Rozelle, White Bay Hotel
The White Bay Hotel was a historic hotel along Victoria Road, n the inner city suburb of Rozelle. It was first built in 1861, rebuilt in 1916, and refurbished in 1925 and 1933. It was popular with wharfies (wharf labourers) at the White Bay Container Terminal. After becoming landlocked by roads and with no local workers in the area, it closed in 1992. It had been waiting renovations when on 5 September 2008 it was destroyed by a suspicious fire and immediately demolished so this is a historical photo now.
Well, that's a sad story. I think it was an attractive building and of some historical significance. At least it served some useful purposes during its life. Gotta wonder who would profit from its death by fire...
ReplyDeleteAnd it has remained undeveloped since.
DeleteReduced to ashes at an opportune moment.
ReplyDeleteI wonder if it knew its future and lost the ‘h’ because it turned red with shame.
Thanks for visiting my blog.
Hi Jim, On the Glebe Island/White Bay page of my blog are a couple of paintings I did of the White Bay Hotel in the 1990s, one from the pedestrian bridge & one from the corner of Victoria Road & Mullens st. http://janebennettartist.blogspot.com.au/p/glebe-island-white-bay-paintings.html. I just sold one of them to a bloke whose dad used to run it back in the 1970s (he definitely wasn't the owner in 2008!) & he used to live in the room on the right hand side under the sign!
ReplyDeleteThanks, Jane. Always great to see your artwork of these magnificent buildings.
DeleteYou have to love capitalists and profiteers :( I bet it was demolished by goons at 3am, before it could be saved :(
ReplyDeleteThat's a shame Jim.. we've had few of those same suspicious fires over here!
ReplyDeleteI'm glad you were able to photograph it before it was demolished. It's so distressing when communities don't have a sense of their history enough to cherish treasures like this.
ReplyDeleteMe too. I usually don't bother when a building is derelict but in this case I'm glad I did.
DeleteYes, I'm glad that you took the photo when you did! Thanks for sharing this with us at WWDD :)
ReplyDelete