A Dynasty of Butchers and their Paths to Woy Woy – Joan Patrick

The Woy Woy abattoir, owned and managed by family business F.C. Nichols Pty Ltd, was an integral part of the Central Coast for almost fifty years. it employed thousands of local people and injected millions of dollars into the local economy. When it finally closed in 2004, it was one of only two locally-owned abattoirs left in New South Wales.

Central Coast Historian Joan Patrick traces the history of the Nichols family, from arrival in New South Wales in 1882, through work as slaughtermen and development of their family business: a slaughteryard at Tennyson, an iceworks in Ryde, a string of retail butcher shops in Sydney and the Central Coast, and the Woy Woy abattoir.

Patrick documents the development of the abattoir site on the Woy Woy Peninsula, from small farm to meatworks, the industry that went on around it, such as building the railway, and the abattoir’s interactions with local businesses and the community.

But a dynasty of butchers and their path to Woy Woy is about more than one family or place. Patrick brings to life the history of the meat industry in New South Wales: early slaughterhouse, associated pollution and waterways, government inspections and regulations, wartime meat rations, trade union disputes and changes in slaughtering techniques and equipment. Above all, this is the story of the men and women who worked on farms, in abattoirs and in retail butcher shops to bring meat to our tables.