Lost Newcastle

02/12/2025

02/12/2025

📣📣📣 CALLING ALL SURFEST MEMORIES! – Help us celebrate 40 years of Surfest Newcastle 🌊🏄‍♂️

Lost Newcastle is partnering with Surfest to celebrate the 40th anniversary of this iconic Newcastle event, and we’re looking for your photos, videos, stories, and memories!

Do you have:

📸 Old Surfest photos from the 80s, 90s, or 2000s?

🎥 Video footage?

✂️ Newspaper clippings or memorabilia?

⛱️ Great stories from the beach, competition, or behind the scenes?

We’d love you to share them with us! All contributions help tell the story of Surfest over four decades — from the people who lived it.

👉 Submit your photos, videos, and stories here:
https://forms.gle/2fpxwcNFm3mxeLbn6

📝 Your material will not be used for commercial purposes — only for historical and storytelling projects connected to Surfest’s 40th anniversary. You’ll be credited whenever your contribution is used.

💡 Got a great old photo but no scanner? No problem! Apps like Google PhotoScan, Microsoft Lens, or even the iPhone Notes app produce excellent scans in seconds.

Thank you for helping us preserve and share the history of Surfest Newcastle!

🌊❤️🏄‍♀️

29/11/2025

Vale, Art ‘Poppa’ Ryan. Media icon of our town, storyteller, adored family man and much-loved Poppa Ryan to generations of Novocastrian kids. Deepest condolences to Christa, his family and friends. Well played, Poppa.

28/10/2025

We *love* her! But what year was this Newcastle Ladies Darts Association confection presented?

16/10/2025

Can't wait to get back to Tower Cinemas - Newcastle

16/10/2025

AUSTRALIA'S GREAT RESOURCES BEING UTILISED TO ASSIST IN THE WAR.

Following Great Britain's call upon her colonies for aid, Australia has manfully come forward and is doing more than her share in supplying the needs of the Kingdom. Australia is one of the richest of Great Britain's coloies in resources, her annual exports of what, cattle, wool, minerals, etc, amounting to over $235,000,000, and since the war started this amount has increased by leaps and bounds, owing to the added demands made upon her. The photograph shows a view of the Broken Hill Steel Works, at Newcastle, New South Wales, Australia.

Photo: Underwood & Underwood, Lost Newcastle collection. Publication date unknown but the image was under embargo until 1927.

16/10/2025

Hello Losties! Today's photo is a beauty that accompanied an article during WWI. I haven't yet found the actual publication but the image was under embargo until Feb 1927.

‘AUSTRALIA'S GREAT RESOURCES BEING UTILISED TO ASSIST IN THE WAR.

Following Great Britain's call upon her colonies for aid, Australia has manfully come forward and is doing more than her share in supplying the needs of the Kingdom. Australia is one of the richest of Great Britain's coloies in resources, her annual exports of what, cattle, wool, minerals, etc, amounting to over $235,000,000, and since the war started this amount has increased by leaps and bounds, owing to the added demands made upon her. The photograph shows a view of the Broken Hill Steel Works, at Newcastle, New South Wales, Australia.’

Photo: Underwood & Underwood NY, Lost Newcastle collection.

14/10/2025

Come and celebrate the creativity and craftsmanship of model makers across the region at our special weekend event – Model Newcastle: Meet the Makers!

A unique opportunity to meet hobbyists and enthusiasts who build everything from miniature ships and trains to planes and dioramas. This informal gathering is a great way to connect, ask questions and be inspired by the people who helped create the Model Newcastle exhibition.

📆 Saturday 18 October and Sunday 19 October
⏰ 10am - 3pm
🧒 All Ages
🎟 FREE, drop-in event, no bookings required

Newcastle Museum is supported by Create NSW

05/10/2025

❤️💯

26/09/2025

🔎 Find it Friday! 🔎

Every Friday, we’ll be sharing a mystery photo from across the Hunter Region — and it’s your turn to play detective. 👀

Do you know where this photo was taken? Drop your guesses in the comments below! ⬇️

We’ll reveal the answer at the bottom of the post… but no cheating 😉

✨ Stay tuned each week for more local history gems from the University of Newcastle’s Special Collections.

✨ Want to see more? Check out our “Ralph Snowball” collections on Living Histories — link in bio!

📷: Clarendon Hotel, Hunter Street, c. 1896
This image was scanned from the original glass negative taken by Ralph Snowball. It is part of the Norm Barney Photographic Collection, held by Special Collections.

15/09/2025

This is going to be fabulous! Opens 27 September Newcastle Museum

08/09/2025

Mosquito, Moscheto ... we love this 1885 illustration of the arms of the Hunter River and its islands before the reclamation project led to it being named Kooragang Island - although Kooragang was the name of the property of the Reverend Charles Pleydell Neale Wilton. He's a story for another day!

From the Geographical Names Board 26 January 1968:

"IN accordance with the provisions of the Geographical Names Act, 1966, the Geographical Names Board of New South Wales has this day discontinued the recorded names Ash Island, Moscheto Island, Dempsey Island, Walsh Island, Spectacle Islands, Table Island, Pig Island, and Goat Island, which islands have been reclaimed and amalgamated to form one island, and named such island “Kooragang Island”.
Also, the Board simultaneously assigned the name “Walsh Point” to the locality comprising the southern extremity of the proposed Kooragang Island. GNB 299."