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.

Time Capsule 2003

Amelia Street, Waterloo on Monday, 30 March 2020

Yellow Night in Amelia Street from the series Night Cruise, 2003

Amelia Street in 2003

This is one of the streets I went to in 2003 when I first had the idea to record streets with female names. I didn’t continue then. Recently, I found some of the photos I took at the time. One of them was from my project Night Cruise.

Amelia Street is in the middle of the new apartment complex in Waterloo where an enormous factory ground used to be, spanning several blocks. When I came to Sydney in 1997 it was deserted, still remaining like this for years. In 2003 there was the first apartment block on Lachlan Street at the end of Amelia. It must have been just about to be finished. A banner on the building fence read “Now Leasing”. Apart from this, the skyline was empty.

At the dead end of this short street was a scrap metal yard. In its place and beyond, is now the vast complex of a residential area with new streets and shops. The former office building, 24 Amelia Street, is still standing.

Three dingy little terraces are lingering on. Maybe abandoned by now. There are a lot of discarded household goods on the porches. A small lot next to them is empty, protected by a wooden fence with barbed wire on the top. At the corner is a luxury car dealer named ‘Prestige Connex’, which has been there for 28 years. Opposite were small white factory buildings and a take-away shop in 2003. Now apartment buildings have replaced them.

I observe all this from the car. It just doesn’t feel right anymore to loiter in the streets and take photos.

Metal Merchant in 2003

End of Amelia Street in 2020

2020

Ann Street, Surry Hills

2003

After that, I drive to Ann Street. This is the other one from which I’ve found a photo from 2003. It’s divided by Riley Street, leaving only a short dead-end bit at the highest end. The other longer part winds steeply downhill to Commonwealth Street. This is the neighbourhood of Ruth Park’s novel The Harp of the South. 

I have to come back here sometime in the future because today I am not getting out of the car. I park at the upper end from where I can see the crossing to Riley Street. It is 5 pm, business traffic hour, but there are almost no cars. Eery and silent. I recognise the corner where I took the photo in 2003 by the yellow railing along the footpath. It’s still yellow. The side of the building, a small terrace, is now painted a dark grey. Then it was a lighter colour and had the street sign screwed to the wall. In 2003 a few things were happening on that wall. There was a patch of white which presumably was supposed to cover some tagging. But maybe they forgot their ladder and couldn’t get high enough, as some red tagging still sneaked out at the top of that white patch. The council used to cover tags and graffiti with whatever colour. It never matched the walls. The white rectangle in Ann Street proved to be a suitable background for some more stencils, tags and writings.

I don’t think I can do this project any longer, as we are not supposed to leave our homes except for clearly defined purposes. Roaming streets, even by car, may not be part of this.

Maybe I can still do my own suburb Redfern on the way to the grocery and chemist shops?

A serious street in Surry Hills

Mary Street and Mary Lane, Surry Hills on Saturday, 7 March 2020

On the way home from East Sydney where I had my gallery tour this Saturday, I went to Mary Street. I had been in this street a bit in the past but never noticed the name. One part of Mary Street is flanked by the Centennial Plaza, an ugly, soulless office and shop complex. My first computer repair man had a shop there, so I often parked in this street. After that, it continues on past Albion and Reservoir Streets.

This narrow street is home to quite a lot of institutions. The Salvation Army Foster House, the Chinese Masonic Hall, the Australian Chinese Community Association, the NSW Teachers Federation building, a bookshop called Published Art, a few restaurants, a gym or two, and even a brewery.

I feel the street is overwhelmed by the seriousness of so many important places. It looks a bit down and depressed. 

The existence of a Chinese Masonic Hall intrigues me, so I try to find something about it. It is, like any aspect of Chinese history, multifaceted. It was built in 1911, the year when the Qing Dynasty in China came to an end and the Republic of China was formed a year later. It grew out of the Hung League, which was an ancient secret society. By the time of the foundation of the Chinese Masonic Hall, the Hung League was a strong supporter of the republican cause. Like other secret societies of China, it had been connected with crime in the 19th century, known as the Triads (their symbol is a triangle). The founding of the Masonic Hall was meant to end this association with crime and to gain respectability. 

In Mary Lane is an intoxicated young man stumbling around and trying to do something with doorways. I think to leave him in peace and don’t venture very far into it.

At least one place is offering some fun. Or maybe not when you look closer.