Dick's Hotel was built in 1872 on the corner of Beattie and Montague Streets Balmain

Balmain, New South Wales

Balmain is a suburb in the inner-west of Sydney, in the state of New South Wales, Australia. Balmain is located slightly west of the Sydney central business district, in the local government area of the Municipality of Leichhardt....

, an inner-west suburb of Sydney

Sydney

Sydney is the most populous city in Australia and the state capital of New South Wales. Sydney is located on Australia's south-east coast of the Tasman Sea. As of June 2010, the greater metropolitan area had an approximate population of 4.6 million people...

, New South Wales

New South Wales

New South Wales is a state of :Australia, located in the east of the country. It is bordered by Queensland, Victoria and South Australia to the north, south and west respectively. To the east, the state is bordered by the Tasman Sea, which forms part of the Pacific Ocean. New South Wales...

, Australia

Australia

Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...

. Built by John Dick, local publican of note, it was known as Lean's Hotel from 1886 to 1898 when owned by Jabez Lean, but reverted to its former name after and has remained as such since.

Associated with the political movements of the late nineteenth century, especially the growing labour movement, it was also the scene for farewells to contingents from NSW to the Boxer Rebellion

Boxer Rebellion

The Boxer Rebellion, also called the Boxer Uprising by some historians or the Righteous Harmony Society Movement in northern China, was a proto-nationalist movement by the "Righteous Harmony Society" , or "Righteous Fists of Harmony" or "Society of Righteous and Harmonious Fists" , in China between...

 and the Boer War

Boer War

The Boer Wars were two wars fought between the British Empire and the two independent Boer republics, the Oranje Vrijstaat and the Republiek van Transvaal ....

. The hotel did not suffer unduly from Darling Street overtaking Beattie Street as the main thoroughfare of the suburb with the introduction of tramways, but rather grew through its rivalry with the three-story Exchange Hotel opposite, built 1886.

Both hotels enjoy a lively competition to this day.