O'Sullivan Beach is a seaside suburb in the southern Adelaide metropolitan area, within the City of Onkaparinga. O'Sullivan Beach has a unique postcode of 5166, and is adjacent to the suburbs of Christies Beach and Noarlunga Centre to the south east, Christies Beach to the south, and Port Stanvac to the north.
Development
The very first development to occur along the coast of O'Sullivan Beach can be traced back to pre-colonization times, almost 40,000 years ago. The Aboriginal Kaurna people used the coastal area of O'Sullivan Beach as a place for seasonal residence. In particular the mouth of Christie Creek was used as a Kaurna campsite. Christie Creek was also one of the last recorded sites where traditional burial practices were observed.
An area of surveyed land covering Glenelg to Witton Bluff (Christies Beach) known as District B, was made available for settlement in 1838. Many farmers took plots of land along the Anderson Creek (now known as Christies Creek). The entire area remained a land of farming communities until 1923. This is when Rosa Christie created the first subdivision in the area, it was named Christies Beach. In 1926 the suburb of O'Sullivan Beach was subdivided by a group developers - F.E. Wakelin, W.A. Hill, D.B. Neck and F.L. Lillecrap - the developers named the suburb after Ignatius O’Sullivan who arrived from Ireland and settled in this area in 1840.
The O'Sullivan Beach suburb was developed to provide housing to accompany the development of the Lonsdale industrial development and the adjacent Port Stanvac oil refinery facility.
The suburb of O’Sullivan Beach was further developed as a public housing estate in the 1960s and 1970s by the South Australian Housing Trust. However, most of these homes have subsequently become privately owned.