10 November 1928 - "Coogee Pier", Sydney, New South Wales, Australia (restored version)
IMAGE INFO
- Photographer's viewpoint is looking east from an elevated position in Belmore Road west of Beach Street.
- The Pier is not yet completed due to numerous construction delays & disputes between the developer (Coogee Oceanic Pier Co. Ltd.) & Randwick Council.
- The crowd was smaller than expected for the Saturday 2 p.m. opening time but built up through the afternoon.
- A report in the Newcastle Morning Herald dated Monday 12 November 1928 claims "After being under construction for many months, portion of the Coogee ocean pier was opened on Saturday afternoon in the presence of what was claimed to be a record crowd. The pier was thronged at night by crowds until a late hour".
- Extracts from a report in the Labor Daily (Sydney) dated Monday 12 November 1928, page 4, included "The structure includes a soda refreshment salon and soda fountains on two floors", "Over 11,000 people visited the pier on Saturday and a further 7,000 yesterday". However, interest waned rapidly after that weekend to the point where the business soon became economically non-viable.
- Coogee Ocean Pier Co. had been granted a 28 year lease. It stretched 180 meters out across the middle of Coogee Beach & well into Coogee Bay (originally it was meant to extend 250 meters). It boasted to have a capacity for 21,000 people, including a 1,400 seat theatre (but this was never built) as well as numerous restaurants (never built), a dance hall for 600 people (never built) plus a variety of shops & arcades (also never built). The funding crisis that had befallen the Company halfway through the build virtually guaranteed the Pier would have a very short existence (since it now had almost none of it's advertised main attractions).
- One year after this photo, on 16 November 1929 the adjacent Coogee Beach featured a large safe beach swimming & bathing area, protected by steel mesh shark-proof nets supported from pylons next to the Pier. Ironically, this would have attracted even more people away from the Pier, to the pleasure of bathing within the shark-proof enclosure (with night bathing following soon after) at a cost of only 1 d per person. By comparison the entry fees to the Pier were:
Monday-Friday - Adults = 3 d.
Sat, Sun & Public Holidays - Adults = 6 d.
Children = 3 d. at all times.
- The Pier was for a very short time a truly desirable tourist & pleasure-seekers facility, that helped promote Coogee as a major resort destination, similar to Brighton in England. It even had a "Coogee Pier Golf Course" which was constructed on the northern side & extending for half it's length that opened on 1 November 1930!
- However, unlike the calmer waters at Brighton, the incessant pounding, powerful surf that regularly smashed into the pier with every south-easterly "blow" was unrelenting. Sadly for many Sydneysiders, Randwick Council & the Pier's management inevitably capitulated in the face of mounting & un-economical repair costs (repairs alone estimated at £4,000 in May 1933 (over $480,00 today).
- Indeed, by as far back as January 1930, the developers had already sunk £78,300 into the project - around $7,000,000 in todays money - unsuprisingly, they never made any profit during the short life of the project).
- Unsurprisingly then, with mounting financial losses over the period 1931-1933 the by-now-derelict pier remains were sold off for a relatively paltry £2,800 (around $230,000 today) & was finally demolished during the period December 1933-March 1934.
****************************
SOURCE INFO
- One copy of a 15 x 20 cm photo-print from the Hood Collection.
- The original was digitized by the State Library of New South Wales
- The digitized original is available from the SLNSW online collection here: digital.sl.nsw.gov.au/delivery/DeliveryManagerServlet?dps...
******************************
CREDITS
- Photographer Sam Hood for the original photo & print.
- Mitchell & State Libraries of New South Wales for their valuable work in digitizing, archiving & making available online this rare historical content.
******************************
COPYRIGHT STATUS
- Per SLNSW advice:
Out of copyright: created before 1955
- Regarding my own work in creating this unique cropped, restored & duo-toned version from the digitized original, I have applied "Attribution-Share Alike".
*******************************
PROCESS INFO
- I downloaded a copy of the digitized original (very badly faded with uneven exposure).
- Latest version enlarged & enhanced using topaz Gigapixel AI, Skylum Luminar Neo AI & Adobe Photoshop CS2.
10 November 1928 - "Coogee Pier", Sydney, New South Wales, Australia (restored version)
IMAGE INFO
- Photographer's viewpoint is looking east from an elevated position in Belmore Road west of Beach Street.
- The Pier is not yet completed due to numerous construction delays & disputes between the developer (Coogee Oceanic Pier Co. Ltd.) & Randwick Council.
- The crowd was smaller than expected for the Saturday 2 p.m. opening time but built up through the afternoon.
- A report in the Newcastle Morning Herald dated Monday 12 November 1928 claims "After being under construction for many months, portion of the Coogee ocean pier was opened on Saturday afternoon in the presence of what was claimed to be a record crowd. The pier was thronged at night by crowds until a late hour".
- Extracts from a report in the Labor Daily (Sydney) dated Monday 12 November 1928, page 4, included "The structure includes a soda refreshment salon and soda fountains on two floors", "Over 11,000 people visited the pier on Saturday and a further 7,000 yesterday". However, interest waned rapidly after that weekend to the point where the business soon became economically non-viable.
- Coogee Ocean Pier Co. had been granted a 28 year lease. It stretched 180 meters out across the middle of Coogee Beach & well into Coogee Bay (originally it was meant to extend 250 meters). It boasted to have a capacity for 21,000 people, including a 1,400 seat theatre (but this was never built) as well as numerous restaurants (never built), a dance hall for 600 people (never built) plus a variety of shops & arcades (also never built). The funding crisis that had befallen the Company halfway through the build virtually guaranteed the Pier would have a very short existence (since it now had almost none of it's advertised main attractions).
- One year after this photo, on 16 November 1929 the adjacent Coogee Beach featured a large safe beach swimming & bathing area, protected by steel mesh shark-proof nets supported from pylons next to the Pier. Ironically, this would have attracted even more people away from the Pier, to the pleasure of bathing within the shark-proof enclosure (with night bathing following soon after) at a cost of only 1 d per person. By comparison the entry fees to the Pier were:
Monday-Friday - Adults = 3 d.
Sat, Sun & Public Holidays - Adults = 6 d.
Children = 3 d. at all times.
- The Pier was for a very short time a truly desirable tourist & pleasure-seekers facility, that helped promote Coogee as a major resort destination, similar to Brighton in England. It even had a "Coogee Pier Golf Course" which was constructed on the northern side & extending for half it's length that opened on 1 November 1930!
- However, unlike the calmer waters at Brighton, the incessant pounding, powerful surf that regularly smashed into the pier with every south-easterly "blow" was unrelenting. Sadly for many Sydneysiders, Randwick Council & the Pier's management inevitably capitulated in the face of mounting & un-economical repair costs (repairs alone estimated at £4,000 in May 1933 (over $480,00 today).
- Indeed, by as far back as January 1930, the developers had already sunk £78,300 into the project - around $7,000,000 in todays money - unsuprisingly, they never made any profit during the short life of the project).
- Unsurprisingly then, with mounting financial losses over the period 1931-1933 the by-now-derelict pier remains were sold off for a relatively paltry £2,800 (around $230,000 today) & was finally demolished during the period December 1933-March 1934.
****************************
SOURCE INFO
- One copy of a 15 x 20 cm photo-print from the Hood Collection.
- The original was digitized by the State Library of New South Wales
- The digitized original is available from the SLNSW online collection here: digital.sl.nsw.gov.au/delivery/DeliveryManagerServlet?dps...
******************************
CREDITS
- Photographer Sam Hood for the original photo & print.
- Mitchell & State Libraries of New South Wales for their valuable work in digitizing, archiving & making available online this rare historical content.
******************************
COPYRIGHT STATUS
- Per SLNSW advice:
Out of copyright: created before 1955
- Regarding my own work in creating this unique cropped, restored & duo-toned version from the digitized original, I have applied "Attribution-Share Alike".
*******************************
PROCESS INFO
- I downloaded a copy of the digitized original (very badly faded with uneven exposure).
- Latest version enlarged & enhanced using topaz Gigapixel AI, Skylum Luminar Neo AI & Adobe Photoshop CS2.