If you are lucky you might find a picture of your house online, either on its own, part of a streetscape or in the background. The State Library of NSW holds this image of Bellevue at Glebe Point, saved more than once from demolition. The photo was taken in 1899 soon after it was built. The occupier is posing for the shot, indicating it’s for a family album.

1 Also digitised by Mitchell Library are Edith Blacket’s sketchbooks. The daughter of architect Edmund Blacket, Edith spent a lot of time walking around Glebe with her pencil and pad. This is The Retreat on Blackwattle Bay, drawn in 1867, a sandstone house still standing.

2 Also held by the SLNSW is this 1872 photo of twin houses in Derwent Street. This area close to filled up more quickly than the Glebe Point estates.

3 55 Glebe Street, photographed in 1962, an image online.

4 As is this, perhaps not the same shop, but the characteristic corner door and stone step and display windows are the same. The corner store is nearly always a domestic building today.

5 Your house may have been mentioned already in a Glebe Society Bulletin. To check old issues, Google Glebe Society. There’s a search pane.

6 A useful starting point is the City of archives. The collection is constantly being added to. You can check its catalogue and search tools.

7 Starting with its Investigator which will give you an idea of what’s held. I typed in Boyce Street Glebe and these items came up. Among others.

8 Still with the Archives, check for pictures. If you type Glebe, you’ll come up with thousands of images; you can then narrow your search.

9 There are some interesting collections, such as this series of people going about their daily business, in 1973

10 And Bernard Smith’s collection ca 1970. These are part of a terrace 30 – 40 Wigram Road.

11 Also from the Bernard Smith collection. St Malo, 17 Northcote Road. The caption gives its date of construction: 1908.

12 73 Ferry Rd Glebe, described as One of a pair of terraces built 1881showing decorative detail of iron lace on the balcony and wood trim around the gable.

13 You may have an original building hidden behind add-ons. These structures at 50 + 52 Glebe Point Rd were demolished in 1953.

14 Also photographed in 1953 is 14 John Street. It has been knocked down and replaced by a double storey house with a multi-storey complex next door.

15 You might see your house in a broader context. This is another photo held by the City of Sydney Archives: Bridge Rd and Ross St in 1962.

16 Maps put your house in historical context.

17 This is Glebe in 1888. You can see the shapes of the buildings and the names of the landowners.

18 This is Glebe in 1910. You can see that building density has increased with subdivision. The parklands around mansions such as Lyndhurst, Toxteth House (now St Scholasticas) have been replaced by streets and terrace housing.

19 Also online through the City of Sydney Archives is the Sands directory, published most years from 1858 to 1932. To find the previous occupants of a current address, work backwards from 1932/3. If the house is an old one, you'll find that the street numbering will have changed and that the house may have originally been known only by its name. As you track back you'll get a feeling for the progressive infilling of the land and the creation of new streets. People were employed to walk the streets, going door to door writing down the names of the householder and sometimes the occupation. If you track backwards you’ll find that your building may have been known by its name before it had a number. Sands is useful too for listing streets as they were created. Note that the names of the occupants are recorded. They might not be the owners; many people rented. There are also trade/profession listings which are useful. The Directories are online through the City of Sydney Archives.

20 Street numbering changed as density increased. Bidura was progressively 273, 329, 335 and finally 357 . And when you track through Sands, you’ll find that the Fitz Stubbs musical family lived in Bidura in the 1870s. Which explains the addition on the right here ~ a ballroom.

21 In the City’s planning street cards, you’ll find Glebe DAs from 1949-1999 before the suburb was incorporated in Leichhardt Council. These give dates and names which can be checked in other records such as Sands and telephone directories.

22 Subdivision plans. This one is undated but there are some clues which can be pursued: Bridge Road not formally named; Ancient Briton is Jones Hotel; Palmerston Terrace not yet built, the property is Captain Cork’s The Wilderness owned ~ the landowner is Captain Cork; Wilkinson is where Foley Park is now (Judge Wilkinson lived in Hereford House).

23 This subdivision plan is dated 28 August 1881. Most lots on St John’s Road are noted as sold. Those marked. 7.8.9 didn’t sell and today their houses face Purves Street indicating a re-subdivision. This plan also shows other landowners and Purves bakery.

24 Thursday 3 April what year? Many ads for subdivision sales have a day and date, but no year. Google Perpetual Calendar. Guess a time frame. Choose Australia and a year. You can then navigate by arrows until you find a match. This can be double checked in Trove. 1884 or 1890. Cross referencing with TROVE this is the first subdivision 1884.

25 The huge Toxteth estate was broken up over a number of years. A further land release on 23 October 1886

26 These are just a few of the Glebe plans held by the State Library of NSW. They are “possibly online” which indicates that they are in the process of being digitised.

27 Sometimes a building looks out of place. Like this one, a Californian bungalow in a street of Victorian homes. The original house at 1 Allen Street was demolished in 1917 and the site used to access the Glebe railway tunnel. Some of the excavated stone was used in the replacement building which was occupied by 1925.

28 This building too looks out of place. 255 Glebe Point Rd doesn’t match its neighbours and appears to have lost some land at its side. Starting with its current address I tracked backwards from the 1932 Sands directories. An earlier address was 249 Glebe Road and the building’s original name was Ayr House indicating a Scottish connection. Electoral rolls (not freely available online but you can pay at Ancestry.com. I use the fiches in the State Library) give full names and occupations of occupiers. (Historically Glebe was in the West Sydney electorate.)

29 Originally its land would have stretched to the rear lane and the original house probably lost land when Marlborough Street replaced Glebe Lane.

30 2 Marlborough Street has been built on the same block. On the same title, both houses were put up for auction in 1927. The larger on Glebe Point Rd soon became a boarding house.

31 A 1925 Government Gazette (accessed through TROVE, more on that resource in a minute) names the owners. A search through NSW BDM (online indexes) reveals that they are William Parr and two of his sisters. Their parents had died at Ayr House in 1907 and 1909. Their maternal grandfather was Phillip Coleman Williams, a wealthy Glebe ironmonger.

32 Another BDM search reveals that William Parr married Arabella Keightley in 1910. There’s the odd human error in transcribing and the L here should be Z for Zarah.

33 TROVE is a free search engine developed by the National Library, providing access to millions of digiitised items such as this unhappy end to Arabella Parr’s life. Cemetery records are online. She was buried in the Field of Mars Cemetery. The Police Gazette is online at Ancestry.com.

34 TROVE narrrowing search by category, State, decade, “xxx”, down to phone numbers eg MW 2114 (Galluzzo)

35 The earliest reference I have found on TROVE is 1884 when it was advertised for rent. This death notice appeared in 1888.

36 The best place to go to find out when a house was built is The Land Titles Office. Other speakers will talk about that valuable resource.

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