Apex Park: Past and Future

An exciting new Billabong Parklands Project is coming to Campbelltown. The $18.75 million water recreation space will be delivered under the Western Sydney City Deal Liveability fund and located in the city centre in Apex Park, Bradbury. The next phase of design is underway and ideas are welcome from the public. The project is forecast for completion in June 2022. A fascinating and exciting future awaits! But what about Apex Park's past?

The park, first known as Fisher's Ghost Park, was opened on June 19, 1971. It was constructed by the Apex Club of Campbelltown and officially opened by Mayor Clive Tregear. A sum of $2800 was set aside by the club for the park. The "futuristic play area" as the newspaper described it, featured a vintage car, fort and a fire engine. It also featured seven bronze plaques which all tell the story of Fisher's Ghost. They can still be found in the park. A fireworks display and pony and train rides for the children marked the occasion.

Despite being taken in 1979, this view hasn't changed too much. The bridge is still there but with a path leading to it. The vegetation around the creek has obviously grown also. (Trevor Richardson Collection).

On June 3, 1989 the new Skateboard Bowl was opened by Mayor Jim Kremmer in Apex Park. Sometimes referred to as the Mexican Hat Rink or Sombrero, the skateboard bowl provided hours of entertainment for the youth of the town.

Mark Gatherer, Michael Fanning and Jim Kremmer at the opening of the skatebowl on June 3 1989. Michael Fanning grew up to be surfing champion Mick Fanning.

By 1997 Apex Park was looking run down and shabby. That's when members of the original Apex Club got together for a huge clean up. Led by former president Gerry Bakkers, the retired members rejuvenated the park to its former glory days.

Written by Andrew Allen

Sources:

Campbelltown-Ingleburn News, June 15, 1971

Macarthur Advertiser, October 29, 1997

The Way We Were- Part 5

The next series of then and now photographs were taken around Campbelltown and Bradbury on September 11 2017.

The top photo is of an unknown street parade moving down Lindesay Street in Campbelltown.

The same spot today near the corner of Dumaresq and Lindesay Streets.

 

 

 

 Garnet Jennings and Frank Monaghan at St. John's Prepatory College for Boys. Photo taken in 1926.

 

91 years later and little has changed here. It's now St. Patrick's College for Girls.

 

 

Newly built houses in the 1960s in the new suburb of Sherwood Hills.

The same scene in 2017. Sherwood Hills later changed its name to Bradbury. The street is Lawn Avenue.

 

Quondong taken in 1960

 

 

Today Qoundong is the Tourist Information Centre. The environment around it has changed dramatically since the 1960 photograph was taken.

 

Written by Andrew Allen 

Events and Displays

An author talk and two historical displays highlight what's coming up in the Local Studies section at Campbelltown Library.

On Thursday July 30 at 1pm HJ Daley Library will host author Rochelle Llewelyn Nicholls for a free talk about her new book Joe Quinn Among the Rowdies: The Life of Baseball's Honest Australian. I have written about Rochelle's book in a previous post on this blog.

Before its 20th-century Olympic trailblazers, and Depression-era icons such as Phar Lap and Don Bradman, came an Australian sporting pioneer who was celebrated on the most glamorous stage in the world-American major league baseball. Formerly from Campbelltown, Joe Quinn's story has, until now, been lost in the land of his birth. Meet Australia's first professional baseball player and manager, whose willingness to "have a go" in the grand Australian tradition will live long in the minds of sports fans on both sides of the Pacific.

Booking for Rochelle's talk are essential and can be made by contacting the library on 4645 4436.

We currently have on display at HJ Daley Library an exhibition on HistoryPin. Campbelltown Library uses HistoryPin to show then and now images of local scenes. The images are taken from our photographic database Our Past in Pictures and, with the use of Google Street View, the 'then' images are overlayed on to the same position supplied by Google Street View. You can also check out HistoryPin on our website at http://www.historypin.com/channels/view/16333020/#|photos/list/

From July 13 to 31 we will host a display for Bradbury's 50th anniversary called From Sherwood Hills to Bradbury. It will reveal how much change the suburb has undergone since Lend Lease's first stage was completed in 1965. Accompanying this will be a feature on Campbelltown pioneer William Bradbury whom the suburb is named after. The display coincides with the Campbelltown and Airds Historical Society's launch of it's Grist Mills journal on William Bradbury. It will be launched at 'Glenalvon' on July 11 at 10.30am.