored for five months during the war, met and parted today after seeing each other for the first time for 10 years. Sun (Sydney, NSW : 1910 - 1954), Monday 16 April 1951
R1 car in Liverpool Street, Sydney, NSW, c.1950s
Queen Elizabeth arrives at the Cenotaph, Sydney, during the Royal Visit, 1954 / photographer Jack Hickson, State Library of New South Wales
Remembering Sydney's Trams - Elizabeth Street near St James Railway Station, Sydney, NSW, about 1958 John Cowper
From Missenden Road along King Street, Newtown toward Erskineville Road, during the early 1950s. City of Sydney Archives
Easter Parade, George Street Sydney, NSW, 1957, Sydney City

1960s

Sydney traffic, NSW, c.1960 (4463463511).jpg - Wikimedia Commons
Title: Road traffic to York St. View to Lottery Office, Sydney, NSW, Dated: 1 Nov 1961
Speakers' Corner, Domain, Sydney [picture] / Raymond de Berquelle, Created/Published 1964-1970,  Speakers' Corner was established in the eastern end of The Domain near the Art Gallery of NSW in 1878. No copyright
Queen Elizabeth II, and Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh at the Sydney Showground, NSW, during their 1963 royal tour of Australia. SLNSW
Old Sydney William St, NSW, 1968, Alistair Paterson
Sydney, NSW, 1968, wilford peloquin

1970s

Australia Square Sydney, NSW, 1970, wilford peloquin
Construction of the Sydney Opera House, Sydney, N.S.W. - circa 1970, Aussie~mobs
File:70-673, Sydney, NSW, 1970.- Wikimedia Commons
Sydney, NSW, 1971
Sydney, NSW, Sept 1976, wilford peloquin
175 Sydney 433 to Balmain at Circular Quay, Sydney, NSW, Aug 1976, wilford peloquin

1980s

Sydney, NSW, Feb, 1980. wilford peloquin
x
Sydney, NSW, 1980, Nick
Lunch time protests, Sydney, NSW, 1981, pszz
Elizabeth Street, Sydney, NSW, 1982, pszz
Sydney Harbour, Australia's Bicentenary celebrations in 1988, NSW, A6135, K4/2/88/6

1990s

Traffic on Broadway near City Road Glebe, 1990s, Sydney, NSW, City of Sydney Archives.
The Sydney Monorail in 1993, NSW, (originally TNT Harbourlink and later Metro Monorail) was a single-loop monorailin Sydney, Australia, that connected Darling Harbour, Chinatown and the Sydney central business and shopping districts. It opened in July 1988 and closed in June 2013

2000s

Sydney Monorail train on Pyrmont Bridge, NSW, 2009, https://www.panoramio.com/photo/20298345
China Town, Sydney, NSW, 2009, Barendpt
Circular Quay Sydney, NSW, Australia, 2011, Bernard Spragg. NZ
Sydney Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras, Sydney, NSW, 2012
Cockle Bay, Sydney, NSw, is a small bay in inner-city Sydney, New South Wales, Australia. It is located on the western edge of the Sydney central business district, 2015.
Pitt Street Mall, Sydney, NSW, 2016
Sydney, NSW, January 2020
March 31, 2020, Sydney, NSW
Sydney, Queen Victoria Building, NSW
Sydney Invasion Day Rally, 26 Jan. 2023