Historic school building still a part of everyday life

IT MAY be of national significance but this 1873 Caboolture National School building is still a vital part of everyday school life.

Morayfield State School ca. 1897. Photo: courtesy of Queensland State Library.

IT MAY be of national significance but the 1873 Caboolture National School building is still a vital part of everyday school life.

The school, now known at Morayfield State School, is home to the heritage-listed structure as well as a 1903 play shed and Moreton Bay fig tree, which are also protected.

Principal Loretta White says students and teachers are lucky to have ‘living’ historical resources in their midst. She says the old school building has been in constant service and is now used as the detention room.

The original building at Morayfield State School as it looks today. Photo: Dominika Lis

It was designed by Robert George Suter, a private architect commissioned by the Queensland Board of General Education to produce a standard design for timber-framed schools. About 65 schools of this design were built until 1875 and only three are known to have survived.

As the area grew, another school was built at North Caboolture and the original school was renamed Caboolture South in 1889, and again renamed Morayfield in 1907.

Larger windows were installed in the 1920s and ’30s to improve lighting.

Long-time teacher aide Karen Walshe worked in the building for four years and says a lack of any insulation meant it was hot in summer and bitterly cold in winter.

Karen Walshe inside the original building at Morayfield State School.

Karen says despite this, she actually liked the building in many ways.

“It’s got a nostalgic feel,” she says.

Pupils and teachers, back in the day, would have enjoyed no creature comforts and felt like sardines, she says.

Principal Loretta White and groundsman Jeff Wilson on the veranda of the original building at Morayfield State School which is dated 1873.

Jeff Wilson says his children attended the school and he has been its groundsman since 2001. He’s a keen student of the building’s history and says it is a strong structure built to last.

According to the School Admission Register, 13 children attended on the first day, August 4, 1873.

William Berry was the first teacher. By December that year, there were 34 children on the roll ranging in age from five to 18 years.

Morayfield State School now has 550 pupils and about 70 staff.