From One Window to 150 Years: Greenwich Public School Celebrates

In 2026, Greenwich Public School celebrates its 150th year. Twenty-three principals have taught cohorts ranging from 16 children to more than 400. Over those years, and across several locations, generations of school children have learned that there is “Nothing Without Work”, the English rendering of the school’s Latin motto.

Are you a current or past member of the Greenwich School community? Let the school know by filling out this form, and join the 150th anniversary celebrations from 9am to 11am on Thursday 24 September at the Kingslangley Road campus.

One window, one teacher, 1875

Mrs Walker began teaching one to two dozen students in a small wooden building with only one window in 1875, located at the corner of George and Mitchell Streets. Her talkative nature meant the school did not maintain a consistent group of students.

The school officially opened under “Provisional” status with Miss Mary Ann Dunn as teacher in 1876. A year later, the department purchased land a block away for a larger school building. Students travelled by boat from Long Nose Point in Birchgrove or Onions Point in Woolwich and even Cockatoo Island, which was also home to Miss Dunn. She was not formally trained and struggled when changes to education laws in 1880 raised teacher expectations. That same year, Greenwich became a full primary school with up to 40 students taught by Mrs Agnes Munroe.

Moving up the hill

The Department finally decided to build a new brick school on Mitchell and Robert Streets, and Mrs Munroe moved up the hill in 1882, teaching between 40 and 70 children. She was at Greenwich until the middle of 1895, when the size of the school required more than one qualified teacher.

The Leemon years

John Leemon (pictured above with his 1925 class) transformed the school from around 40 students to 150 within the decade. He had a profound impact on Greenwich, introducing the School Savings Bank, Arbour and Empire Day celebrations, plantings from the Botanic Gardens, regular sports, and concerts for prizes and fundraising. In 1895 a wooden schoolroom was removed from Macquarie Street South Public School and re-erected at Greenwich, with the 1882 brick schoolroom converted into part of Leemon’s residence.

Increasing enrolments and new houses in the area argued for the school to be relocated even further uphill. In 1908 Emma Catherine Fell laid a corner stone, and the new school building opened in 1909 on Greenwich Road. There were five classrooms, split with retractable walls so one teacher could cover when another was sick. Leemon lived for 35 years at the site of the reserve that was renamed in his honour in 1991.

A polar sledge and 474 tennis balls

Greenwich Public School has been an active part of the local community. Captain Robert Scott’s sledge, crafted from Australian spotted gum, has hung on the school walls for a century. A.C. Samuels, who built it, lived on Bay Road in Waverton and donated the sledge and a sign to the school in the 1920s.

In 1947 Greenwich Public School made interstate news when plumber Bill Amos spent two weeks pulling 474 tennis balls, plus a couple of hundred more decomposed ones, out of the gutters.

Two campuses, seventy years apart

Greenwich expanded uphill again in 1953 under Albert Carlisle’s leadership. It moved into the former Hillcrest School (built in 1937 as a school for Christian Science children) with the assistance of active local community members. For more than seventy years it has educated local school children across both sites, with younger students learning on Greenwich Road and older students making their way to the Kingslangley campus.

In 2015 the school set out Positive Behaviour for Learning values around “Responsibility, Respect and Success”. New builds at both campuses in the last five years have expanded classrooms and upgraded facilities. Under the current direction of Mr Callum Thompson, the school is gearing up for two celebrations in September.

Two ways to celebrate in September