Grammar Gazette_Issue1_2025

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Flashback: Speech Day The first Girls Grammar Speech Day to be held on the School grounds was in December 1927, when dignitaries, parents and students assembled on a tennis court which, at the time, flanked the eastern side of Main Building.

Prior to that, Girls Grammar’s Speech Day was held in conjunction with Boys Grammar at the neighbouring school, with only prize recipients from the girls’ school able to attend due to limited space. Headmistress Kathleen Lilley put her foot down in 1927, insisting on a standalone event so the entire BGGS community could gather to mark students’ achievements.

The event was staged in the open air in the heat of a Brisbane summer. Governor of the day Sir John Goodwin led the ceremony, noting Ms Lilley had expressed ‘anxiety’ about burgeoning enrolments, with the school jumping from 286 to 442 students that year. Sir Goodwin suggested it was more pleasant to be anxious about too many, than too few students, with Ms Lilley acknowledging in the annual report that record enrolments were ‘the truest expression of confidence felt by the public in the work done in the school’. She was, however, very concerned about increasing ‘motor traffic’ on Gregory Terrace, which, at the time, was still a dirt road.

Captions 1 BGGS's first standalone Speech Day in 1927, with Headmistress Miss Kathleen Lilley, pictured standing, and Governor of Queensland, Sir John Goodwin, seated at the front table 2 Sir John Goodwin presents a prize book (Images from the Doris Kennedy Collection and the Gwen Spurgin Album, BGGS Archives)

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29 GAZETTE • ISSUE 1, 2025 |

Brisbane Girls Grammar School