A passing mention of an engineer, Moriarty, on an historical plaque by the Moruya River, leads to some enquiries. These, oddly enough, result in learning that the sandstone circular dam that created Lake Parramatta, is of some distinction.

It was the first arch dam built in Australia and was the 12th engineered dam built in the world since Roman times!

The bonus was finding a delightful spot to amble through bushland whilst going around the lake.

It is apt that Martin Place, like the man after whom it is named, progressed from humble beginnings to pre-eminence.

Such was the life of James Martin, who arrived in Sydney at the age of one with his Irish parents.

Over the next 65 years, he rose to be Premier of NSW on three occasions and finally to be the Chief Justice of NSW.

The motto he adopted gives an insight into his personality:

"AUT VIAM INVENIAM AUT FACIAM: If there is no way, make one."

On the 22nd of September,1918 the first direct radio message from England was received in Australia.

Surprisingly, it was sent from a Transmitting Station in the NW of Wales to a radio station in a suburban house in Wahroonga , a suburb of Sydney.

The message was to the people of Australia from the Prime Minister, W M Hughes.He spoke of his recent visit to the Western Front in France. Hughes, Guglielmo Marconi and Ernest Fisk of Sydney were the principal organisers.

We sketch out the life of Fisk, a remarkable person.

Despite the fabulous name , this is not about a Spike Milligan or Barry Humphreys character.

There really was an Eccleston Frederick Du Faur. He left a wonderful legacy to his adopted city of Sydney.

In his quiet methodical way he made his dreams come true and left Sydney a better place than found it.

As if being one of the founders of the Art Gallery of NSW was not enough, he was the driving force behind the creation of the Kuringai Chase National Park. That preserved a large area of rugged native bushland on Sydneys northern edge.

A gift for the ages!!

In 1890 the University of Sydney received 250,000 Pounds from the Estate of John H Challis.

It was the first major private benefaction. In today's money , that is $ 42,000,000!

The gift was used to create professorships in Law, Medicine, Veterinary Science, Biology,Civil Engineering English Literature, History and Philosophy.

Challis thus made a major contribution to Sydney.

He arrived in Sydney at the age of 22 with little money.Over the next 26 years he worked as a merchant, and clearly made a lot of money.

What do we know about him ?

The answer seems to be, not very much; even though Challis House is in Martin Place and Challis Avenue , Potts Point is named after him.

There is a statue of Allan Cunningham on the Bent Street frontage of the Lands Department , at the corner with Loftus Street. There is an obelisk to his memory in a pond in the Botanical Gardens, just near the kiosk.

As if that was not enough- the Federal Electorate of Cunningham commemorates him; Cunninghams Gap ( which is the access from the coast to Toowoomba ) commemorates his discovery of it and the Cunningham Highway ( which runs from Ipswich 327 kms to Goondiwindi ), is named in his honor.

He has certainly left his mark.

He was first and foremost , a botanist , and discovery was used to allow him to collect and record plants.



This pod sketches the life of a very well travelled person.

Naval Surgeon, Explorer, Adventurer, and perhaps a would-be Smuggler

George Bass was an extraordinary person, enormously talented and incredibly brave. It was her, together with Matthew Flinders who carried out early exploration from the infant colony at Sydney by traveling down the south coast and ultimately proving there was a large body of water between what is now Victoria and Tasmania. previously maps had all been drawn with Tasmania drawn connected to the “northern island”.

He was an extraordinary man but was never fully recognised in a public way for his efforts. He was highly regarded by those who knew him well, referring to him with phrases such as “ingenious, enterprising, and remarkable” - praise any of us would be overwhelmed to have applied to ourselves. Despite that,  history didn’t treat him well and he is often overshadowed by Flinders. The best indication of which is that no one wrote a biography of him until 1952. There is a subsequent one but it took all that time for someone to tell us about this wonderful man.

He is one of the statues on the Lands Department building, on the Northern Facade of the building. It is truly extraordinary how much he packed into 32 years, the entire span of his life.

If you asked ten Australians who George Bass is or what he did, not many could do it but hopefully this will help close that gap.

If you are visiting Sydney, and only have a day or two and you’re wondering what the best thing would be to do. Then I don’t think there’s much doubt that you should go up to Observatory hill.

It’s a little bit out of the way so it has the benefit that it’s not too crowded, but it gives you some marvelous views of Sydney Harbour, particularly to the west. There’s also a delightful park that surrounds it. On top of all that there’s the Observatory itself, which is particularly interesting.

What a visit to this spot does is it really tells you a lot about getting an overall sense of Sydney.

You get an idea of the geography of Sydney , the topography, the development of the European settlements, the history of the place, and the scientific endeavors that went on in the observatory.

It is simply a gem.

In this episode we return to Churchill, which is on the Rocks Ridge, and move away from the valley of the tank stream heading down towards Darling Harbour, and millers point.

On the way, we mention why gas lane is called gas lane, and also go past two very interesting and historic buildings called the Glover Cottages and the Richmond villa.

Moving along the eastern side of Kent street, we come to the Agar stairs. Then we turn down high street and turn down to really have a look at the Darling Harbour, Millers Point area.

Indeed, there was down on millers point in the very early 1800s, three wooden post windmills. We’ll say a little bit about those and particularly owner of the first windmill who was obviously quite a character.

That will then bring us back to finish for this episode at the Lord Nelson hotel which dates back to the 1840s.

An amble in Randwick gives glimpses of the founding and development of the area together with some potted histories of a number of significant early homes.

The amble leads to a reference to one, Commodore Goodenough. Apart from having a striking name, he was also an interesting person.

He left quite a legacy, given his early and untimely death.