Royal Cricketer's Arms Inn

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Photograph (c) NSW Heritage Trust

Built 1879. No. 385 Reservior Road, Prospect.

The inn was built by James and Agnes (nee Neeves) Manning, primarily to capitalise on the patronage of workers constructing the nearby Prospect Reservoir and Great Western Highway. The inn also had it's own racetrack and cricket pitch and sponsored it's own team, hence it's name. James Manning applied for a Publican's Licence in 1875 and was granted the license 13th September, 1881. The inn was built on land that James and Agnes bought from Agnes' widowed mother, Sarah Neeves in 1877. Adjacent to the inn was the "Flushcombe Stores" (established in 1881), which James operated in partnership with Agnes' brother, William Neeves.

The inn is of high historical significance as the last surviving operational roadside hotel along the Old Western Road between Parramatta and Penrith.

A two storey brick and timber building with 9" solid brick external and internal walls on the ground floor and timber walls on the upper floor. All of the masonry walls are plastered internally and rendered externally. The building sits on an irregular stone base with a cellar under the main front room and a storage space with access from an external opening in the foundation wall. The building has a galvanised iron painted roof. A small weather board clad room protrudes from the roof. There is a galvanised roof over the verandah, with timber posts, decorative timber brackets and timber floor. There are rooms in the roof space which are now used as a private residence. In the 1880's a front verandah was added and in 1916 a rear verandah was added.

With the completion of the Reservior in 1888 and the re-routing of the highway soon afterwards to bypass the inn, the inn soon fell on increasingly hard times. On 16/9/1892 James & Agnes were declared bankrupt and the Supreme Court forced the sale of the inn to Hugh McCue, who mortgaged the property back to James & Agnes, who continued to operate the inn. In 1911 the inn lost it's license and it became a grocery store. In 1913 it was sold to Edward and Florence Cooney - Florence was the daughter of James and Agnes. Edward operated a dairy on the land and his daughter, Agnes, used the inn as a tea room from 1913 to 1936. The hotel was extended at this time to include a rear verandah, rear timber laundry building and a farm shed. From 1936 to 1963 it was a private residence, under several owners. In 1963 it was bought by the Blacktown Drive-In and served as a caretaker's residence for sometime. It was eventually abandoned and badly vandalised before being aquired by the Department of Urban Affairs in 1989 who restored the exterior. The site was then leased to James and Susan Kelly who restored the interior and re-opened the inn as an English-style pub in May 1994. Their son, Daniel, now holds the lease.

I remember my grandmother telling of how she stayed there many nights with her cousins, prior to its sale in 1913.


Sources:
Prospect Trust, "Back to Prospect" tour, 21/7/1996
The Neeves Family, http://www.triode.net.au/~dragon/ft/neeves.html
Blacktown Advocate, 25/6/2003
NSW Heritage Office Website, http://www.heritage.nsw.gov.au
Blacktown City Council website, http://www.blacktown.nsw.gov.au/our_city/oc_royalcricketers.asp
"A History of Prospect", Frank Bloxham, 2002, Blacktown & District Historical Society