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Read more about the article Colin Christie, Newcastle’s musical mayor
Christie Place, Newcastle, in 1982, and Colin Christie. Portrait photo by Boddy Studios, part of the Newcastle Sun Collection held by Newcastle University's Special Collections.

Colin Christie, Newcastle’s musical mayor

Mostly assembled from research by Norm Barney and Ross Edmonds Next to Newcastle City Hall is a little park, sometimes bright with flowers, that goes by the name of Christie Place. The Christie for whom it is named is one of Newcastle's more colourful (in a good way) former mayors, Colin Christie, whose civic career was paralleled by his musical enterprises. Newcastle book collector and historical researcher Ross Edmonds recently acquired a battered old bound volume of sheet music that once belonged to this musical mayor, prompting some interest in the man behind the place name.…

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Shelley Beach, Mayfield: a casualty of industry

The rare photograph above, taken by Newcastle girl Doris Schuck in about 1919, shows Shelley Beach, on the Hunter River at Mayfield. Shelley Beach and its adjoining park were treasured by Newcastle people until overwhelming pressure from the BHP steelworks led to the public reserve being handed over to the corporate giant for reclamation and industrial expansion. These days the former park and beach are buried under tonnes of industrial fill in the approaches to the Tourle Street bridge, leading to what is now Kooragang Island.Shelley Beach fronted “Platt’s Channel”, once a broad arm of the…

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