Where was Ralph Snowball’s house and studio in New Lambton?
The University of Newcastle Cultural Collections site has a number of photographs captioned as Ralph Snowball’s house or studio in Clarence Rd, New Lambton.
Ralph Snowball’s studio, New Lambton, NSW, 11 April 1902
Ralph Snowball Studio, Clarence Road, New Lambton, NSW, [n.d.]
Ralph Snowball Studio, Clarence Road, New Lambton, NSW, [n.d.]
Ralph Snowball’s house, Clarence Street, New Lambton, NSW, 11 April 1902
Chinese Market Gardener at Ralph Snowball’s residence, Clarence Road, New Lambton, NSW, September 1886
The first thing to note is that these are all of the same building. Compare the fence and the verandah in these two photos.
The NSW Land Registry Services has a historical map that shows a property owned by R.G. Snowball on the corner of Clarence Rd and Baker St (lot 1165), and for a number of years I thought that the photographs above were of that location
Recently I realised that couldn’t be right, in particular because in one of the photos of the back of the house (on the elevated side of the block) there is clearly another house to the right. So the Snowball house in this photograph cannot have been on a corner.
Also in the Cultural Collections archive is a photo taken from near the top of Collaroy Rd, looking northwards towards Lambton colliery and township.
Lambton Colliery and township, Lambton, NSW, 15 October 1900
I was able to locate Snowball’s house in this photograph, and notice that the right wall of the Mechanics’ Institute in Lambton, the top of the Lambton Park rotunda, and the chimney of Snowball’s house were in alignment. I was then able to replicate that alignment in Google Earth by drawing a straight line using the Mechanics’ Institute and rotunda as guide points.
Using this alignment in Google Earth, I then inspected the path of that line on a 1944 aerial photograph looking for a matching building – one with an expansive front yard with steps going up to the front of the house, and with the back of the house very close to the street. There was a very good match at 19 Clarence Rd.
A closer inspection of the map with the property owners names shows on lot 1149, although the name is slightly worn away, “Ralph Snowball”.
Finally, when I overlaid this map into Google Earth along with the line I had drawn earlier using the Mechanics Institute and Rotunda as a guide, the line goes straight through lot 1149!
Google Earth shows that lot 1149 (19 Clarence Rd) now has two modern buildings on the block.
Locating this block of land also explains why the Federal Directory of Newcastle and District for 1901 has a listing for “Photographer. Snowball, Ralph, Gwydir Rd”.
Lachlan, your research identifying Ralph Snowball’s Lot 1149 is confirmed by his certificate of title, vol-fol 1121-228. Lot 1165 (vol-fol 1728-61) was Richard Gladstone Snowball, presumably the son referred to as ‘Yank’ in the reply posted above.
Thanks for that confirmation.
Lachlan, the house on the corner of Baker and Clarence Street was the home to Ralph Snowball’s eldest son. He was known in the district as ‘Yank’ because he was born in the USA when the Snowball’s lived before coming to Australia. Yank worked at the Lambton coal mine. Ralph’s house was still in Clarence Street in 1993. It had been long vacant and overgrown with vines. Just before it was demolished his long-stored photo glass negatives were retrieved from under the front verandah. They had been there from 1925 when he died.