Merewether, New South Wales
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
 Merewether |
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| Country: | Australia |
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| State: | New South Wales |
| City Council: | Newcastle City Council |
| Ward: | 2 |
| Postcode: | 2291 |
| Surrounded by: | Hamilton South (North); Bar Beach (East); Merewether Heights (South); Adamstown (West) |
Merewether is a beach-side southern residential suburb of Newcastle, New South Wales, with a population of around 10,000. The NSW postcode is 2291. The Suburb is geographically long and thin, stretching from the beach in the east to Adamstown in the west, 6 kilometres away, and is in places only 1 km wide, north to south.
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[edit] Establishment
Merewether was originally part of the Burwood Estate, and takes its name from the owner, Edward Christopher Merewether. The Church of England parish church is St.Augustine, in Llewellyn Street, the land and cost of erection met by Mr. Edward Merewether. It became the centre of a new Provisional District in the Diocese of Newcastle in 1890. In 1891 the Census gave the population as 4,700. Merewether was incorporated as a Municipality in 1885, covering 1,110 acres and 19 miles of streets. The Mayor in 1901 was David Lloyd, a funeral director who resided in Railway Street. The former Council Chambers, opposite the Post Office, are today the clubhouse of the Australian Returned Services League. In 1938 an Act of the New South Wales Parliament created a "City of Greater Newcastle", incorporating 11 municipalities into one local government area, including Merewether.
[edit] Industries
The dominant industry within the old municipality was coal mining, with the last colliery, at the Glebe, not closing until 1959. This was served by a railway which left the main Government line in the city centre, crossed the main Hunter Street, passed down the centre of Burwood Street, crossed Newcastle's Civic Park, passed under Laman Street and continued along its own permanent way through the suburb of Cook's Hill, to The Junction, past its school then up Merewether Street embankment crossing Llewellyn, Caldwell & Ridge Streets, past the telephone exchange, up Morgan St., crossing Yule Road to the Newcastle Coal Mining Company's colliery complex. Coal mining also took place to the south of Merewether at Murdering Gully, near Burwood Beach. Access to this colliery was via a railway which ran from The Junction past Merewether Beach and through tunnels (2) directly above the Ocean Baths. This colliery closed down during the 1949 miners' strike and did not reopen.
Merewether also once had extensive pottery works and brickyards, the last to close being Hughes' Pottery, opposite The Junction School, in the last two decades of the 20th century.
[edit] Beaches
The suburb of Merewether includes some of Newcastle's most famous beaches. Dixon Park Beach leads south onto Merewether Beach and a little further to the small Ladys Beach and the more isolated Burwood Beach which leads to Glenrock Lagoon. At the southern end of Merewether Beach are the Merewether Ocean Baths, the largest ocean baths in the Southern Hemisphere.
In 2006, organisers of Newcastle Surfest announced that the competition would be moving from Newcastle Beach to Merewether Beach, in order to capitalise on the beaches superior surfing conditions, caused by the rock bottom of the beach, compared to the mud bottom of Newcastle Beach.
Professional Surfer Mark Richards is a resident of Merewether.
[edit] General
Merewether, once served by electric tramways to the city and today by buses, has excellent road connections to all sections of Newcastle and the major highways which serve it. Merewether's oldest mansion is Hillcrest, originally the residence of the Merewether family. Above it is the Scenic Drive with many expensive 'modern' homes from the late 1950s, with spectacular views.
There are three primary schools in the area - Merewether Public [State] School in Henry Street at the Glebe, the Roman Catholic Holy Family Primary School in Janet Street, and The Junction School (State). Pupils from the schools feed into the secondary schools of Newcastle High for state pupils, or the Roman Catholic St Pius X at Adamstown or the Church of England's Newcastle Grammar School for private students. The Merewether High School, an academic selective public school, is actually located in the suburb of Broadmeadow.
At Merewether is the Lingard Private Hospital, in the lower part of Merewether Street.
[edit] References
- Newcastle - 150 Years, edited by Eric Lingard, Newcastle, 1947.
- The Diocese of Newcastle, by A.P.Elkin, Sydney, 1955.
- Federal Directory of Newcastle and District for 1901, Newcastle, reprinted 1982, ISBN 0-9593518-0-9
[edit] External links
- [1] Glenrock Railway & Burwood Colliery
- [2] Newcastle City Council item on Merewether History
