David Gyngell buys into John "Strop" Cornell's Hotel Brunswick at Brunswick Heads

David Gyngell buys into John "Strop" Cornell's Hotel Brunswick at Brunswick Heads
Jonathan ChancellorFebruary 19, 2013

The Channel 9 television executive David Gyngell has spent $5.25 million to buy a half share of John "Strop" Cornell's Hotel Brunswick at Brunswick Heads.

The Brunswick pub is a northern NSW tourist stop-over location known for its traditional pub food, a shady beergarden, and the vintage ambience of classic Austalian 1940s architecture.

The "Bruns" has courtyard space shaded by giant poinciana trees.

It ranked highly in the 2011 Best Of Summer Top 10 Beer Gardens by the Daily Telegraph being placed in number two position behind the Opera Bar @ Circular Quay.

The small coastal village pub was built in 1940 by Jim Cavill overlooking the Brunswick River and Simpsons Creek.

It was almost two decades earlier that Jim Cavill had built the 16-room Surfers Paradise Hotel in what was then Elston and then campaigned to have it renamed Surfers Paradise which occured in 1934.

The first hotel in Brunswick Heads was Bob Marshall’s Ocean View Hotel, which opened in 1884.

The freehold of the pub was bought by the Cornell-directed Hizan Holdings in 1990 from Austotel for $2.1 million.

Hizan has recently touted getting development permission for the site but had a dispute with the local council about the definition of “floor area”.

Property Observer gathers the dispute was concluded without the need for contested litigation.

Gyngell, who has a newly completed retreat in the Byron Bay hinterland, has been a family friend of John Cornell and Delvene Delaney.

Gyngell’s gather, Bruce, helped found the Nine network in 1956. Another father figure was Kerry Packer who died on Boxing Day 2005.

The fellow Byron hotel owner John Cornell, who was the legendary producer who managed Paul Hogan and helped Kerry Packer set up World Series Cricket in 1977, is like a father figure to him.

The purchase had been mooted, but the official paperwork was only available last week at the land titles office.

Jonathan Chancellor

Jonathan Chancellor is one of Australia's most respected property journalists, having been at the top of the game since the early 1980s. Jonathan co-founded the property industry website Property Observer and has written for national and international publications.

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