Published on Thursday, 17 September 2026 at 11:16AM
Cheers to 100 years of Beadon Bay Hotel, a few cyclones and countless good yarns!
By the end of September 1926, the new town of Beadon, now Onslow, had something every good North West town apparently needed: a pub – and 100 years later, the Beadon Bay Hotel still stands as testament to the resilience of Onslow and its community.
Before the Beadon Hotel opened its doors, refreshments were a little more makeshift. The town’s two general stores held two-gallon licences, and the bar from the old Rob Roy Hotel at Old Onslow was brought across to serve as a temporary watering hole.
Then along came the Beadon Hotel...for a young North West town, it was quite the building. Costing around £7,000 to build, and close to £10,000 once furnishings and plant were included, the Federation Filigree-style hotel featured concrete block walls and a corrugated iron roof.
And those weren’t just any concrete blocks. The imported cement was mixed and the blocks made by hand by builder R. Rennie and manager Harold Cornish. Harold’s son Cyril remembered lending a hand and even stamped his initials and the date into one of the blocks. His handiwork remains low on the hotel’s front wall today, an unofficial foundation stone and a small piece of Onslow history hiding in plain sight.
Of course, no North West pub makes it to 100 without picking up a few battle scars.
- In 1931, fire destroyed the storeroom, stock, lighting and freezer plant, laundry and oil room, although thankfully the hotel itself escaped damage.
- In 1934, a cyclone caused extensive damage to the roof and upper storey.
Over its lifetime, the hotel has also closed its doors twice after falling into disrepair. But each time, it came back.
From the original 15-bedroom hotel, it has grown and changed with Onslow. Motel units arrived in the 1970s, followed decades later by a major redevelopment in 2014–15, adding new accommodation, dining and meeting spaces, a reconfigured bar, beer garden, Simpson Street entrance and addition of the bottle shop.
Its name has evolved too. It started as the Beadon Hotel and today is officially the Beadon Bay Hotel. Unofficially? Well, locals have been a little more creative.
Hotel Beadon. The Beadon Creek. The Local. The Pub. And, perhaps most colourfully, the “Bleedn’ Beadon”. But whatever you call it, for 100 years it has been a place where people come together.
There have been Ashburton Road Board meetings and race club gatherings, weddings, Christmases and New Year’s Eves, dances and bridge parties, charity fundraisers, live music, pool competitions, Jag the Joker and even cockroach races.
People have celebrated there, sheltered there during cyclones, caught up with old mates and welcomed newcomers and somewhere along the way, more than a few people walked through the doors for a drink and walked out having met their future husband or wife.
A century on, the Beadon Bay Hotel is more than bricks, beer and a very resilient roof. It’s part of Onslow’s story.
So, happy 100th birthday to the Beadon Bay Hotel! Here’s to 100 years of cold drinks, warm welcomes, cyclone stories, celebrations and good old-fashioned North West hospitality.
If you would like to share your memories, photo’s or stories, please email the Shire's Local history Team at [email protected] or post your memories of the Beadon Bay Hotel in the comments to share with others!
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