Epilogue

Roslyn Street, Kings Cross, 7 June 2021

In the final month before my exhibition, I realised that I cannot visit all of Sydney’s streets with female names. I would have liked to go to Sandy Glen, Nadine Close, Kerry Avenue or Kim Street because I know women with these names who might possibly visit the exhibition and should find a photo with their name. But this would have meant to do many more trips to far-away suburbs. Looking at some of them on Google maps also told me that these streets are mostly residential and very similar to each other. I took some screenshots from the map, but that was not the original idea. So the most logical moment to stop was with the exhibition Random Discoveries in April 2021.

There were also a few streets in my vicinity that I had missed. One of them was Roslyn Street in Kings Cross. This street has a lot of memories for me as I lived nearby in Macleay Street when I had come to Sydney in 1997. It marks the beginning of my life in this city. That’s why I want to include it here at the end of this journal.

In those days the street was busy by day and night. There was the Café Amsterdam at the corner to a small lane. Smoking was still allowed in cafés and bars then. In the ‘Amsterdam’ people often smoked other stuff than just cigarettes. Next door was the Baron’s, a bar to chill out late at night. On the other side of the street was the Piccolo Bar, an iconic café since 1952. The owner Vittorio himself was always present, making cups of coffee and chatting with customers.

My visit today is not the first one since the heady days of the late 1990s. I’ve been here many times and know that the ‘Amsterdam’ and ‘Barons’ are long gone. Instead, there is a commercial building by the Architects Durbach Block which won the Harry Seidler Award. It is impressive but somehow cold and impersonal. At least on my last visits, Vittorio was still there, sitting outside of his café and talking to his friends.

This time, after lock-outs and lockdowns the street looks sad. The Piccolo Bar is closed, and newspapers boarding up the windows. I heard that Vittorio has retired and wants to sell it.

It is the beginning of June 2021 and I don’t know yet that the longest lockdown is still to come.

Know my name

March and April 2021

By March I was mainly hunting for street names. My exhibition was going to open on 17th April at Articulate project space in Leichhardt. Over the months of working on the project, I became more and more aware that the accumulation of female street names is a powerful statement as such. This had to manifest itself visually in the exhibition. I had mostly taken photos of the things I encountered in the streets and the signs just occasionally. It was only a few weeks ago that I realised I needed many more of those. I visited Penrith and Fairfield, Chester Hill, and Greenacre to name a few because there are clusters of female names in these suburbs. I think they were just taken out of the hat to name the many new streets in the sprawling residential developments over the last 30 years or so.

Streets named in the 19th century mostly refer to Colonial interests. Elizabeth Street which goes from the CBD to Zetland is named after the first wife of Governor Macquarie. Many of the countless Victoria roads and streets in Sydney would have been named after Queen Victoria, among them the one in Marrickville. There was a push from the Inner West Council last year to rename such streets with Aboriginal names.

But apart from Victoria and a few princesses, the naming of the older streets took place on a more domestic level. From what I could find in the online history archives, they were named after relatives of early property developers. One of them was Joshua Josephson, the son of a convict, who became a musician, a solicitor and the Mayor of Sydney at some stage. In Newtown, many streets were named after his daughters, his stepsister and his brother’s wife.

I found only one street with a first and a surname: Lilian Fowler Place in Marrickville. She was Australia’s first female mayor, serving as the mayor of Newton from 1937 to 1939. It seemed to show that Sydney doesn’t acknowledge the achievement of women in their naming of places. A historian pointed out later that some women may be mentioned only by their surname. But this is a half-hearted homage. Who would know that Lawson Avenue in Marrickville is named after Louisa Lawson? A poet, writer and feminist and the mother of Henry Lawson. But this is an entirely different area of research. Instead, I took the liberty to claim some of the street names as female, when they might have been someone’s surname, a flower or a place.

For the exhibition, I installed rows of photos with street signs running along the gallery walls like roads. Another part was to put a second set of photos into alphabetically labelled boxes. Visitors were encouraged to look for their name or for any woman’s name who has a meaning to them and take the photo home.

Ruby and Harriett

Harriett and Ruby St, Marrickville on Wednesday, 17 March 2021

Ruby and Harriett are neighbours. In between is an industrial strip of Carrington Road. While Harriett is a rather unassuming, residential street, Ruby has an unusual feature. The street has a higher and a lower part which is divided by an old sandstone wall. Above runs a path that reminds me very much of places I have seen in France. It feels like being in a village.

Alfreda on the beach

Alfreda Street, Coogee on Tuesday, 9 March 2021

Alfreda goes down to the ocean. Everything is geared toward beach life. It has holiday flats, a shop for diving equipment and a busy parking officer. He slipped into my photo unnoticed when I took a shot of the buildings.

Angel

Angel Street, Newtown on Friday, 5 March 2021

This street has a lot of variety, considering that it’s only small. Here is the old, derelict factory which you can see from the platform of Newtown Station. It must be one of the last abandoned industrial sites in Sydney still standing untouched. Further down is a community garden before the street turns into a footpath with a village feel to it. I imagine the two empty shops at a corner to have been the butcher and the baker in days long ago. The news agency was in the next street. I recognise it from the peeling ‘Daily Telegraph’ sign.

Where the sun never shines

Alberta St, CBD on Thursday, 25 February 2021

Alberta is a narrow alley between high buildings where the sun never shines. Definitely not today. It just stopped raining. The clouds are dark and there are puddles on the pavement. In the past, this would have been an area for warehouses. The Teahouse, which stood empty for years, is still there across Wentworth Avenue. I find a few pleasant things though. When I turn around a corner, I see a colourful mural with pink trees and purple mountains. There are bright green teapots in the window of a closed café. Next to it is an Italian bar with old movie posters. I should go there one day.

Finding Buddha

Blacktown/Seven Hills/Toongabbie on Sunday, 28 February 2021

A hot Sunday that I could be spending at the beach, but instead I’m street name hunting in Western Sydney. I have come to that stage where I’m more or less ticking off streets to add to the long list of female names as this is now going to be a part of my exhibition in April. I left quite early to be able to be back by lunchtime for other things. I ended up spending the whole day in the Blacktown area.

I start with Jane Street which is near the railway line at the backside of Blacktown College. There are some industrial estates behind high fences, among them the ‘Mortuary Embalming & Funeral Services’. Someone is sitting in their car with a running engine for the air conditioning and playing with their phone or maybe reading. Another car arrives and parks. Why do I think a group of tough guys will get out of the car? It’s only a young couple. Maybe they live in the nearby flats. I can’t see any shops. I must be on the wrong side of the track.

Blacktown has a long list of female names and I follow them strategically, identifying on the map where the clusters of these streets are. It never takes me to the centre of Blacktown but leads me to find more names in Seven Hills. On the way, I encounter a Buddha painting in Robina Street, next to a discarded bathtub.

And suddenly I’m in Toongabbie because of Cornelia Road. That’s the name of a friend. This area features names from ancient Rome. The main shopping strip seems to be in Aurelia Street, near the train station. There are mainly Indian shops. In Claudia Road, unexpectedly in the middle of suburbia, is a small shopping centre in a country town style. There is an IGA store and a Pizzeria with lots of people sitting outside and having lunch. It has a nice feel to it. At the corner of Valda Street, a group of old people sit together on the front verandah. An elderly couple, dressed in black, just left from there. I imagine it to be a wake.

The fence at the end of the world

Emma Street, Leichhardt on Sunday, 14 February 2021

I have noticed Emma Street a while ago. At the upper end, it feels to me like stepping into a surreal film setting. The world seemingly ends here at a wooden fence, just as the German folk saying went when I was a child. This part of Leichhardt is on a hill before the land slopes down into a valley, so that from a certain angle you only see blue sky above the fence. The deserted colonial house with its verandah on stilts contributes to the bizarre scene.

Ada

Ada Place, Ultimo on Thursday, 4 February 2021

When I went to the Lord Wolseley Hotel last year, I noticed for the first time that there is an Ultimo part of Ada Place. The end near the hotel has kept its historic character with rows of cottages. Some sandstone, others nicely painted in white, pink, yellow, and cream. Plants in pots on the footpath. The only things disturbing the beauty are the rubbish bins. But I think it might still look more pleasant now than it did 100 years ago.

The Pyrmont and Ultimo part must have been connected once. The street seems to end at the overpasses in grey concrete with the glowing sculpture underneath. Beyond I discover that Ada Place indeed goes on as a small path at the backside of apartment blocks with lots of trees and greenery. It ends at Allen Street, a motorway exit off the Anzac Bridge. On the other side is the Pyrmont part of Ada Place which I discovered in April last year.

Succulents and Pomegranates

Alexandra Road, Glebe on Monday, 1 February 2021

Alexandra goes down to Jubilee Park at the bay. People grow their hobby plants in the front gardens. It’s a hot day. A chubby young man in pink shorts and a fancy hat is walking on the footpath and singing very loudly to himself. He has earphones on and he’s singing along with a song, completely out of tune.

Is this Emily?

Emily Street, Leichhardt on Saturday, 30 January 2021

Emily is small and quiet. It runs off Catherine Street near Parramatta Road. People have used the nature strip on the footpath to grow plants. A small sunflower has lost all its petals and some seeds and looks like a sad little girl in a green dress. Maybe it’s Emily?

Something to do

Amy Street, Marrickville on Friday, 29 January 2021

When I arrive in Amy Street it was raining heavily. At the end of the street is a playground and beyond an oval which is being resurfaced. The lawn has been removed, bulldozers are lined up. Two teenage girls are making their way down to the oval despite the rain. Maybe they’re going to sit in the Grand Stand under the roof? It’s still school holidays. You need to do something with your time off.

Down the "Olive"

Caroline Street, Balmain on Thursday, 21 January 2021

Caroline Street has a deserted-looking 60s block of flats. But if I took a photo, somebody would have watched me from inside through the dusty windows and broken blinds. And while I am thinking this, someone actually does come bursting out through the front door. Instead of asking the expected suspicious questions, he greets me very friendly like an old mate and rushes away. There is another almost derelict house where a down-at-heel-looking woman just enters. Otherwise, most places look neat.

Caroline Lane leads down to the former Colgate Palmolive factory at the waterfront. It has been converted into luxury apartments. The factory was established at this location in 1923. Local residents made up most of the staff. According to interviews with former employees ‘everyone had a cousin down the “Olive”’.

Ref: Lackey and Vardabasso, Down the ‘Olive: A memory of Colgate-Palmolive in Balmain, New South Wales, 1994.

Hot Asphalt

Crystal Street, Rozelle on Thursday, 21 January 2021

Crystal is a U-shaped, small street between Wellington and Terry ending at Victoria Road. It seems to be hard to reach, coming from the city by car. Maybe that’s why it still looks like a remnant of old times in the midst of new developments. Not in the sense of historical buildings, but rather something thrown together haphazardly and then forgotten. There is a mix of modest homes and local industry. One of them is a panel beating shop. So there must be a way for the initiated to get in here with their cars.

In fact, the difficulty reaching this spot at the moment is due to the extensive road works happening in Victoria Road. The pungent odour of hot tar is drifting over from the construction site. The smell should be unpleasant, but I almost like it. It brings back memories of playing in the streets in my hometown Hamburg, when, in hot summers, the asphalt melted in the heat.

Frog Hollow

Ann Street, Surry Hills on Saturday, 16 January 2021

I am back in Ann Street after that time in March last year in the middle of the first lockdown, when I didn’t dare to get out of the car. It’s a sunny Saturday. There are not many people and not many cars, and plenty of parking spots. But when I turn around the corner into Commonwealth Street I see lots of young people queuing up for something. I’m curious but I don't go nearer to ask. We just recently had a new outbreak in the Northern Beaches and now have to wear masks in a crowd. And people don’t like to talk to strangers anymore.

The quiet street bathed in sunlight, containing the heat between the buildings, makes it hard to imagine the surroundings 100 years ago. Now, most of the small terraces are neat, with security grills and nicely painted doors and geraniums flowering on balconies. Only the imagination can strip this away and go back to the times when Frog Hollow was the most horrible slum in Surry Hills from about 1900 to 1925 and even later.

Ann Street bordered Frog Hollow on the lower side. Originally there was a creek and swampy ground. Although not suited for housing, the gully was developed by greedy speculators. The houses were dark, damp and overcrowded and only accessible by steep stairs with poorly lit, narrow laneways.

It was home or headquarters for many gangsters, one of them Samuel ‘Jewey’ Freeman, the leader of the Riley Street Gang. Kate Leigh became his lover in 1913, then a thief and prostitute who would later rule the crime scene of Sydney together with her rival Tilly Devine.

Frog Hollow is now a park. The old stairs, leading down from Riley and Albion Street, are still there.

And the times they are a-changin'

Fanny Place, Surry Hills on Friday 15 January 2021

It’s a small lane, lined by neat, freshly painted houses. People who live here meet for a glass of wine outside on Sunday evenings, as I discovered one day when coming past by coincidence. Today a plaque in the small playground tells me that the area became a desired address in the 1830s. In the 1860s mechanics, shopkeepers and skilled artisans moved in. And by the turn of the 20th century, it was an overcrowded slum. Now Fanny Place looks gentrified and rather wealthy.

The plaque doesn’t tell me that this was and always will be Gadigal land.

Olivia

Olivia Lane, Surry Hills on Friday, 15 January 2021 and 17 April 2020

I have gone back to Olivia Lane to get a photo of the street name for my exhibition project. My first visit was in the early weeks of the first lockdown in April 2020. I didn’t post my journal then, because I didn’t get any interesting photos. This lane shows mainly the backside of houses, fences and garage doors.

At one end it leads to Devonshire Street and the new tramline. When I look around the corner I notice a red armchair has replaced the discarded mattress from last year. This was the meeting place for a group of skateboarders, and maybe it still is. The only other person I saw then was a girl, about 8 years old, dancing all by herself a kind of hip-hop dance, pretty good. When I came nearer I heard that she was dancing to “Don’t worry, be happy”. She stopped and smiled at me. I smiled back and said “very nice”. She also had hopscotch squares drawn on the asphalt. She seemed to know how to keep up her spirits in those scary and lonely times.

Cecilia

Cecilia Street, Marrickville on Tuesday, 5 January 2021

From the corner of Cecilia Street, the view goes to the Marrickville Town Hall and a winged goddess on a pedestal in front.

The street is a cul-de-sac, ending with a block of units. It looks almost like a gated community. There are two long rows of garbage bins lined up on the side of the footpath. A young man comes out from the property, rolling a bin to join the others. He’s wearing a mask and a turban and looks suspiciously at me. I don’t know why as I haven’t even taken any photos yet. I think it’s this aimless, slow walking and looking around, this loitering in a place without an apparent purpose that is suspicious. I turn around but observe that he is appearing again and again, one bin at a time. A tedious job.

Still Christmas

Florence Street, St Peters on Tuesday, 5 January 2021

In Florence Street, the Christmas decorations are still in full swing. Especially at the property of a Rabbitoh supporter who has the green, red and white club flag in his window. In front is a chrèche with life-size figures and a lot of plaster animals.

The owner comes out of his house. He can’t possibly be angry about me taking photos when his display is screaming for attention. ‘Nice decorations’, I say to him. “Yeah. It has to come down now”.

Many more people have decorations on their front porches and even in the trees on the footpath. Only one place has a lot of junk. Broken timber, flower pots, and scrap metal piled up on the porch and in the driveway, even on top of a tarpaulin-covered car. Does someone still live in this barricaded house?

Adelheid

Adelaide Street and Place, Surry Hills on Saturday, 12 December 2020

In the 1920s and 30s, two women ruled the crime scene of illegal alcohol and drugs in Sydney. Tilly Devine in Darlinghurst and Kate Leigh in Surry Hills. Kate Leigh had a sly grog shop at 212 Devonshire Street in the flat above her fruit and veggie shop. Adelaide Place is just around the corner.

Places in Australia named Adelaide might refer rather to the city than a female name. But in fact, the city is named after the German princess Adelheid who married the English King William IV.

The houses in this street are pretty. Some have blue or yellow window frames. Bougainvillea is growing over garden fences. Further down is a colossal building occupying a whole block. I notice cubist-looking concrete ornaments intersecting the facade. I read that it is the former Readers’ Digest office and a highly significant modernist building, designed by architect John James, sculptor Douglas Annand and landscape architect Bruce Mackenzie. The construction was completed in 1967.

At the back of the building in Adelaide Place are cast iron statues with bull horns, reminiscent of ancient cult symbols. On the opposite side, a white-painted brick wall is covered with tags. Posters announce the upcoming Sydney Festival in January 2021. Walking towards Devonshire Street, I pass small houses, one a sandstone cottage that must be quite old. Somewhere two ibises are watching from the balustrade of a balcony. Around the corner, I find Kate Leigh’s former shop. It’s now called Jazzy Café Bar and is closed until further notice because of COVID. According to an online travel guide, it was the ‘Sly’, just a few years earlier. It probably had many incarnations since Kate Leigh died in 1964.

For Tilly Devine see the entry about Charlotte Lane, Darlinghurst published on 13 May 2022.