DK Travel : Sydney : History & Culture

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Dame Joan Sutherland

Opera diva Joan Sutherland has lived in Potts Point for much of her long and prestigious career.
David Wenham

The critically-acclaimed actor is at home in Sydney’s Eastern Suburbs.
Dunbar Sinks

On a wild night in 1857, the migrant ship Dunbar, en route to Sydney from England, struck rocks near the Heads. Only one passenger survived, while 121 others drowned. It remains Australia’s worst ever maritime disaster and came as a bitter blow to the young colony.
Elizabeth Farm

Built by John and Elizabeth Macarthur (see John & Elizabeth Macarthur), this 1793 estate was once an important social, political and cultural centre. The farm’s cottage is the oldest surviving building in Australia, and is carefully furnished with reproductions of the original interiors.
Ensemble Theatre

Australia’s longest continuously running professional theatre is located in a converted boatshed on Careening Cove. The company performs a mix of local and international plays with an emphasis on ensemble values. Reliable and definitely rewarding.
Experiment Farm Cottage

Emancipated convicts James and Elizabeth Ruse established Australia’s first self-sufficient farm in 1789. In the colony’s first land grant, Governer Phillip gave them a further 12 ha (30 acres) for their efforts. The charming Colonial bungalow was built in the 1830s by the farm’s next owner, the surgeon John Harris.
Federation Pavilion

Prior to Federation on 1 January 1901, Australia was not a united nation but actually six unaligned and competing colonies, comprising New South Wales, Victoria, Tasmania, Queensland, South Australia and West Australia. This 1988 pavilion in Centennial Park marks the site of the historic original pavilion, which was right at the centre of celebrations in 1901.
First Fleet Arrives

Governor Phillip and the First Fleet of 11 ships, carrying 1,500 convicts, guards, military officials and their families, arrived at Botany Bay in 1788. Unable to find sufficient fresh water, Phillip sailed north and found one of the world’s “finest harb-ours”. The colony was established at a small cove named in honour of Phillip’s neighbour, Viscount Sydney.
Fort Denison

This small island was once named “Pinchgut” due to the meagre rations doled out to its recidivist convicts. The body of a criminal, Francis Morgan, who was executed in 1796, was left to rot out on the gallows for three years as a warning to new convicts who sailed past the island upon their arrival.
Frank Moorhouse (b. 1938)

His early stories focused on middle-class, small-town Australia, demonstrating his affinity with the “new journalism” of Americans such as Tom Wolfe. Grand Days and Dark Palace trace the aspirations and disappointments of the League of Nations through the eyes of an Australian woman.