Category: Crag Archives

On 10 November 1925, the residents of Castlecrag came together in the basement of the then recently-opened shops (now the Griffin Centre) for what was to be the inaugural meeting of the Castlecrag Progress Association. Edgar William Herbert was elected president and Walter Burley Griffin served on the executive committee.

In celebrating the 80th Anniversary of the Castlecrag Progress Association (CPA) we remember its many achievements and those who have contributed to its proud record.

Edgar Herbert was a pioneer of physical education in Australia and, while working with the YMCA in Melbourne, he and his wife had become friends of the Griffins. When Herbert came to Sydney in 1923 to work with G Z Dupain (father of Max) at the Institute of Physical Education, he made his home in Castlecrag. The Herbert family initially lived in the King O’Malley house on the site of the present hospital, then moved to the end of Edinburgh Road. Herbert served as president of the CPA until 1929 and was also an instigator of the Community Circle.

Edgar Deans, who arrived in Castlecrag in 1928 as Secretary to the GSDA, was another key figure in the Progress Association. He served as its president for four years and as secretary for 13 years. He was also secretary and president of the Willoughby Federated Progress Associations and a Mayor of Willoughby.
The early concerns addressed by the Association included the establishment of a Government Infants’ School, better transport access to the city by construction of an arterial road from East Lindfield to North Sydney (now Eastern Valley Way), the upgrading of Edinburgh Road, undergrounding of electricity wires, sewage services for the peninsula and tree planting along Edinburgh Road.

Over the period 1944 to 1964, the Progress Association ‘retired’ in favour of the Castlecrag and East Willoughby Community Advancement Co-operative Society Ltd, which was formed to raise funds for and build a Community Centre. The centre was opened in 1947 and the Castlecrag Community Library opened its doors in 1951. Both facilities continue to serve the needs of our community.

The resurrected Progress Association arranged for the construction of the Griffin Memorial Fountain in 1965 and initiated tree planting at the shopping centre. By the 1970s, traffic issues were of increasing concern in the community and the Association led a successful campaign to stop the construction of the proposed Warringah Freeway along the Northern Escarpment of the peninsula. Traffic calming measures and the need for a right-hand turn signal at Eastern Valley Way were dominant issues in a survey of residents conducted in 1981.

The CPA commenced a community newsletter, Castlecrag News in 1974 and this became The Crag in March 1978. It has maintained a regular production schedule since then.

More recent community events sponsored by the Progress Association, notably the Castlecrag Community Fairs, and its achievements are being chronicled in the history series. The Association celebrated its 80th birthday at a special dinner held at Christine’s Restaurant on 18 November 2005. The Guest of honour, long-term Castlecrag resident Joyce Batterham, entertained the guests with a memorable presentation on the early days in the suburb.

Bob McKillop

NSW Fire Brigades and Willoughby City Council’s Bushfire Crew successfully completed a hazard reduction burn in bushland on the Castlecrag Northern Escarpment near Sunnyside Crescent on 28 and 29 July.

The aims of the burn were to provide protection to surrounding properties in the event of a future wildfire and to maintain diversity of native plant species. Considerable planning and preparation was required by Willoughby City Council’s Bushfire Crew to ensure effective bushfire management. The crew developed a detailed burn plan of the area that included conservation of cultural heritage sites, bushland vegetation and wildlife habitat and property protection.

The burn area was prepared by cutting down standing vegetation and leaving it to season for a year before burning. This helps ensure that a hot burn is achieved to assist the regeneration of plant species. The preparation also reduces available fire fuel over the area and the burn can be conducted safely. This burn preparation technique also minimises air pollution and reduces the amount of water needed to manage the burn.

The crew had to await ideal weather conditions on 28 and 29 July this year to carry out the burn, which was most successful. The burn area will continue to be maintained by Willoughby City Council staff to ensure weeds are controlled. The public can assist the native plant regeneration throughout the burn area by sticking to the paths to enable plants to regenerate and to reduce erosion. A successful pile burn was carried out in Casement Reserve on 13 September also.

Keep a close watch on this area, as the regeneration occurs over the next year. An abundance of beautiful native wildlife flowers is expected to flourish on the site. If you require further information on how to protect your house during the fire season, please contact Willoughby Council on 9777 1000.

Rebecca Hill, WCC

On Sunday 18 September, approximately 40 residents gathered at the Stoker Playground on Edinburgh Road, for the Inauguration of the Edinburgh Road Tree Planting program, as well as the official opening of the refurbished Stoker Playground.

The Progress Association put forward the tree planting program to Council as a Centenary of Federation project in 2001. We envisaged a project that would improve the presentation of Edinburgh Road with a fine avenue of locally indigenous trees.

For the ceremony, 13 Banksias, of a planned 100 trees, were planted along the southern side of Edinburgh Road. In addition to being a local species, this tree has been chosen for its relative ease of pruning around electrical wires. A number of long-standing residents participated in the event.

The Mayor of Willoughby Pat Reilly and Mrs Reilly were present for the planting and the opening of Stoker Playground, as two of Phyllis and Michael Stoker’s children, Annette and Kathy spoke of their parents’ contribution to the Castlecrag Community. Michael Stoker moved to Castlecrag in 1935 at the invitation of the Griffins and was active in local theatre group activities. He and Phyl returned to ‘The Crag’ in 1942 and established a registered child-minding centre, which expanded to become the Castlecrag Kinder-garten. Several of those present had attended that centre.

The Stoker Playground upgrade is one of many planned open space refurbishments in the City of Willoughby. As Mayor Reilly highlighted, the design and fit-out of Stoker Playground is very much in keeping with, and complementary to, the unique character of Castlecrag.

The playground is once again enjoying much use from families. For those who visit the playground, have a look at the rubber mat surrounding the castle. (The mat is made in the shape of the Castlecrag Peninsula!)

Jennifer Kos

The Castlecrag Community Centre Committee has finalised the installation of the Castlecrag Infants’ School plaque in a prominent position at the Community Centre.

As reported in the last issue of The Crag (No. 156, 2), Willoughby City Council arranged for the restoration of the plaque by International Conservation Services. As shown in our photo below left, the plaque is again in pristine condition with the motto, ‘Together We Grow’, the centre of attention. The plaque is an important symbol of our community’s achievements and the Progress Association expresses its thanks to Council and the Committee for this outstanding result.

Castlecrag Private Hospital is establishing a display of old photographs interpreting the history of the hospital. It is a colourful history, with the origins of the hospital going back to 1927 when Dr Edward William Rivett purchased the Walter Burley Griffin-designed ‘King O’Malley House’ on the corner of Edinburgh Road and Sortie Port. This had been constructed on Lot 96 of the original Griffin subdivision of Castlecrag in 1922-23 and was financed by King O’Malley, the flamboyant Minister for Home Affairs in the Federal Government at the time the international design competition for the Australian Federal Capital was held. It was O’Malley who resolved the controversy over the design for Canberra by endorsing the majority view of the selection committee and approving the plan of fellow-American Walter Burley Griffin. O’Malley became a strong supporter of Griffin in the subsequent upheaval over the implementation of his plan, and he continued this support to the Castlecrag project.

The O’Malley house was leased by Edgar Herbert, a friend of the Griffins and a pioneer in physical education who came to Sydney from Melbourne to work with GZ Dupain at his Institute of Physical Education. Herbert was the foundation President of the Castlecrag Progress Association and his family lived in the O’Malley House until 1927. The house was a small stone cottage, very similar to the Cheong House at 14 The Parapet. Herbert’s daughter Erwin remembers that the picture window in the living room offered a commanding view of Middle Harbour and The Spit. It was ‘a typical Griffin house with polished floors and a blue and white Chinese rug in the living room’.

Dr Edward Rivett had graduated in medicine from Sydney University in 1920 and became Resident Medical Officer at Sydney Hospital and The Women’s Hospital that year. Rivett practised in general surgery and obstetrics. Following his purchase of the O’Malley House in 1927, it was converted into a small five-bed hospital. Griffin’s office designed significant extensions to the house to provide a two-storey 20-bed hospital, which Rivett called Cabarisha after a legendary Indian healer. Rivett’s vision was to provide a hospital that was more a home than an institution, in which people could be nursed back to health in an atmosphere of peace and tranquility. The grounds were laid out with lawns, gardens, ponds, fountains and a tennis court – which was used by staff and local residents.

Further extensions to designs by Eric Nicolls were made to the hospital, notably a wing along Sortie Port and a nurses’ home in The Battlement in the 1930s, and an obstetrics wing along Edinburgh Road after the War. It remained very much a family affair, with Edward’s sister, Dr Amy Christine Rivett, assisting at Cabarisha for some considerable time from her practice in Northbridge. His sons Ronald and Howard also worked there as medical practitioners. The topsy-like growth of the facility resulted in a rambling geography, however, leading to a high staff-to-patient ratio. This, together with the need for new equipment and techniques to keep abreast of medical developments, resulted in financial losses by the 1960s.

To the older residents of Castlecrag the hospital was and always will be Cabarisha. Dr Rivett was a very popular doctor and the hospital was a thriving business, with many of his patients coming from the local community. The post-war baby boom made heavy demands on the hospital’s obstetrics facilities, so the wing along Edinburgh Road was added, with Dr Rivett undertaking some of the construction himself.
Many of Castlecrag’s post-war babies were born at Cabarisha, with the two-weeks of post-natal care provided there enabling mothers to return home fully able to meets life’s demands. Dr Rivett is remembered with affection for the professional standards of care he brought to his practice and for a hospital that was at one with the beauty of its natural setting.

Following the death of Edward Rivett and Christine Rivett in 1962, Ronald and Howard continued the business, changing the name to the Castlecrag Private Hospital. In 1970 they reluctantly decided to sell to a company with adequate capital for further development of the facilities. This did not eventuate and the hospital was onsold. The present remodelled building was opened on 5 January 1986. The architect, Michael Cavanagh, endeavoured to preserve the character of the former hospital, with the front façade being retained and the building’s past character reflected in the new Griffin-like mouldings in the other facades.

Bob McKillop and Elizabeth Lander

Castlecrag residents have been increasingly inconvenienced by the weekend traffic congestion associated with sporting events at the Shore School Playing Fields and Bicentennial Reserve in recent years. Our frustrations are minor, however, compared with the significant inconvenience suffered by residents in South Willoughby and Northbridge who are more directly affected by the increasingly chaotic situation.

Alpha Road and Sailors Bay Road are now virtually gridlocked on Saturdays as many hundreds of pupils, parents and spectators attempt to arrive, park and depart the area. At a recent meeting of the Northbridge Progress Association, residents complained that surrounding streets are completely parked out on Saturdays and they were regularly unable to leave their houses because of gridlocked traffic or because desperate parents park across their driveways for hours.

They were among the large numbers of residents who attended a special meeting of the Association on 12 July to hear the Principal of Shore School outline a Development Application it has before Council to upgrade the facilities on the playing grounds. The proposal covers improved drainage, the construction of a new large grandstand to replace two smaller ones, new perimeter fencing, the construction of nine new tennis courts and the removal of 65 trees (with 94 new trees to be planted). While the Progress Association stated it has no objection to Shore improving its facilities in Northbridge for the benefit of its pupils and their parents, it called for more rigorous action to address the traffic situation.

The Shore submission states: “The proposed upgrade will not alter the periods when the facilities are used or increase the intensity of use.” Similarly, Shore’s traffic report concludes: “The upgraded facilities would not generate any new activity in terms of traffic generation and parking demand”. In its submission to Council, the Northbridge Progress Association states that it expects there will be growth of use, especially through the additional tennis courts (and their new use for competition tennis) and the increasing popularity of soccer. Even if there were no increase, Shore’s playing fields already have a serious adverse impact on traffic and parking in the area.

Accordingly, the Northbridge Progress Association has called on the Shore School, Council and the RTA to work together to reduce the considerable traffic and parking problems caused by the playing fields and which have inconvenienced Northbridge residents for decades. The Progress Association also called on Shore to more rigorously address the chaotic traffic situation that has developed in Sailors Bay Road on school days since Shore’s early learning centre and lower primary school opened in 2004 without any changes to cater for the new traffic conditions they generated.

The Castlecrag Progress Association has supported its Northbridge colleagues with a submission to Council on this matter. Our submission expresses concern is that the proposal will inevitably generate still further traffic activity in Alpha Road and Sailors Bay Road between Eastern Valley Way and Alpha Road thereby affecting Castlecrag residents as they drive between Castlecrag and Northbridge using Alpha and/or Sailors Bay Roads. It urges Council, before consenting to this proposal, to ensure that as many car parking spaces and drop off zones as possible are provided on Shore land. The submission states that the proposal provides Shore School with an opportunity to ameliorate the traffic chaos generated by its Saturday sporting events that have increasingly clouded the otherwise good relationship existing between the school and its Northbridge, Willoughby and Castlecrag neighbours.

The Shore School Playing Fields and Bicentennial Reserve are just two of the many traffic trouble spots that have erupted across Willoughby City in recent years. The increasing ownership of vehicles and the increasing trend to drive children to school and sporting events have put tremendous pressure of our local street that have been provided for the movement of vehicles, but are increasingly being usurped as private parking lots. Recent meetings of the Willoughby Traffic Committee have been dominated by requests from residents to impose parking restrictions in narrow streets that are ‘parked out’ in a manner that seriously impeded traffic flow and hinders residents accessing their properties. As noted in the Smart Transport Show report (page 5), we all need to walk, cycle or use public transport much more to get to our destinations.

Bob McKillop

Willoughby Mayor Pat Reilly rode on an electrically powered bicycle to officially open the Smart Transport Show in the Chatswood Mall at 11am on 19 May. Held over two days (19-20 May), it showcased sustainable transport modes that benefit both the environment and people’s health. On show were alternative fuel cars, fuel-efficient vehicles, scooters, solar powered cars and bicycles. New Transport Access Guides promote walking and the use of public transport to get to the Chatswood Shopping Precinct, Willoughby Leisure Centre and Willoughby Park were launched at the Show. The private initiative, CarShare, which enables residents of high-density areas to use public transport and book the use of a shared car when required was one of the popular stalls at the show.

Mayor Pat Reilly also officially launched the CouncilCab service at the Smart Transport Show. He said the service “is part of Council’s commitment to sustainable transport and the initiative is the first of its type and scope in New South Wales.” The new service, which has been developed in consultation with representatives of the Taxi Council and Combined Communications Network (the owners of ABC Taxis), will see Council hire taxis on a fixed hourly rate and make them available on a multiple user basis at a subsidised rate. Under the scheme, which is being trialled for 12-months, residents can pre-book transport ‘from anywhere to anywhere’ within the boundaries of Willoughby City at a flat rate of $4 per trip. The service is currently available between 10am and 4pm on week-days.

Residents wishing to make a journey within Willoughby City need to make bookings prior to 4pm the previous day of travel, they will be given a 30-minute ‘pick up window’ and will pay for their journey by giving the driver a pre-paid voucher. Vouchers are sold in books of five for $20 and are available from the driver, the Customer Service Centre on Level 4 of the City Council offices and the Dougherty Centre. To book a CouncilCab, phone 8332 8338 by 4pm the DAY BEFORE you wish to travel. Bookings are open on a 24-hour basis. If you want more information about CouncilCab, please ring 9777 1000 during business hours.

Bob McKillop

Last issue we promised to bring you a photo of the Griffin Fountain with water. Here it is, back to its operational condition, burbling happily along and weaving magic in the night. Following its lengthy repairs and restoration work, the water to the Griffin Memorial Fountain commenced a two-week trial run on 6 July. It is best at night with the lights, but the fountain offers different perspectives throughout the day. Following the trial, Council will be meeting with the Friends of the Griffin Fountain group to instruct them on a regular maintenance schedule.

Bob McKillop

The Walter Burley Griffin Society website went ‘live’ on 27 June 2006. The beautifully presented site provides Internet access to educational material about the lives and works of Marion Mahony and Walter Burley Griffin. The pages have been prepared on a voluntary basis by various members of the Society and with the assistance of a grant under the Federal Government’s ‘Sharing Australian Stories’ Program to access material and to contract professional assistance with technical aspects.

The project’s goals have been to create a greater understanding and appreciation of the work of Marion Mahony Griffin and Walter Burley Griffin and thereby encourage the conservation of their extensive work. The site provides a user-friendly hierarchy that accommodates the Griffins’ extensive and diverse projects in Australia and also the United States and India. There are 35 sections or pages for the website. This covers sections about the Griffins’ urban planning, architecture, landscape architecture and interior design by a team of writers with expertise in the various fields. It also has included a chronology of their work, selected publications for further reading, films and videos, news and events, the Society’s past newsletters as downloadable pdfs.

The wonderful images on the website have been sourced from the Avery Library at Columbia University, New York; Block Museum of Art at the Northwestern University; and the New-York Historical Society in the United States; the National Library of Australia; the National Archives of Australia; the State Library of NSW; the State Library of South Australia; and from professional and amateur photographers in Australia and the USA.

The searchable Photo Gallery has nearly 300 images, including the magnificent Melson House in the USA, Marion Mahony’s design for Henry Ford’s house, some of their Melbourne work including Newman College, the stunning interiors of the Capitol Theatre and also Café Australia, some of their Sydney work including the two Pratten houses at Pymble, early photos of the Castlecrag houses, and ones taken by Max Dupain in 1965, plus some of the truly remarkable Indian work. In addition there are three short movies on the website, including one produced specially for it on the Griffin walkways and reserves.

The new website is a wonderful educational source on the lives and works of the Griffins. Check it out at www.griffinsociety.org – or you can also access it via a link from the Castlecrag Progress Association website.

Adrienne Kabos