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Sugars' Brickworks
Established in 1896 by William Sugars and his son Albert, Sugars’ Brickworks was located where the Redcliffe Bridge was recently upgraded to accommodate the increase of lanes to eight.
In 1895, after arriving as a family in Western Australia, the two men wasted little time and built their brickworks on the banks of the Swan River, where an excellent supply of clay was found. Not only was their bricks used to build many of the houses in the area, flat pavers manufactured at Sugars’ Brickworks were suitable for flooring. Albert and his wife Louisa would go on to build the first house on Keymer Street.
The brickworks were a significant employer until they closed in 1914.
Gwendoline Sugars, the granddaughter of William, together with her racing identity husband Eric O’Malley, established stables in the 1950s on a site adjacent to the brickworks. The Redcliffe Bridge officially opened on 16 April 1988 and also destroyed the stables. The bridge had initially been proposed in 1955 and named the Beechboro-Gosnells Highway, after the two suburbs the bridge planned to link up.
A plaque was erected as part of the Bicentennial celebrations in the same year, recognising the important contribution of the Sugars’ family and their brickworks. It’s believed to have been missing since the extension of the bridge.
Archaeologist Dr Shane Burke examined the area in 2006 for any potential evidence of the brickwork site but other than a number of bricks in the river bank, he was unable to find any.
It was renamed Mooro-Beeloo Bridge in December 2023 when the Tonkin Gap Project was completed, which saw widening of Tonkin Highway between Dunreath Drive and Collier Road, as well as duplicating the old Redcliffe Bridge.
