GFE Stumpes: Sydney, AU II (8/19/2025)

Tuesday, August 19, 2025 (continued)

In Sydney, we continued walking up Macquarie Street, once the most fashionable street in the city.

The Parliament of New South Wales, the first of the Australian
colonial legislatures, is housed since 1929 in the north wing
of Sydney Hospital (1816, by D'Arcy Wentworth)

Il Porcellino (1968 replica of c 1634 statue in Florence,
Italy) stands in front of Sydney Hospital (rebuilt 1885);
one rubs the boar's snout for good luck

The south wing of the original Sydney Hospital (1811-1816)
served as the Royal Mint from 1855-1926, and now as
government offices and a museum

Hyde Park Barracks (1817-1819, by Sir Francis Greenway,
himself a convict) was built with convict labour in Georgian style

On the left is Sydney Tower Eye (1975-1981),
an observation and telecommunications tower
that is the tallest structure in Sydney; on the
right is St James' Church (1819-1824, also
by Sir Francis Greenway in Georgian style)

Outside of St James' Church lies Homeless Jesus (2018 copy
of the original sculpture by Timothy Schmalz in Toronto)

Interior of St James' Church, the oldest church in Sydney

The south porch of St James' Church was
remodelled in 1988 as the Chapel of the
Holy Spirit with the stained-glass Creation
Window (by David Wright)

Hyde Park (1810) is the oldest public parkland in Australia,
located in the Central Business District/CBD of Sydney
where Aborigines once hunted ducks in the marshes;
view of Archibald Memorial Fountain with a statue (1926,
erected 1932, by François-Léon Sicard) of Apollo

Registrar-General's Building (1909-1913,
by Walter Liberty Vernon in Federation Gothic style)

St Mary's Cathedral (1868-1928, by William Wardell in
Geometric Decorated Gothic style; spires were added in 2000)

St Mary of the Cross (2010, by Louis Lauman)
depicts St Mary MacKillop, Australia's first saint

Interior of the Catholic basilica

Today there was no fee to enter the Crypt,
with its terrazzo mosaic floor depicting
Creation as inspired by the Book of Kells

Hyde Park (where we took a lunch break) with
a chess game in progress despite the rain

Great Synagogue (1874-1878, by Thomas
Rowe in Victorian eclectic mixed styles)

Hyde Park Obelisk (1857, modelled after
Cleopatra's Needle in London) was a sewer vent

Hyde Park Anzac War Memorial (1932-1934, by
Charles Bruce Dellit; sculptures by George Rayner Hoff,
in Art Deco style) with the Pool of Reflection

Anzac began as an acronym for the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps in World War I, but was soon accepted as a word on its own.

The memorial features monumental figural
reliefs of sixteen seated servicemen and women
and four standing figures representing the
branches of service: an infantry lieutenant (Army),
naval commander (Navy), an air force officer
(Air Force), and a matron (Army Nursing Service)

Fountain at the south end of the Anzac War Memorial
with the entrance to the Centenary Extension (2016-2018,
by Architects Johnson Pilton Walker)

Hall of Service (2018, by Fiona Hall) with
The International Soil in the center of the floor

Soil from 100 Significant Military Sites are set into a ring
embedded in the floor of the Hall of Service

Eight panels feature The Home Soil, displaying soil from
1,701 New South Wales' towns, cities, suburbs and homesteads
given as a home address by First World War enlistees

Detail of The Home Soil

Hall of Silence holds the sculpture Sacrifice
(1930-1934, by George Rayner Hoff) that
depicts a dead soldier being carried on his
shield by his mother, sister, and wife carrying
a child, symbolizing the immense grief and
the spirit of courage and sacrifice endured by
those who lost loved ones in war

In Sacrifice, the soldier is lying on his back at the top with his arms outstretched and his head hanging back on our side.

We took the Metro train to Martin Place.

Even outdoor spaces are smoke-free (KSS)

Cenotaph (1927-1929, by Bertram Mackennal),
guarded by statues of a soldier and a sailor,
modelled on real returned servicemen

Sydney General Post Office/GPO (1866-1891,
by James Barnet in Italian Renaissance style)

A closer look at the Sydney GPO, which
now houses the Fullerton Hotel

Inside the Sydney GPO, formerly an open
interior courtyard, is now a glass-covered atrium

Mailboxes are still in use

Angel Place with Forgotten Songs (2009, by
Michael Thomas Hill), part of the 2009 Sydney
Laneway Temporary art scheme, but made
permanent due to popularity; recordings are
played of the songs of fifty bird species that
used to live in the central Sydney area (KSS)

Dobell Memorial Sculpture (1979, by
Herbert Flugelman) to honor William Dobell,
one of Australia’s most celebrated
landscape and portrait artists

Obelisk (1818, by Francis Greenway) of
Distances is the zero point from which all the road
distances in New South Wales are measured; it was
also the ‘symbolic peg’ indicating the furthest extent
of the British Empire in the early 1800s

Wrought iron anchor and cast-iron cannon from the
HMS Sirius, flagship of the First Fleet, which arrived at
Port Jackson in 1788 (both recovered 1905)