Parramatta Road photography exhibition | Lyndal Irons

Oh I Know It Oh So Well!

I was born about a half a kilomtre from Parramatta Road in Stanmore in 1957.

The story goes that when my mother went into labour my father, who was one of the old fashioned railway men that inhabited the area at the time, suggested she needed a "pony" (which was a seven ounce beer and lemonade), to settle herself down prior to attending hospital.


So off they trotted to the Elswick Hotel on Parramatta Rd for a quick one.

Something tells me is was not my mother who needed the settler.

So with a bit of Irish blood cursing through my veins, in more ways then one, I entered the world courtesy of a midwife with the very unfortunate, but thankfully not prophetic, name of Sister Death.

Upon release I was taken back to Carrington Street Petersham where, with Nan and Great Aunty Winnie, my parents and I lived till we moved way out west to Berala (11kms from the CBD!) in the dark of Christmas Eve 1959. We moved in the dark apparently because we had no furniture and mum didn't want the new neighbours gossipping.

Of course we visited every weekend and, not long after we moved, my Grandmother and Great Aunty moved right on to Parramatta Road opposite the old Tooths Brewery on Taverners Hill, Petersham. A prestige car yard now sits on the site of the old place.

It was a different world Parramatta Rd back in the early 60's. The volume of traffic was nowhere near what it is today. On the many occasions when we stayed over, as dear old dad had enjoyed himself so much with his local mates that we missed the last train out west, there was hardly a car to seen on the road after 9pm.

In the linked to article about a picture exhibition of Parramatta Rd,  Macdonalds is mentioned. Well back in the early sixties we had an old fashioned 50's style American drive-in Diner next to the brewery. It was straight out of Grease with a mini juke box in each booth and the old Drive-In  movies style hook on window speakers for the cars in the carpark. You can keep your Macdonalds for fun let me tell you.

In the article there is also a picture of a street sign embedded in the concrete on the corner of Crystal Street and Parramatta Road at Stanmore.

I can remember standing on that in '62 because that was the centre of the universe. Pubs everywhere, the Leichhardt stadium that had the best fight nights (kids could go and did in great numbers.) The Crystal Palace dance hall (Ballroom if you please!) just up the street and the picture show across the road.

And the shops. It was even then like walking in a time tunnel going into them. My Dad's other aunt had this fabulous shop just down from Crystal St on Parramatta Rd that we frequented quite a lot. I can't recall what she sold, if she sold anything, because I can never remember seeing a customer walk in. But it was very Dickensian I can tell you, dark and dusty. But there were bigger stores too all glass fronts and prim and proper staff.

The people were different then in that area. Lot's of heavy drinking Railway and Tram workers who lived in the Pubs more than they did at home. A lot of 40 something returned WW2 returned serviceman I recall. They played hard but were great people. Two up was ubiquitous every Friday night and Saturdays were race days, blaring radios (no Fox TAB) and chock full pubs with men wearing ties and hats. Illegal bookies were thicker then punters. There were "cockatoos" on all the pub corners. My dad knew them all having for a short time been a bit of a lad himself in the 40's and 50's along with his best mate "Buick Eddie", quite the spiv, the only bloke to have rolled his car on Parramatta Rd without another in sight. I wonder what could have been the cause of that? lol.

Saturdays, when Mum was along, we always walked from nan's into the city to Woolworth's cafteria on George St (an extension of Parramatta Rd) and let me tell you that was better than any fancy restaurant and the place for the upwardly mobile working class to be seen, you even had to get dressed up, and if I had anymore Brylcream in my hair I would have been an environmental hazard. I wonder if my knees looked knobbly in my pressed shorts (pulled up around my throat) and my long socks?

There all gone now, the characters, the war heroes, the stay at home mums, the hard working and playing men, great Aussies all of them, and Parramatta Rd will never be the same.

I am glad Lyndal Irons used artistry to capture it as it is today because today will be someone's long off yesterday, like it is now for me, and memories are not time or era dependent.

Rest in Peace all those people I knew and vale to a Magnificent Queen one who has fallen on less then regal times.

 Parramatta Rd: Thanks for the memories.

Photos Lyndal Irons


Parramatta Road photography exhibition Lyndal Irons