Below is a 1973 photograph of the Greater Sydney region taken from a Satellite in orbit 318 miles (599 kilometres) above the Earth. This photograph was published in The Daily Telegraph on May 15, 1973. The aerial photo also encompasses Gosford, Newcastle, and part of the Hunter Valley.
Below is a newspaper advertisement promoting apartments for sale in the Twin Tower Eastgate Gardens complex at Bondi Junction from 1988. Two-bedroom apartments were on offer from $330 000 but were "very limited".
Below is a 1972 newspaper advertisement promoting a four-bedroom home at Beauty Point (Mosman) for $95,000. According to the RBA Inflation Calculator, this was equivalent to paying the buyer around $1.5 million today. The vendor was Andrew Spring & Co.
Highlights of the 1999 Royal Easter Show
Opening Day
Robosaurus
Robosaurus made his second Easter Show appearance following his 1994 visit. Daytime and evening sessions gave showgoers plenty of opportunities to see him in action. However, Robosaurus would not return until 2010.
Good Friday
Like the previous year, it was a wet day for the show, with 74,000 passing through the turnstiles by 5pm, down 10,000 on the previous year. At the last show in Moore Park (1997), 164 980 attended on Good Friday.
Fortunately, no events were cancelled despite the poor weather.
Source: Dent, J. 1999. "Ennui rains on Friday's parade". The Sydney Morning Herald, April 3: 4.
The Easter Show Wedding
How many attended?
Around one million attended, down from the previous year's record, but historically it would rate as one of the highest-attended shows. The attendance could have rivalled the record if the weather had been more favourable.
What was consumed?
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| Above: The cover of the preview guide published in The Sun Herald on 21 March 1999. |
This week, I will focus on key facts and the showbags, and I will share feature articles next week. For those following the series redevelopment of East Circular Quay, it will resume on Easter Monday (1 April)
Date: 26 March to 10 April 1999
The Easter Show ran for 16 days in 1997 and 1998, and it will run for 12 days in 2024.
Admission
In part six of our series, focusing on the redevelopment of East Circular Quay, I am going to focus on 1989 and 1990 as Colonial Mutual Life (CML) undertook further acquisitions of buildings and sites on the block and proposed their plans to redevelop the site.
Last week, I posted this article from The Sydney Morning Herald from 1988 because it focused on why Unilever House was demolished. The article focused on CML acquiring Lend Lease House for $57 million, which adjoined Bennelong House, which it already owned.
Source: Sing, T. & Chancellor, J. 1988. "Space bonus for Quay block". The Sydney Morning Herald, June 7: 34.
In February 1989, it was reported in The Sydney Morning Herald that CML had purchased another three sites - Hope House, 35-37 Macquarie Street and Unilever Hotel Site. All purchases were undertaken separately and had cost CML $250 million.
Source: Chancellor, J. 1989. "The best block of land in the country cost only $250m". The Sydney Morning Herald, February 10: 1.
Therefore, the purchases would extinguish the hotel that was to replace Unilever House and the Jedobo development next door.
CML presented their plans to redevelop the now combined site that same year to Sydney City Council, though it would be the following year before the first plans were made public.
Source: Chancellor, J. 1990. "Controversial plan for Circular Quay East like a 'wingless 747'". The Sydney Morning Herald, October 24: 8.
The plans were leaked to the public and were "likened to a wingless 747 about to hit the Opera House". The architect was Dino Burattini, the architect behind Melbourne's Rialto Towers and the State Bank Building (52 Martin Place) in Martin Place. The building would rise up to 30 storeys tall.
While that plan didn't get off the ground, CML Would unveil a more realistic scheme the following year, which will be the focus of the next entry in the series. However, next week, with the Royal Easter Show due to commence, I will spend two weeks looking at the 1999 Royal Easter Show as I turn back the clock a quarter of a century.
Entries in this series
