Ex-students travelled from as far away as Tasmania and Queensland to attend the Combined Catholic Schools reunion recently.

The celebration began with dinner in the auditorium at Club Gunnedah where memories were shared, old photos produced and lots of chatter as former classmates reminisced their days at St Xavier’s School and St Mary’s College.

The presence of former college teachers Sr Christine Belling and Sr Regina McInerney added to the occasion as many of the students were taught by them. The Sisters were delighted to hear news of families and friends and events that have passed since the busy school days.

The singing almost raised the roof as the old school song for St Mary’s echoed around the room. It had been sung on many occasions over the years with the lines “for virtue, courage and culture of mind, stand the red and blue” never forgotten.

The school song was again sung with gusto at the end of Mass in St Joseph’s Church on the Sunday morning, with a sumptuous morning tea in the parish hall, an occasion for more reminiscing.

A sausage sizzle in the quadrangle surrounded by the historic buildings at St Mary’s was another opportunity to share more memories, with many students spending several of their school years as boarders under the care of the Sisters of Mercy. Their former dormitories upstairs in the 1906 O’Driscoll Wing are now classrooms and a heritage walk has been created along the corridors with many familiar faces smiling from the photographs on the walls.

The ex-students wandered through the grounds of St Xavier’s as well with some classrooms open for inspection, while the beautiful gardens surrounding the chapel were blooming with colour as masses of spring roses blossomed.

The reunion was hailed a great success with fond farewells after lunch and the promise of further reunions.

Adba (Melick) Kidd and Suzanne Campbell.

Simone and Sue Eather.

Jacinita (Gaynor) Stanley, Marie (Campbell) Hobson, Anne (Robinson) Beulah, Wadette (Hassab) Shaw and Patsy (Tailby) Spradbrow.

Sister Regina McInerney, Adba (Melick) Kidd, Suzanne Campbell and Pat Gaynor.

Back, Phillip Dean, Frank Rugers, Tony Plevey and John Campbell. Middle, Lyn Carlyon, Wanda (Druce) Dunnet, Chris Egan and Thèrése (McNamara) Freeman.
Seated, Cathy (Campbell) Roberts, Helen Robinson and Beth Flynn.

Back, June Lucas, Trish Aust, Susan Esdaile. Front, Lois Hoar, Sr Christine Belling and Marlene Nelson.

Debbie Hawkins, Maureen Blackburn and Anne Hope.

Kay Clark, Christine Jansson, Trish McMahon, Fay Walsh, Francis Whitman and Desne Delaney.

Gaynor family: Pat, Kay Clark, Maree Roach, Jacinita Stanley and Ray.