School a lesson for all
It’s funny when you look back
TALES of watermelon sabotage, rummaging through blemished bricks and building a school on a budget that would make a pauper blush will flow freely this weekend.
Catholic education’s enduring Cairns history began with the St Therese’s School being transported from Chillagoe to Edmonton 90 years ago – but the story did not stop there.
Former Edmonton Parish priest Fr John Lizzio led the charge to build a new St Therese’s school which opened in 1969 on the sweat and charity of a small band of residents.
The school has since moved to a new building in Bentley Park but the bricks, mortar and recollections of former students still persist today – and now they are compiled in a book of memories by Fr Lizzio.
“Everybody knows I was the parish priest but there was no record of the myriad men and women throughout the whole parish and community that built the school,” he said.
The book presents memories of prominent Cairns identities including Lou Piccone, who recalled an inexplicable drop in watermelon sales at his grocery store in the ’60s – all because St Therese’s had received a large fruit donation.
“I made a trip down to the school and there the children were, selling watermelons cheap, with at least two of my children involved … talk about sabotage!” Mr Piccone wrote.
Former students will come from far and wide to mark the anniversary this weekend.
Fr Karel Duivenvoorden wanted to honour the life of a growing parish and the parish priests who came before him.
“This milestone was really the second phase of our Catholic school system in the area and it brought the community together in a key way,” he said.