Calling You Home

More than 160 people returned the Fairholme College Assembly Hall to help celebrate the Launch of 100 Years at Fairholme in 2017. Memories were shared, Old Girls performed, Artwork depicting those memories was unveiled, and our oldest living student shared her story.

100 candles lined the steps to the Assembly Hall, representing the milestone Fairholme College is about to reach. Former students and staff members joined with current families to share old and new memories of the College that became ‘Fairholme’ in 1917.

Old Girls, Meg Hamilton and Alice Neldner sang, while trio Matilda Watkins, Georgia Shine and Emma Lumsden returned to play the piano, violin and cello together, as they did in Year 3.

Principal, Dr Linda Evans revealed the plans already in place for 2017, including the College’s first Art Exhibition, Facets of Fairholme, which will see artists with a connection to Fairholme create a piece that depicts their time or memories at Fairholme.

Acclaimed Artist and Fairholme Old Girl, Di McIntyre unveiled her painting, that portrays her memory of the old school ground. Despite becoming a successful and well renowned artist, Di revealed she was nervous at the thought of the unveiling, and questioned whether it was good enough for her “Fair Holme”. There was applause throughout the hall, as the Tartan sheet was lifted.

99 Year Old, Jean Le Brocq (nee Denhert) shared her stories of the early 1930s at a College where she was taught good manners, and to always sit up straight.

Janine Haig, renowned Bush Poet and former Fairholme Parent, performed her poem, One Hundred Footsteps, she wrote for the school as it enters its 100th Year.

One hundred years of footsteps

One hundred years of footsteps echo up and down these halls;

One hundred years of memories resounding from these walls;

One hundred years of laughter and of longing and of tears;

One hundred years of learning how to face the world and fears.

The Homestead where it started, remaining firm and strong,

Embracing many secrets for the students who belong

Within its solid framework, both now and long ago;

Girls skipping up the stairway - ten steps and one to grow.

Six little pairs of feet trod up the stairs on that first day;

Six nervous little faces trooped inside to lead the way

For so many, later others; six thousand and then more,

Young hearts and minds that came to find a new world to explore.

There are boarders, there are day girls in a city/country blend,

A gathering of talents in the students who attend

Through the passing of the decades, as the numbers ebb and flow,

Feet treading up the stairway - ten steps and one to grow.

A century of schooling and a century of care –

Young girls who turn to women in the years that they are there;

Girls who come with attitude, resentment and distrust,

While others come with confidence and easily adjust.

The College has expanded and embraced the modern ways,

Yet holds to old traditions, and the centre of it stays

In the Homestead where it started, built so long ago,

The doorway calling softly - take ten steps with one to grow.

Janine Haig