FOR years before its demolition the old arts union building at 123 Claisebrook Road sat on a draft heritage inventory, passing hands from Perth council to Vincent and neither going through with granting it any permanent heritage protection. Built in 1890, for 50 years it was the base of president of the Authorised Newsagents Association of…

VETERAN firefighter Ron Harley has marked 60 years’ of service, first on the front line defending lives and property and then behind the scenes fighting to save the Old Perth Fire Station museum from demolition. Mr Harley, 86, left Highgate secondary school at 14 and worked as a milkman, carpenter and whale flenser before joining…

FROM Vincent Library’s local history centre archives comes this photograph and information from Julia Robinson-White, great-granddaughter of prominent trader Bill Beadle. It was submitted to the 2020 Local History Awards, with supplemental research by Friends of Local History volunteer Liz Millward. NEXT time you’re at the corner of Charles and Newcastle Streets, take a moment…

MORE than 600 dead fish were found in the Swan River near the Garratt Road bridge this week. Mostly bream, they were reported around the bridge and upstream on March 6, with the WA health department warning against fishing or even touching the water.  The health department says the cause and extent is still being…

PLANS to put a commercial kiosk in Hyde Park has the WA branch of the Australian Garden History Society “deeply concerned”. The society says the kiosk could be detrimental to the park’s health and heritage, and it should be retained as a non-commercial space.   Vincent council is testing public opinion on whether to put a…

THE first woman elected to a WA road board, Nellie Fawdrey Tant, has had a park named in her honour. Bayswater mayor Dan Bull first moved to name a park after Ms Tant back in 2019. She was elected to Bayswater’s predecessor the Belmont-Bayswater Road Board in 1921. The first woman to be on a road…

A World War II era Women’s Land Army Recruitment poster. ANZAC Cottage is marking Women’s History Month with its March Anzac Afternoon dedicated to the Australian Women’s Land Army. The AWLA was formed after Japan entered World War II, with Australian prime minister John Curtin’s response to the threat to build-up the armed forces, leaving…

FOGO is starting in Bayswater with the “kitchen caddies” going out now and due to be in every home within the next four weeks. Under the new three bin system the lime green lidded bins currently used for garden waste will now also take food and be picked up weekly. The kitchen caddies are little bins…

EAST PERTH residents will meet with WA Cricket Association representatives this week to get a better idea of the planned WACA redevelopment. A reno of the WACA’s been on the drawing board for years since Perth’s new stadium was announced in 2011, and given more impetus in 2013 when the WACA was overlooked to host…

NETS over drain outlets are being considered as a way to keep garbage out of our waterways. Bayswater councillor Elli Petersen-Pik has asked council staff to look into whether there are any outlets that’d benefit from the nets, which were first installed in Kwinana council in 2018.  Cr Petersen-Pik says:  “During one year, two of…