Charlestown is a suburb of the

City of Lake Macquarie The City of Lake Macquarie is a local government area (LGA) in the Hunter Region in New South Wales, Australia. It was proclaimed a city on 7 September 1984. It is adjacent to the city of Newcastle and is part of the Greater Newcastle area. ...

New South Wales New South Wales (commonly abbreviated as NSW) is a States and territories of Australia, state on the Eastern states of Australia, east coast of :Australia. It borders Queensland to the north, Victoria (state), Victoria to the south, and South ...

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country comprising mainland Australia, the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania and list of islands of Australia, numerous smaller isl ...

, and the largest suburb in Lake Macquarie and in the

Greater Newcastle Newcastle, also commonly referred to as Greater Newcastle ( ; ), is a large Metropolitan area, metropolitan area and the second-most-populous such area of New South Wales, Australia. It includes the cities of City of Newcastle, Newcastle and Ci ...

area. It is approximately west-south-west of the central business district of Newcastle.

History

The Aboriginal people in this area, the Awabakal, were the first people of this land. Originally granted to the Waratah Coal Company, the area was the site of the company's first shaft, sunk in 1873. Officially called South Waratah Colliery (later just Waratah Colliery), the pit was variously known as Charles' Pit, Raspberry Gully or The Gully Pit. These names all applied to Charlestown in its early days and the surviving name seem to have been derived from that of Charles Smith, the company's manager. The first settlers were miners from the pit. The colliery closed in 1961. The company had the area surveyed on 29 April 1876; the first subdivision later became Ida Street, Pearson Street, Milson Street and Frederick Street. Harry Wright bought the first lot when it was auctioned later in 1876. The town had its first water main in 1927 and was connected to civic sewage in 1959.

Commercial area

The commercial area of Charlestown is situated around the Pacific Highway. Charlestown Square is a large shopping centre located just off the Pacific Highway. There are also two smaller shopping centres including Hiltop Plaza and The Forum Centre, an office and retail centre located on Pacific Highway featuring a

Hoyts The HOYTS Group of companies in Australia and New Zealand includes HOYTS Cinemas, a cinema chain, and Val Morgan, which sells advertising on cinema screens and digital billboards. The company was established by dentist Arthur Russell in Melbo ...

Cinema. Charlestown features clusters of shops along Pacific Highway as well as in surrounding streets. The suburb has a police station and a fire station. New South Wales Ambulance has its Northern Communications Centre in the suburb, off Dudley Road.

Schools

The suburb contains four primary schools; the State schools of Charlestown Public, Charlestown South Public and Charlestown East Public, and the Catholic diocese's St Joseph's Primary School. The state primary schools feed into nearby Whitebridge High School, while the catholic primary school feeds into nearby St Mary's Catholic College at Gateshead and St Pius X High School at Adamstown.

Population

According to the 2016 census of Population, there were 12,912 people in Charlestown. * Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people made up 2.3% of the population. * 83.8% of people were born in Australia. The next most common countries of birth were England 2.2%, New Zealand 0.9% and India 0.8%. * 88.1% of people spoke only English at home. Other languages spoken at home included Macedonian at 0.9%. * The most common responses for religion were No Religion 30.4%, Catholic 23.3% and Anglican 17.4%.

References

External links

History of Charlestown
(Lake Macquarie City Library) {{City of Lake Macquarie suburbs Suburbs of Lake Macquarie