Donated by the Mt Eden College Old Girls’ Association in memory of Mary Ellen Bews and Alice Lindsay Bews of Mt Eden College. Originally it hung outside the school library, until it was installed in front of Clouston Hall in 1958, under its own belfry, affectionately known as ‘The Gallows’. Each year as a tradition Year 13 Leavers ring the Bell on their last day.
Mt Eden College
Established in 1895, the Directors of the Auckland Ladies Presbyterian College purchased Mt Eden College from the Misses Bews in late 1914. When their former Headmistress, Miss May Bews, died in 1945, the Old Girls’ Association of Mt Eden College, which had been established in 1931, presented gifts to St Cuthbert’s College in memory of Miss May and her sister, Miss Alice. These gifts comprised a bookcase filled with books on New Zealand, a set of Encyclopaedia Britannica, and a school bell which had once been a ship’s bell.
Pictured above: Mt Eden College, Stokes Road, Mt Eden 1895-1914
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