Mirimbah Camp Coordinator, 1975

John Thurgood outside classroom at PHHS

Today our year 7 students and a few other lucky students attend the Mirimbah Country Centre camp. 40 years ago PHSC was a smaller school with fewer students and every pupil went to Mirimbah for a camp during the year. In the early days of Mirimbah two staff members lived at the camp and met the student groups when they arrived by bus. For teachers Ros Robertson and John Thurgood, 1975 was their first year as a team. Year 11 & 12 visit at the beginning of term one followed by year 7. Year 8 & 9 in term two and finally year 10 in term three. Also visiting that year was an ex-students group and a couple of year 12 study groups. The camp buildings were much as they are today but with an outdoor toilet block and only one of the houses had been built at that time. The second was built during this year along with the machinery shed to store andbuild canoes. There were also plans to build a field research laboratory a place where the local plants, animals, rocks could be collected, stored, identified, read about, studied, etc. John and Ros were planning many new activities for students, some of which survive to this day.

John Thurgood with a bushwalking group at Mirimbah, 1970

The Delatite river is not suitable for canoeing, but there are good, safe parts of the Howqua River near the area where it enters the Eildon Weir. The canoes built in the 70s at Mirimbah are still inside the shed and were used right up to the 1990s. Fishing tackle had also been bought for keen fishermen or women to use. During the winter, groups were going up into the snow country to build snow caves, go tobogganing and cross-country skiing. A rope and obstacle course, including a flying fox, were built during the year in the bush in front of the country centre. For the evenings and wet days, a lot of art/craft material was available. Students were able to do such things as kite-making, macrame, talc-stone carving, candle-making, woodwork, painting, bread-making, bean bag making and weaving. All of these were BIG in the 70s! An Orienteering course was marked out which involved groups finding their way around the bush with a compass to different spots marked on a map. A lot of books and games were purchased for the library up at Mirimbah.

John Thurgood with Student Council members Alf Quattrochi and Peter Ferigno

On the 16th of December 1975, the last day of the school year, John & Ros packed their gear, locked up the camp, following the same ritual as staff do today, and began the drive back to Melbourne.

They hadn't gone far when their car was involved in an accident at an intersection in Mansfield. John was killed and Ros very badly injured.