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I have had the good fortune to have known past pupils of our beautiful College from every decade and probably year of its existence, right back to the very first day! However, when I think about Kilbreda one hundred years ago, I remember interviews with various old girls, all of whom are now no longer with us. 

One of those, Amelia “Millie” Henderson ended her days at Avonlea not far from here in Mentone. Millie’s parents had tea-rooms down on Beach Road when she was a student here in 1922. She recalled people coming there by wagon and camping out the back. In Millie’s day, day pupils wore black tunics and “black stockings, which I hated”. She also fondly remembered Sr Genevieve, who “was a lovely young nun… I learned music from her” and that “on special occasions we were allowed up the tower. That didn’t happen very often!” 

Tessie Bone (nee Lemmon) was a favourite of mine from that time. She played the organ at St Pat’s and lived over the road. I’d often hear her playing as I approached the door. She recalled the Principal’s office being one of only two classrooms. “The corner room was one classroom. The next one down was the senior room. They were the only two rooms until they built the new wing. Mother Agnes had a classroom down the lane, what they called the box room. She had a room there and taught Grades 4 and 5. It was a separate building. There was a farm, orchard, a tennis court and a bit of garden."

Another favourite of mine who was here 100 years ago was Nan Kelly. Towards the end of her life, she was quite blind, but could make out my silhouette in her doorway when I visited and always opened the door with a welcoming “Hello Damian! Can I make you a cup of tea?”

Nan “was a day scholar all her life then decided if she wanted to get anywhere she’d have to do more study and became a boarder” (despite living near St Bede’s on Beach Rd). Her parents didn’t believe in them starting school too early so Nan began in 1918 aged 7. She remembered “the Novitiate House on Mentone Parade, which then moved to Malvern when they established the college there (Kildara)." “The first nun who taught me was Mother Evangelist, in the babies up to third grade… about 25 in her class. She was also in charge of boarders… if the darning wasn’t right it had to be ripped out and done again!” Students referred to her as ‘Mother Bango’. Nan was also taught by Mother Berchmans Foley, a cousin of Archbishop Mannix, who “would correct, after lunch, while we worked on a set subject”. With Mother Berchmans there was only one way to do things, and when Nan tried to do something another way, she was reprimanded thus: “Nan Kelly, you schemer! This is not the way  I taught you to do this!”

Nan donated all her photos and annuals to the Archives but sadly could not see the students to name them for me. Fortunately, her memory was such, that she could recall certain girls from memory, saying something like, "the girl in the back row with the plaits is Alice Livingstone and sitting next to me was Isobel Donovan." Fortunately, my grandmother, Tess and others were still able to identify the other students.

I travelled to Werribee by train for Nan’s 95th birthday celebrations and then two years later she died there whilst living with her niece. Her funeral mass was held over there, but, when she was brought back to Cheltenham to be buried, her Parish Priest John Walsh, a small band of locals and I were there to say our last farewells. Nan made a bequest to her beloved alma mater, of which she was a prefect and President of the Past Pupils’ Association for a time.

The group photo above shows Millie seated next to Nan in the front row, third and fourth from the left. At the right-hand end of the second row is Isobel Donovan. 

Damian Smith

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