The Father of Modern Sydney - 

John Job Crew Bradfield CMG 

John Bradfield was born in Queensland on the 26th of December 1867. His parents were John Bradfield and Maria (née Crew) who moved from England to Brisbane in 1857. He had several siblings. In 1891, he married Edith (nee Jenkins) and had six children.  

As Australia’s most famous engineer, John Bradfield is a notable person who has left an indelible mark on Sydney for generations to come. He is known as the father of modern Sydney and his legacy is enduring. As recently as March 2021, the NSW Government honoured him by announcing that Sydney’s newest suburb will be Bradfield, which will be located at the northern end of Bringelly and alongside Sydney’s new second international airport. He is honoured in many other ways as well, including the Bradfield highway (in both Sydney and Brisbane), the Bradfield Honour Roll – a prestigious list of Sydney visionaries that is displayed in the University of Sydney Quadrangle, the Federal electorate of Bradfield, and Bradfield Senior College, a school for the creative industries in St Leonards. 

Bradfield was a hardworking and conscientious student. Educated at Ipswich Grammar School, he won the University Medal twice (one for his Bachelor of Engineering and the other for his Master of Engineering). He was also the first recipient of a doctorate in engineering from the University of Sydney in 1924. Bradfield is best known for his lead role in the construction of The Harbour Bridge. He was involved in many other notable projects like Sydney’s underground railway system (The City Circle), the Cataract Dam, the Burrinjuck Dam and Brisbane’s Story Bridge. 

In 1891, the same year he was married, he was retrenched from the Queensland Railways Department because of an economic depression. He picked himself up and moved his family to NSW where he joined the NSW Department of Public works. He was involved in many projects and in 1909 he applied, unsuccessfully, for the position of foundation chair of engineering at the University of Queensland. Bradfield was not the type of person to give up. In 1915, he submitted a report which proposed a grand scheme for electrifying Sydney’s railways, a city underground railway and the Sydney Harbour Bridge. All three proposals were rejected. Unperturbed, in 1924 his Sydney University doctoral thesis was titled “The city and suburban electric railways and the Sydney Harbour Bridge”.  

Bradfield oversaw the design and construction of the Sydney Harbour Bridge, which opened in 1932. Ironically, the very university (the University of Queensland) which did not give him a job when he applied in 1909, honoured him with a Doctor of Engineering degree in 1935. He died at his home in Gordon, Sydney on 23 September 1943. He is buried at St John’s Anglican Church in Gordon beside his daughter Mary Margaret. His wife died in 1954 and is also buried there. 

I chose John Bradfield as my notable person because of his lasting impact. There are very few people who have had as much influence over the infrastructure of modern Sydney as Bradfield. As noted in the NSW Premier’s announcement when Bradfield was named as the city’s newest suburb, “Bradfield was selected after the community was asked to have a say, with a panel settling on the final decision to honour John Bradfield’s enduring city-shaping impact on Sydney”. Bradfield was a visionary with great resilience. His life was one of total professional zeal and he became one of Australia’s most outstanding engineers.  Bradfield is a particularly appropriate person to choose for my notables project.  

 

  

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