The Birth of an Organising Union

Smokestack soot mingled with the
pungent reek of the tannery and the
horse manure scattered along Kent
and Sussex Streets. This is where trolly
and draymen worked, and where their
families lived.
The living conditions were poor: often
not much better than the horse stables
that were also a feature of every
street. The streets and lanes provided
the playgrounds for the children.
Plague Outbreak
A dramatic revelation of the poor
living conditions was provided by
the outbreak of that medieval terror,
bubonic plague, which suddenly struck
in the Rocks districts of Sydney in
1900, transmitted by nimble rats from
ship to the squalid shore of Darling
Harbour where it found a fertile
breeding ground.
A City Council inspection of the
14 The Birth of an Organising Union