It's yonks since I walked in Gosford, September 2006 in fact. Must get more organised.
Booth's Motors opened on the 1st of September 1939. 2 days later Australia joined the war and Booth's couldn't get any new cars to sell for 6 years. They survived though, flogging all the spare parts they could lay their hands on, servicing cars already in town and selling petrol.
Booth's is still in the family, which is always good to hear. Over the years they've sold Humbers, Hillmans, Sunbeams and Singers. Singer I know is the sewing machine crowd and there's a crowd called Sunbeam who sell electric kettles. After those they sold Chryslers then Mitsubishis.
Lots of Singer pictures
Association of Singer Owners, more pictures
Rootes Group Car Club, Humbers, Hillmans, Singers, Sunbeams, Commers, Karriers
Gosford Hall was on the cutting edge in the early 20th century. Good dance floor, sliding stage, dressing rooms, supper room and acetylene gas lighting. And later it was one of the first places in Gosford to have the electricity. It was a hotspot for entertainment for decades, dances, stageshows, flower shows and a market.
It housed the Gosford Municipal Council (City Hall) for a bit then C.H. Brown's Furniture Store and a few other business until it was knocked down in 1994 for extensions on the Gateway arcade. The Gateway arcade is that one with the footbridge across to the railway station and it's now half empty. So much for progress.
The Hall was opened in 1911 by a mill owner called Parsons. That's believed to be him on the left and the builder on the right.
Western Sydney cops it again, Woy Woy unscathed
That's what, half a dozen massive storm fronts that've ripped up western Sydney this summer? Poor bastards have barely got the tiles back on their roofs when the next lot comes through. Roofs back off, streets flooded, trees uprooted again, trains cut off in peak hour.
We got a lovely light show about 10PM and a nice southerly breeze. The light's flickered a bit a couple of times but that was it and it was lovely and cool this morning.
Sydney storms
"Mystery surrounds the shooting of an off-duty [male] police officer in Centennial Park early this morning." He was attacked next to the loo apparently.
Centennial Park is a large park wedged between Anzac Parade and Oxford Street, just down the road from the old army barracks. Of a morning it's popular with joggers, dog walkers and those seeking a little pre-breakfast companionship. The mystery is was it the same bloke who shot him that had a go at him last November outside his place? Poor bastard.
First stabbed now shot
