Early one wet, Saturday morning in January 1917 an explosion rocked “Bangoola”, the Schreiterer family home in Parriwi Road better known then as New Spit Road. It was heard as far away as Cremorne Point.

Frank Pursell, Mayor of Mosman, 1939. Detail from a photograph titled ‘Mayor’s Room’ in the Mosman Library Local Studies collection.

It’s timely that a few weeks before a talk on the Great War in the air, historian and local resident David Carment has researched a Mayor of Mosman who, with his brother, served with the RAF in WWI.

It’s funny how once you have a specific focus on a particular subject you somehow develop antennae that pick up other relevant bits and pieces that like a jigsaw fit into place and tell a story. In the course of working on this project I have rediscovered some great characters.

Just a quick post to let you know that we’ve mapped on Historypin some images shared at Scan-a-thon, including the postcards of Vignacourt belonging to Allan Allsop.

Historypin allows you to see ‘than and now’ views using Google Maps and Google Street View — or with your phone if you’re lucky enough to be in situ in France!

Doing our bit photos on Historypin →

We’ll try to add more soon. Any suggestions?

Also, take a look at the work Historypin are doing with the Imperial War Museum around crowdsourcing and ‘The Participatory Museum’ concept.

It was a packed Mosman Room to hear Tony Cunneen’s talk on Sir William and the Cullen family of Tregoyd in Raglan Street. Tony brought a unique perspective to our project by sharing his knowledge of the Sydney legal profession’s contribution to the war effort.