The Principal, Term 4 Week 8
An edited version of the address provided by the Principal at the 174th Speech Night
The Pulteney Street Schools were founded in 1847 taking their name from the street in which the school was built. This year, we have been incredibly fortunate to be able to display a watercolour of the original school building kindly made possible by Mr Ross Leckie. The painting is one in a series of early Adelaide buildings which dates from the time.
I had wondered why the artist might choose to paint a rather ordinary appearing building on Pulteney Street until I stopped to consider that it is in fact one of the earliest buildings in the entirety of the city and thus, what by my modern eyes, might appear ordinary now, the founding of a school and school building in 1847, was quite the big deal.
The need for education has been ever present in human history; and such was the desire and need in the fledgling city of Adelaide circa 1847. To encourage the founding of schools, the state government of the time established an incentive for entrepreneurs whereby a grant of 20 pounds was payable to any teacher for the first 20 pupils they could enrol in their school; an additional 1 pound was then payable for each additional student. A school, therefore, for an artist capturing the heartbeat of the city at the time, could perhaps have encapsulated aspiration, ambition. And so it was that with guaranteed funding of 27 pounds, The Pulteney St Schools opened their gates on the 29th of May, 1848. Most assembled here this evening will be aware that a school has a second source of revenue: school fees. At the time of opening, fees were 2 shillings and 6 pence, per month, and as the history of the School notes in quotations ‘payable in advance’. Thus, with some fairly elementary mathematical calculations, I have the Rev E. K. Miller opening Pulteney Grammar School on the veritably shoestring budget of 29 and a half pounds. Such were the times and no wonder, the school’s history goes on to proudly declare, that by the end of the first week enrolments had risen to 50 and by Christmas the same year to 270. 100% growth in seven months suggests something was going right for the Rev Miller.
I dwell on this story of our origin in this our 175th anniversary year as I believe it affords insight into the culture of our school. We were born from entrepreneurial opportunity; drawn together under the guidance of people who sought to take a chance. There never was, never has been and never will be any guarantee to our success. Ours is a future that we co-create; a collective spirit that compels us forward; an earnt existence that keeps us tethered to the moment and the importance of our task.
It is this same spirit that has seen us, since moving to Town Acre Lot 681 in 1921, seek opportunity though the past century to build the campus we have today. At best count, some 23 different titles have been acquired and consolidated throughout the past century; the most recent in 2018 with the purchase of the cottages on the southern lawns of the Cambrell and Isaachson Buildings.
An anniversary brings with it opportunity for nostalgia, self examination, optimism and aspiration. This year has provided moments of all these various shades. The burden of our origin story is that we must always strive to be better; to not accept who we are as perfect and to instead aim for improvement where opportunity may lay. There is much we as part of the fabric of Adelaide, the fourth oldest school in Australia, can, should and must do to be a voice for equality, an active participant in the quest for a world free from discrimination and a force for an inclusive society. We are not perfect. We all make mistakes; we all wish for the chance to learn from the mistakes we have made. But where we as a School, and by the embrace of this collective spirit we as individuals assembled here tonight stand high amongst the ranks of schools throughout Australia, is that we are unwavering in our commitment to improvement; for this entrepreneurial spirit to create opportunities, to strive against the dying of the light has been part of our identity since the days of 1847. Our acceptance of our imperfect humanity and our desire to improve I hold dear as virtues of this school.
In my rummage through the archives of Pulteney Grammar School there is much that reveals itself to offer windows into the soul of this institution. Medals, trophies, photographs and ephemera abound; capturing the stories and accolades of individuals and revealing the milieu of moments in time. These artefacts carry with them the tendrils of our culture that, this year, we have embedded as our lived values: authentic, relationships, enduring, boundless, personalised and purposeful.
One of these treasures that manages to distil each of our values into its very existence are some 13 ledgers that date from Canon Ray’s years as Headmaster. These are perhaps the greatest single artefact held by the school. For Canon Ray was many things, as those who can recall his time will attest; but what they perhaps did not realise was that he scrapbooked. Obsessively. For in our archives lies an annualised collection of each and every speech he made, article he wrote, card, invitation, memo and ticket stub accumulated or issued each and every year. It is the most comprehensive collection of artefacts that an individual could accumulate save for a daily diary entry. Across 25 years and 25 volumes, it stands – in my opinion – as the single most important artefact held by the archives. And its single greatest effect on me is to make me quiver with inferiority. For here is a man who not only has devoted his life to the service of the School but who has, in addition, chronicled his service throughout this tenure as a comprehensive account of a daily life for a quarter of a century, and then, on top of this, as some will know, compiled the first and authoritative history of the school. It does give me pause to wonder how any other Principal is to compare? My own sense of inadequacy noted, in searching the pages of Ray’s journals I stumbled onto his Speech Night address from 1948; the year the School determined to mark its centenary.
Canon Ray’s speech, which numbers some 3,300 words, was his second as Headmaster and the tenor of his writing carries with it the ambition of youth and yet the wisdom of age. ‘In this centenary year of Pulteney Grammar School’ he writes, ‘our thoughts covert in retrospect a fairly wide range of activities… worthy tribute… to an institution that has weathered the storms and basked in the sunshine of 100 years’. There it is again, the spirit of survival writ large in the collective consciousness of the School. ‘More important’, Ray continues, ‘one feels, than that outward expression [throughout the centenary year] was the rekindling of the flame, and revivifying of the soul of Pulteney, whereby those who are older and we who are younger met on a common footing, with a common resolve, to forge into the future’. It is hard standing here before you this evening not to draw parallels and inspiration from Ray’s phrase ‘the rekindling of a flame’. For throughout this year’s celebrations, with the opening of the quadrangle, the staff room, the dance factory, the Osmond St Precinct and Café, the dedication of the Graham Lange Centre, and the spectacle of the Lot 681 Ball, it is hard not to think that this ‘rekindling of a flame’ has been the defining feature of this anniversary as well. Perhaps this is the purpose of anniversaries: moments in time that remind ourselves of who we are, what we have, and what we strive to do. Moments that rekindle the flame.
Ray’s speech goes on to other matters, before it turns towards commentary he offers regarding the teachers of Pulteney in 1948:
“I must halt here to give you a picture of a staff. It would seem that a Schoolmaster or School mistress must be a being of superhuman attainments: of course, they must be able to teach: they must be able to run a tuckshop: they must be able to skip nimbly across the dewy grass in PT togs, with a sou-westerly blowing hard: they must be able to produce a needle and cotton to mend a tear in the usual spot on a pair of pants or make running repairs to a button parted from its natural surroundings: they must be able to stop a bleeding nose, a fight among two gangs at lunch time: brew a cup of tea at the recess break: wield a bat at the accepted time and bowl a passable ball: write a considered estimate of a student’s worth: be a banker for forgotten or lost money: interpret and improve the hieroglyphics of an English composition: help mend a puncture: sleep on the hard, cold ground at a camp: answer accurately fifteen question at one and the same time: work far into the night despairing of ever bringing a Maths syllabus to completion: rush a student off to the doctor: wipe noses: be Solomon-like in their judgements: even wash clothes: find lost property: read for, and pass University examinations: as well as keep a ready smile and an even outlook, all these things as well as many more enter into the complete picture’. Sewing buttons and running a tuckshop aside, I ask my colleagues sitting before me this evening: has much changed?
Ray continues to address the assembled audience: ‘And here are these people sitting in front of you. Their worth is far above rubies, their reward, materially at any rate, far below them. I think, too, the expression of that worth is not made as readily or as often as it should be. Personally, I cannot pay them a sufficiently high tribute for their hard work, their lofty conception of their vocation, and their amazing resilience. Thankyou, Ladies and Gentlemen, for your warm support through the year. I know, too, that the Parents would want to thank you. By now, you’ve probably discovered the real reason for school holidays. Students think they are for them: not a bit of it, they’re to save teachers from complete and frequent annihilation.’ To my colleagues gathered here this evening and those unable to join us tonight, may I join with Canon Ray in offering you my sincerest thanks for each and every day of the year as we stave off the rather dramatic though perhaps, at times, apt ‘annihilation’”.
In addition to reflection and nostalgia, anniversaries offer the chance to celebrate and to set the course for what lies ahead. Tonight we launch the Legends of Pulteney, a hall of fame for those who have either contributed to the School or gone on to thrive in the world’s eager strife following their graduation. Tonight we induct fifteen such people as Legends of Pulteney and in the year ahead will induct more again until such time as the total number matches our age: 175; with the chance to indict a further legend, on this very night each year. In the new year, we hope to find occasion to bring together all our living Legends to honour, revel and celebrate their lives and contributions. Would you join me in congratulating them as the inaugural Legends of Pulteney. View the Legends of Pulteney HERE
Tonight, I offer thanks on behalf of a grateful school community to Chair of The Board of Governors, Mr Allen Candy. The role of Chair in the life of a school such as Pulteney is often thankless and is certainly undertaken without material reward. Reward for the time dedicated is derived, I can only imagine, through the chance to reflect upon what has been achieved and this year is yet another of significant achievement for which I am grateful and I offer you, and indeed the entire Board of Governors, my sincere thanks for the support and direction you all provide this school.
Finally, and perhaps most importantly, I draw on Canon Ray – in part – once again this time in addressing our students who gather this evening. Ray observes, with a few minor modifications, that ‘[b]ehind the happiness of Pulteney’s staff, there lies the cooperation of the School with them. I must pay tribute to our students. For you, there is too much speech and too little action at these Speech Nights. But I would have you listen to this section of the Report, because so often you are reminded of your possible shortcomings through a year. Your greatest contribution to 1948, apart from your work and your sporting prowess, has been the effort you have made to cement the happy atmosphere of the School. Harry Oates, Adi Schwartz and their band of Prefects have won the confidence of the School in a quiet and efficient way, the leaders of the Houses, of the sport and music teams, have genuinely thought of their teams’ wellbeing and not their own personal glory, the seniors have been very much elder brethren to the very small Kindergarten students and the Service groups have considerably helped the appearance of the School. So you may go home for seven weeks content that you have run this stretch of your race well. I hope you have a carefree break.’ For our Year 12s who join us this evening, I offer you a few more than Canon Ray’s seven weeks and look forward to welcoming you to your one year reunion late in 2023. Thank you, as Canon Ray says, to our School Captains, Addi, Harry, Lilly and Fynn; to the Prefects, House Captains and all our student leaders; to our Year 12s – our seniors – and to all our students for you are the school and those who, as Canon Ray observes, ‘cement its happy atmosphere’.
Cameron Bacholer
Principal