PLEASE NOTE:

* Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander viewers are advised that this website may contain images of people who have died.

* Working on Gundungurra and Dharug Ngurra (Country), we recognise the deep and ongoing spiritual connection to, and custodianship of, Ngurra.

* All images on the Local Studies Flickr site are selected by staff from our Image Library archives, evaluated for significance, researched, analysed, described, and optimised for display and use.

* To properly recognise the significant investment the library makes in acquiring and preserving these resources for the community, please attribute any secondary use to Blue Mountains Library, Local Studies Collection. This is reflected in the Attribution - ShareAlike licensing.

More at: www.copyright.com.au/about-copyright/moral-rights/

About

The Local Studies Flickr site is managed by the Local Studies Librarian at Blue Mountains Library, based at Springwood, New South Wales, Australia.

Here you will find curated, high resolution images from our collection. Images that we think are cool, useful, interesting, quirky, historically significant, posses artistic merit, or we simply want to know more about.

Donations of historic photos, slides, albumen prints, glass plate negatives and old family albums, as well as documentary material and books relating to the Blue Mountains are always welcome, see website contact below. If the library cannot use it we may know another library or archive that will. Your donated material will be safely preserved and become publicly accessible for use by students, researchers and future generations; and by doing so it will continue to gain value as a public good.

Comments

We welcome crowd-sourcing: visitors are encouraged to post relevant comments and add more information. A big thank you to our many enthusiastic viewers and followers who continue to add so much useful information to our photos and images.

If you wish to post a relevant image in a comment, please ensure it is small size or just a link. Posting a large image in a comment detracts from the main image and is bad manners. Large image comments will be deleted, and for the same reason access to Notes within images has been disabled.

Please contact the Library Service direct with any historical or family history enquiries.

Moderation

All comments are moderated according to our Library User Guidelines, which state among other things that users should:

 be considerate of others

 be polite to others

 respect cultural differences

 respect the rights of all library users and staff.

The full document is available at - library.bmcc.nsw.gov.au/client/en_AU/default/?

Licensing

All images are available under a Creative Commons, Share Alike licence, with attribution to Blue Mountains Library, see note above. A link to the image as used in any publication is appreciated, as is acknowledgement of the original donor when shown in the caption.

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 2.0 Generic License.

Our new homepage : Blue Mountains Library library.bmcc.nsw.gov.au

A larger collection of over 6,000 historical photos is accessible at the main library web site.

Check out the Local Studies Blog for longer historical articles - bluemlocalstudies.wordpress.com/

The Local Studies Service

From a couple of shelves of books in 1982, the Local Studies Service has grown into a collection of national significance about the Blue Mountains. The collection includes newspapers, books, journals, periodicals, oral history recordings, local archives, vertical files, photographs about the Blue Mountains and by local residents, maps and plans. The enquiry service and collections are used by a broad range of library patrons including students, local historians, family historians, independent researchers, heritage consultants, local businesses, book and magazine publishers, visual and performing artists, writers, film makers, local council and government departments.

Annual Report 2024

Pro member since 2008

All time views 13,662,473 (total views not comparable with last year's due to changes in the way stats are collected)

Peak daily views 24,101 - 6 May

Average daily views 1,685

Annual views 615,025

Total images 2153

Images added 150

In Explore 15

Albums 138

Space used 9.82 GB of unlimited

Groups administered 36

Groups moderated 45

Groups established 1

Followers 582

Following 7

A significant acquisition was the Hodgkinson Collection of around 700 glass negatives produced by a Blue Mountains family and dating from the 1880s to the 1930s, with a wide geographical spread centred on the Blue Mountains and places still to be identified.

Most popular image all-time is still Kingsford Smith Park 104,028 views flic.kr/p/7jMSXn

Most popular image 2024 was Woman with an Umbrella, in Explore 5342 views, and counting flic.kr/p/2qmjUAa

Annual Report 2023

All time views 13,650,863

Annual views - 55,592

Images - 2003

Images added - 326

Total file size - 9.04 GB

Groups administered - 35

Groups moderated - 43

Groups established - 4

Followers - 621

Following- 12

Most popular image, Kingsford Smith Park - 103,823 views

Annual Report 2022

All time views 13,595,271

Annual views - 788,810

Images - 1,766

Images added - 587

Total file size - 8.52 GB

Groups administered - 31

Groups moderated - 43

Groups established -

Followers - 621

Following- 26

Most popular image, Kingsford Smith Park - 103,378 views

Annual Report 2021

All time views 12,806,461

Annual views - 1,052,608

Images - 1,766

Images added - 352

Total file size - 7.07 GB

Groups administered - 31

Groups moderated - 43

Groups established -

Followers - 598

Following- 12

Most popular image, Kingsford Smith Park - 102,976 views

Annual Report 2020

All time views - 11,753,608

Views for the year - 949,484

Average daily views - 2,601

Images - 1,414

Space - 5.68 GB

Albums - 117

Groups administered - 30

Groups moderated - 41

Followers - 565

Following - 15

Most popular image, Kingsford Smith Park - 102,456 views

Annual Report 2019

Total views since May 2008 - 10,804,174

Views for the year - 1,052,282

Most popular image was Kingsford Smith Park - 101,753 views

Total images - 1,329

Average daily views - 2,882

Space used - 5.21 GB

Albums - 113

Groups administered - 27

Groups moderated - 42

Followers - 530

Following - 16

Annual Report 2018

Local Studies Flickr – total views = 9,751,892.

Monthly activity = 81,348 views, new images posted = 33

Annual Report 2017

Total views since May 2008 reached 8,700,379 on 1,107 images

Views for the year were 1,314,213

Most popular image was Kingsford Smith Park - 97,341 views

Average daily views - 3,600

Space used - 4.03GB

Sets - 101

Annual Report 2016

Total views since May 2008 reached 7,386,166 on 920 images.

Views for the year were just under 2 million.

Followers were 397.

The most popular image was Kingsford Smith Park at 74,292 - flic.kr/p/7jMSXn

A total of 10 images have now been in Explore, including two during the past year. They are shown in the photostream graphic.

The most Interesting photo is Dawson's Chambers 1885 with 39 comments - flic.kr/p/peNe9Y

The most Favourited photo is Weeping Rock 1880 with 127 faves.

Annual Report 2015

Total views reached 5.4 million on 790 images in 85 albums.

Groups administered were 59 with a further six moderated.

Followers were 341.

Another three images received Explore status.

Mid-year Report June 2015

Around 4,160,000 total views on 770 images.

The top 20 images have 25,000 - 35,000 each and daily views are running at 5,000 - 10, 000.

We administer 58 groups and moderate another five.

Five images are in Explore.

We have 295 followers and continue to benefit from the knowledge and hard work of our commentators who add valuable details and identifying information to our images - thank you every one.

Annual Report 2014

We finished the year with 2,850,000 total views on 740 images.

Our keen band of followers provided much useful information and added considerable value to the collection. They researched locations, provided commentary and simply shared their enjoyment of our historic images.

Mid Year Report 2014

All-time views reached 1,873,445 on 707 images, averaging 2,650 each.

Most popular image was Victoria Pass with 34,125 views and we had 223 keen followers.

Daily views are averaging around 5K and every image is viewed every day.

Our many followers continued to provide valuable comments that enrich and extend the usefulness of our images.

We currently administer 54 groups and moderate another six.

Annual Report 2013

We finished the year with 1,028,474 total views on 685 images.

Daily views averaged 3,000 - 4,000 and each image was viewed between 3 and 60 times daily.

Most popular was the Holden Monaro and the Buckle Mini Monaco on Craven A corner at Catalina Park Circuit with 7,238 views; followed by the Geological Sketch Map of Katoomba and Brief History of Coal Mining with 7,043.

In the top 20 were the Granville Train Disaster images and the 1957 Bushfires.

Much useful information has emerged from comments and we have 206 enthusiastic followers.