From the Archives
Stories From the Archives
Long-form research notes, historical essays, and the documents behind the tours.
Colonial History
William Gore's Farm: The Convict Orchard That Became Artarmon
Before Artarmon was a suburb of brick bungalows and Edwardian shopfronts, it was an orchard worked by men in chains. The story of who they were has been hiding in colonial land-grant records for two centuries.
Colonial History
The Rum Rebellion's Forgotten Victims: A North Shore Story
The 1808 Rum Rebellion is remembered as a coup against Governor Bligh. The people who paid for it — many of them on the North Shore — are mostly forgotten.
Medical History
Gladesville Mental Hospital: Inside Australia's Most Complex Asylum
For 155 years, Gladesville Mental Hospital was where colonial NSW sent people it couldn't classify, couldn't manage, or simply didn't want to see. Its records survive — and they tell a story very different from the urban legends.
Aboriginal History
Cammeraigal Country: The North Shore Before the First Fleet
The land we now call the North Shore was — and is — Cammeraigal Country. Recovering that history means reading the colonial record against the grain.