Connections, Characters and Commerce – Smith St Summerhill
A guided walk to flesh out the characters and events that contributed to our heritage of Smith Street, Summer Hill.
The history beneath the surface of Smith Street is extraordinary. This tour will uncover the natural features of the landscape, which by the 1880s became the site for an extraordinary late-Victorian building boom. How did the new subdivisions respond to the landscape, and who were the first urban landowners and residents? Was Summer Hill the domain of the fashionable well-to-do, or the labouring class, or both? Why? The shops, the halls, the offices, the churches and the meeting venues, the factories, the houses and the duplexes are still visible and active, and yet the pressure for change remains strong. The story of Smith Street gives us a great insight into the complex nature of Summer Hill and the Inner West society of today.