Objects of Substance – OGA Honour Board

1949 the flagpole erected on the East side of Main Building, now the Stage Lawn

The following minutes from the OGA meeting held in July 1948 document the matter of the honour board: Miss Cossins was asked to check, by writing, the names of those girls who she already had for the Honour Board. Those eligible to have their names inscribed on the Board would be those girls who had served as full-time members of a defence force paid by the Commonwealth Government and signed to serve wherever they were sent. It was decided to ask Old Girls and Present Girls to submit designs for the Honour Board. A prize of £2.2.0 was to be offered and the designs to be in by 30 Sept 1948. The Board was to be wider than it was long and to carry three columns of perhaps one hundred and fifty names. The artist could perhaps suggest wording. The accepted and stylish board was not designed by a Grammar girl but by a past Grammar boy and architect, Godfrey Blackburne. The board is surmounted by the OGA badge, and the insignia of the branches of air, land, and sea forces divide it into three sections. Jubilee Day in 1949 was a very successful and happy occasion for both past and present students. At 3 pm the School bell was rung, and everyone present gathered in the Assembly Hall (now named the Annie Mackay Room) where the honour board was unveiled by Mr Victor Grenning, Chair of the Board of Trustees. After the unveiling, Sister Eunice Paten (1898) reminisced about her time as one of the first nurses to see active service in World War I. Eunice joined the AIF on 21 September 1914 and served in Egypt, England, and France, returning from France on 11 December 1918. She was awarded the Royal Red Cross (2nd class). Design: