Hilda’s Brisbane gra duation photo. Lef t: Tadem a New ton Studio photo of Hild a L’Estrange (Auckla nd, NZ).
O ‘Their deeds do follow them’ One of the pleasures of working in the School Archive is learning about the often extraordinary lives led by our Old Girls.
64
DIO TODAY
n 17 February Dennis and Margaret Donovan came all the way from Brisbane to visit the Archive. Margaret’s mother Hilda L’Estrange (Sharp) attended Diocesan from 1918 to 1920 after a year at St Cuthbert’s and four years in state schools. Hilda’s father was a self-educated mercantile manager who led his family from Sri Lanka, where Hilda was born, to Australia, Canada, the Western United States, Tonga, Auckland, Virginia and back to Australia. Letters show that both Hilda’s parents were intelligent supportive parents who encouraged her to engage with her education to her best advantage. In one letter back to her father, Hilda went so far as to say that her school of the moment was no good and asked her parents to relocate her! Diocesan must have been a good fit. Hilda boarded in Cowie House while her father was working in Tonga and her mother living across the harbour in Calliope Road, Devonport. Not much is reported in the Chronicles, but in 1918 Cowie House Notes mentions that the House was hoping to present a play written by Hilda in the last term. Margaret found a copy of this play in her late mother’s papers. Essentially it is a retelling of the story of Greek hero Ulysses coming home to his wife Penelope after his years of wandering. Doubtless inspired by the School’s
