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Newcastle Herald
Newcastle Herald
National
Damon Cronshaw

Old photo surfaces of lake bull shark

Lorraine Edwards, of Cardiff Heights, has dipped into the family album and pulled out a photo that's chilling and breathtaking.

Having read our piece on Australia Day about bull sharks in Lake Macquarie, Lorraine sent us a photo that her Dad took in the 1930s.

It shows local fishermen at the foreshore park at Belmont South with a bull shark caught in the lake.

"I don't know the circumstances involved with landing this beast. Dad only told me it was brought ashore at the local swimming hole," Lorraine said.

"Dad's name was Frank Short and he always used to tell me sharks were a common sight in Lake Macquarie, according to local fishermen.

"In those days the swimming hole was used by the local children, including my Dad who lived at Marks Point."

On Australia Day, we wrote about bull sharks caught on the western side of the lake, around Eraring Power Station, in 2012. Saturday's attack at nearby Yarrawonga Park - which authorities say was probably a bull shark - revived our memories of those days.

We hope the victim of the attack - reported as Australian Antarctic Division veteran Rick Burbury - will be OK.

Joe Biden's Newcastle

Boolaroo's Col Maybury tells Topics that Joe Biden's first public office was as a New Castle County Councillor.


New Castle County is in Delaware.


Col added that the Delaware state boundary was part of the so-called Twelve-Mile Circle, which runs around New Castle.

"The compass point is on the New Castle courthouse cupola [a rounded dome]," he said.


This circle is actually a circular arc. A small section of it, known as the Arc Line, is part of the famous Mason-Dixon line. The line forms part of the borders of Pennsylvania, Maryland, Delaware and West Virginia.


Col said New Castle sits at the start of the Mason-Dixon line. Astronomer Charles Mason and surveyor Jeremiah Dixon did the survey work for the line from 1763 to 1767.

"The wonderful song Sailing to Philadelphia by Mark Knopfler and James Taylor relates to the Mason-Dixon line. It's superb," Col said.


Knopfler essentially condensed Thomas Pynchon's 773-page novel, Mason & Dixon, into the song. He read the 1997 novel on a flight from London to Nashville.

"When Mason and Dixon were in America, it was a turning point because there was the beginning of the rumbles of independence, a very exciting and interesting time. America was a colony of England at the time and then it turned around and colonised the world with its music and films and a great many other things," Knopfler said in 2001.


Some of the lyrics go like this: A stargazer am I, it seems that I was born to chart the evening sky. We are sailing to Philadelphia, a world away from the coaly Tyne. Sailing to Philadelphia to draw the line, a Mason-Dixon Line.

We can see why stargazer Col, our resident astronomy expert, likes that song. And oh, that Knopfler guitar gets us every time.

Rise of the ebabies

A tipping point is set to occur in 2040.

This is the point in time, apparently, when more Australian couples will meet online than offline.

The claim was made in the Future of Dating report, compiled by Monash University and online dating website eharmony.

The research claims that 34 per cent of newborns will be so-called "ebabies" within the next decade. Ebabies are kids born to couples who met online.

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