[1] In 1888 the Wallarah Coal Company, an English venture with strong colonial connections, purchased land including the former Cowper Township and began construction of a jetty to replace the original wharf which had burned two years before.
By the turn of the century, Catherine Hill Bay's reputation as a "picturesque" beauty spot had been added to its underlying identity as a scene of industrial prosperity and occasional labour unrest.
In 1941, public attention focussed again on Catherine Hill Bay, when 100 Wallarah miners staged a stay-in for a record 101 hours over a penalty clause in their award.
"[1] During the ensuing decade, sporadic schemes to improve housing, services and facilities in the communities of the Catherine Hill Bay Cultural Precinct stalled, failed, were indefinitely postponed or succumbed to token gestures such as the bowling green, tennis court and recreation area which graced Middle Camp in the early 50s.
While this scheme provided greater incentive for the new owners to maintain and improve their homes, dwindling employment throughout the remainder of the 20th Century saw declining population and a corresponding disappearance of community services.
Although the varied and dramatic juxtaposition of broader sea-land landscapes, ranging from exposed ridges and cliff forms to sheltered sloping gullies, does not lie within the Cultural Precinct, this setting contributes powerfully to the sense of the built environment's modest scale.
Its two villages, Catherine Hill Bay and Middle Camp consist principally of modest miners' cottages lining both sides of the road through the towns.
Against this striking backdrop, the character of the streets derives from the low-scale built form and highly consistent pattern of predominantly single storey weatherboard cottages.
[1] The Catherine Hill Bay Cultural Precinct forms the oldest collection of buildings in Lake Macquarie with scale, fabric and interrelationship of the features largely retained and in good condition.
[1] Ongoing additions and modifications to the original building stock over time have tended to respect the prevailing scale, materials and spatial relations that characterise the Precinct.
[1] The Catherine Hill Bay Cultural Precinct comprises picturesque and distinctive historic townscapes forming the oldest group of buildings in Lake Macquarie, set in land/seascapes of exceptional aesthetic and technical significance, both visually and as an archaeological resource for industrial heritage.
Although few buildings belong to a recognised style or period, each is distinctive, and all display a high degree of consistency in terms of size, scale, form, setbacks, siting and materials.
[1] The Precinct is set in a landscape, now largely dedicated as a National Park, which is distinctive both for its coastal topography which creates a natural visual catchment and for its evidence of coal mining dating from the 1890s.
The Precinct's built environments, location and geological character are state significant because of the key role played by 19th Century company towns in the development of Australian resources.
The Catherine Hill Bay Cultural Precinct is state significant for its associations with coal mining, organised labour, and early maritime industry in NSW.
The Precinct is also associated with the State Heritage Register listed WWII radar station RS208, near Mine Camp, which was a key unit in Australia's war time protection and was manned in part by Catherine Hill Bay women who were members of the WAAF.
Catherine Hill Bay exhibits a significant sense of place and history through a number of monuments and memorials and through its association with the development of company towns in NSW.
Further research and consultation are needed in order to formulate appropriate management strategies for the Aboriginal cultural heritage resource of the Precinct, its setting and the Wallarah Peninsula generally.
The precinct also provides a rare living example of the scale, materials and spatial relations that typified Company Towns in NSW from the late nineteenth century onwards.
The Catherine Hill Bay Cultural Precinct is state significant as a documented and widely acknowledged intact representative of the era of company towns in the development of Australia's resources.