From the Archives

1930s

It was in the 1930s that a group of past pupils, parents and staff believed that the College should be known by a “distinctive and appropriate” title. The name Kilbreda was coined, coming from the Gaelic Cill and Breda, the church or holy place of Brigid. The name, which first appeared in print as the title of the 1932 Annual magazine, is attributed to both Mother Margaret Mary Bourke and Mother Berchmans Foley.

Houses in competition were introduced in 1934, with three houses, Kilbreda, Lisieux and Padua, which were represented by the colours green, red and fawn. These colours also formed the basis of the first full school uniform, and were also used in building and colour schemes around the College; some still in existence today. The three house captains were Marge Paterson, Irma Crowe and Joan McGrath. The uniform was officially adopted in 1932, but students were not required to make the change until the start of the 1933 school year. A coloured plate from the 1932 Annual shows a group of junior and senior students modelling it.

In 1933, a special day for the community was the visit of Archbishop Mannix to open and bless the Colonnade building. Opened in the late 20s, the nuns were finding it difficult to pay off, with the effects of the Great Depression being felt far and wide. It was decided to bring Mannix to Mentone, as he was the cousin of Mother Berchmans, the Convent Superior, and wherever he spoke a crowd would turn up to hear him. The assembled crowd were then encouraged by Dr Mannix to put their hands in their pockets, following the lead of the Archbishop, who contributed a considerable sum of £20.

Other events were held to offset the considerable debt; one such being an evening held in Como Hall, the former St Patrick’s Church, on August 2 1933. One of the first school productions was staged that night, entitled “Patricia- Roman martyr of the third century”. “The entertainment concluded with the production of a Roman drama in four acts, which was staged with appropriate scenic, lighting and dressing accessories and the various characters were capably sustained by Valda Dickens, Joan Smith, Patty Cooper, Irma Crowe, Margery Paterson, Norrie Harrington, Betty Lawrence, Monica Lawlor, Merle Peterson, Lois Fogarty, Aileen Toomey, Violet Kernick, Mollie Mahony, Cassie Maher, Peggy Davis, Mary Fogarty and Moya Allman.” 1

Head Prefect or College Captain in 1932 was Pauline Allman and her sister, the aforementioned Moya Allman, had that role the following year. Moya would be known to many as Sr Roch, who was my Principal at OLA, until she moved to Kilbreda to be Primary Principal in 1975. The list above also includes a later College Captain, Monica Lawlor, and Mollie Mahony, who became Sr Clement, a Josephite sister. A number of Past Pupils from this period are still about. Two, in particular, have had more extended involvements with their Alma Mater. One of those, Mrs Betty Cook, née Johns, of Point Lonsdale, started here in 1930. Her daughter, Margaret Mercer of Mentone, and granddaughter, Sarah Mercer, were also students here, Sarah having been in my homeroom in Year 9 in 1995. The other who started in 1930 was Elise Barwick, née Portner, of Tallangatta, who was usually involved in anything musical and is the mother of Tessa Merritt, who was a boarder in the 1960s and grandmother of Lorraine Merritt, whom I taught in Room 5 in 1991.

The 1932 Annual contains a wonderful photo, complete with all the names, of about fifty past pupils, who had returned to Kilbreda to celebrate the Golden Jubilee of their former teacher, Mother Vincent Brennan. In her speech, the President of the Past Pupils’ Association, Fern Cahill, née Findlay, spoke lovingly of her former teacher. “We, the past students of the Brigidine Convent, Mentone, desire, on the occasion of the fiftieth anniversary of your Religious Profession, to offer you our heartfelt congratulations.

Twenty-five of those fifty years have been spent in the service of our beloved convent in untiring and unselfish effort, labouring in the vineyard of Our Lord and on behalf of Christian education.

You came to us when our convent was in its infancy-when its future was necessarily a matter of conjecture- and you have watched it grow under God’s guidance into a successful and happy institution. Indeed, you have watched us all grow from girlhood to womanhood, and through all those years your spirituality and culture have been, and still are, a source of comfort to us.”2

Mother Vincent remained at Kilbreda until her death in 1945, having spent, by then, forty years at Mentone. She is buried in the Cheltenham Pioneer Cemetery. A chair in the archives was carved, assembled and originally upholstered by her, but I can find no evidence of where or when she acquired this skill. As I often sat on it and ate my lunch, Sr Maree Simm, referred to it as Damian’s chair; I prefer to call it Mother Vincent’s chair.

Damian Smith

Archives

1 Kilbreda Annual 1933, p 29

2 Kilbreda Annual, 1932 p 50