Lots of Visitors

December has been a busy month for visitors to the The Hall School Museum.

Elliot Dunn from ABC Radio conducted an interview with Allen Mawer, Kingsley Southwell and myself on the history of the Hall School Museum and its importance in retaining and sharing its history with the Canberra community. The interview was aired on the "Drive" programme on 7 December.

The Museum has also been host to a group from the Canberra Tourist Bureau. The group consisted of seven of the volunteers who 'man' the counter at the Canberra Tourist Bureau giving advice to visitors to Canberra. The visit was a 'familiarisation' exercise to showcase the Museum and Heritage Centre to these volunteers so that they are able to suggest it to visitors to Canberra as a great place to visit. The idea is not to compete with the National Museum, Australian War Memorial, Australian National Gallery etc. but to complement them as a typical rural museum showing the rich heritage of the area prior to the creation of Canberra!
The Canberra Tourism Group was astonished by the amount of work that has been done in such a short time by a small group of 'Friends' to restore the old school to its former glory and to conserve the valuable collection of early educational material.

Cathy Bryson from the Royal National Capital Agricultural Society met with Kingsley Southwell and myself to discuss the early days of the Hall Show. The Canberra Show next year will feature a heritage element where the precursers of the current Show, which were held at Hall and Ginninderra, will be highlighted in the form of early photographs and newpaper articles projected on a big screen in the main event area. Cathy was looking through the photos and memorabilia that Kingsley kindly brought to the meeting. Further discussions will take place and it is hoped to gain wider recognition of the importance of the Hall/ Ginninderra District in the early days and the promotion of the Museum's own Heritage displays in 2013.

The Museum also had a visit from Chris Bourke MLA. Chris is one of the local members for Ginninderra and has been a supporter of the museum for some time. The purpose of the visit was to keep him informed on the productive use of the old school site by the Hall Community. He was shown the great work being carried out by the "Friends of Hall School Museum" volunteers on the old schoolhouse and heritage area and was impressed by the progress made since his last visit. He also took the opportunity to speak with representatives of the Hall Mens Shed and was also impressed with their achievements.

As a result of an invitation by a "Friend", Gary Rake (CEO of the National Capital Authority) also paid us a visit. He was greatly impressed with the old school and the heritage display. He has promised to provide information and advise on ways to increase the profile of the museum. He was also fortunate to arrive at a time when the 'Friends of the Museum' and the Hall Mens Shed group were having a Christmas 'banquet'. So after his tour he joined the group for lunch.

The Museum team will be taking a short break over Christmas and returning to work on 10 January 2013.

I wish you all a very happy and safe Christmas.

Phil Robson
Honorary Curator
Hall School Museum & Heritage Centre