Great Scot - The Scotch Family Magazine - Issue 150 April 2017 GS150-ONLINE Version_FA | Page 82

Archives
Scotch Archivist, Mr Paul Mishura
The buildings of Scotch in
photographs
In 2016 Freddie Frew (SC 1972-83) came to
set of photographs taken by his father Max Victor
Frew (born 26 September 1919, SC 1934-37,
died 2 October 2004).
Max was a boarder in School House and,
in the absence of a computer, mobile phone
or television, he had plenty to time to take
photographs of a school that was rapidly
changing. During Max’s time at Scotch the
concrete fours boatshed (1935) was built, as
were the Monash Lodge (1935), Monash Gates
(opened on 21 February 1936), the Hospital
(completed between May and October 1936), the
Littlejohn Memorial Chapel (opened 18 October
1936) and the domestic staff quarters on the
Hill, later known by some as Siberia (mid-1937).
Further helping to date his photographs were the
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Great Scot Number 150 – April 2017
planting of elms in Monash Drive (winter 1936)
and the asphalting of the drive in Term 3 that year.
Without doubt the gem of this photographic
collection is the photograph of excavations on
Monash Drive with shovels, picks, horses and
carts. A Scotch boy looks over proceedings as
if he were a foreman. None of the photographs
are dated, but as a road already existed, and
with the proximity of the boarding houses as a
guide, these were obviously excavations for the
foundations of the Chapel in 1935.
The sweeping panorama showing the Chapel
and new kerbing around the Main Oval predates
Mackie Hall by only a few years, but the James
Forbes Academy by decades. A close-up view
of the Chapel shows it as stark and very new,
long before the garden matured around it and
softened its image. More utilitarian in appearance
are the fours’ shed (Scotch’s only boatshed from
1935 to 1961) and the Hospital, but the Archives
is no less grateful that Max took the time to
photograph them for posterity.
No doubt Scotch Family homes have many
photographs of Scotch buildings and scenes
that are unique and likely to be of interest and
use to the Archives. Almost 32,000 images have
been digitised by the Archives in recent years to
help preserve and share them, but this has also
highlighted the gaps in Archives’ collection.
The Archives welcomes donations of any
such photographs, or else the loaning of them for
scanning and return. They all help to enrich the
record of Scotch’s long and fascinating history.