THERE may not be many who remember the small Chellas School which once stood on the outskirts of Tingha. A new sign marks the spot of the place where children from surrounding farming families learned for over 50 years.
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Local author Mavis Richards was the catalyst for the sign. Mavis devoted 29 years of her life to her book, Chellas School, The Journey, published in 2013. The book uncovers the history of the little school that stood from 1905 to 1957.
Recently, Mavis wrote to Guyra Shire and asked if the council might erect a sign marking the site of the schoolhouse.
“They wrote that they didn’t do personal requests, but they could make a donation. I thought, ‘Oh well, that’s it, I won’t hear anymore’. So a few days ago, I got a phone call. Bloke said his name was Paul and (he said) ‘I’ve been trying to get you for months’,” Mavis said.
“I thought, ‘I wonder what’s going on this time?’”
“He said, ‘I’ve got your sign.’”
With the help of Tingha resident and Guyra deputy mayor Audrey McArdle, the location for the sign was chosen and on March 6, it was erected.
The Chellas School sign was created by the Guyra Men’s Shed, with materials donated by the Guyra shire. Craftsmen were John Jackson, Shawn Taylor, Graham McKay, and Paul Fleming with the letters hand-painted by Peter King.
Mavis said Paul Little supervised the job with John Fenton, David Leitinger and Paul Schuman erecting the new sign. It stands in a clearing on the north side of the Guyra road about seven kilometres from the Tingha town boundary. Mavis reported that the sign had already had visitors posing for photographs.
The mystery behind the name Chellas may have derived from a connection with the Inspector of Schools at that time, Stephen Smith.
Mavis explained that as a newlywed, Mr Smith had purchased a property called ‘Chellas’, formerly owned by a local minister who had a wife from Chelas, Portugal. It was Mr Smith’s first job as inspector to name the Chellas school.
“And we think that why, he, in respect the minister, his first school, for a young man, he was a connection and this is what he called the school,” Mavis said.
In 1979, the locality where the school stood was officially recorded in NSW as Chellas. The schoolhouse was moved some years ago, and lives on as a shearing shed at the property ‘Indiana’.
Mavis said she was very pleased about the sign and hoped to meet all the people involved in the project.
“I’d love to get a photo of them all because I think it would be lovely to put it in the book and say, right, these are the men who put it up,” she said.
“To me, it’s the icing on the cake.”
