Helen Best at Barraba Creek School

Helen Best, Barraba, New South Wales
(Submitted by Gillian Unwin – Helen’s daughter)

The first school in our district – in the 1930s – was in the wool room of a woolshed, where the bales were stored at shearing time.  One wall was a tarpaulin covered with pictures cut from the Sydney Mail.  To this school, three families came.  The Irwin children walked three miles from their farm, our family – the McNeills – walked one mile, but the lucky ones were the four Faulkner children.  They came four miles on Paddy, a big broad-backed, quiet old horse.  There was plenty of room for Edna, Norman, Pat and Gordon, but one afternoon, my brother, Maurice, decided he would hitch a ride instead of walking home.
All went well until a child jumped out from behind a tree, waving her arms.  Poor old Paddy got a terrible fright, shied and all five riders slipped over his tail, landing in a struggling heap.  My brother broke his arm, but it was the only mishap that occurred in the time Paddy was responsible for getting children to and from school.