By Callum Ludwig
The Wandin Preschool is still going strong, 60 years on from when it was first opened after a push from local families.
90-year-old Ray Taylor, who now lives in Mt Evelyn, was part of the original committee that wanted to fill the need for a kindergarten in the town and made a visit to the Union Road site on Thursday 19 April to share the story.
Mr Taylor said a few families got together and deceived it was about time they had a kindergarten in Wandin.
“When we started raising money, we used to have paper collections, and we’d get truckloads of paper donated from all the people and I’d sell it and (inaugural President) Fred Gaudion had a food truck, we’d take a full load down and we’d get money for that,” he said.
“We’d collect bottles, we had dances, we had raffles all the time, we even had a big fishing competition for people every week,”
“18 months from that day, we’d got it up and built it.”
The initial Building Committee for the Wandin Preschool plans consisted of President Fred Gaudion, Mr Taylor as the vice-president and publicity officer, Secretary David Vivian and Treasurer Dorothy O’Neil.
Mr Taylor said the committee brought in two brothers from Coldstream to build the preschool.
“When we looked around, we looked around all the preschools nearby and this was the same as the one over at Ferntree Gully, we copied that,” he said.
“Once we were, you should’ve seen my wife, Cynthia, she was always up here working and holding working bees and things like that.”
A plaque still on the wall in the Wandin Preschool recognises that the opening was held on 8 November 1964, and there are plans to celebrate the 60-year anniversary near to the date this year. The plaque also thanks local councillor Percy Mould, who the nearby PJ Mould Community Park is also named after, for donating the land for the school which was previously a raspberry farm.
General Manager of Operations at Yarra Ranges Kinders Mark Gibben also came to meet with Mr Taylor and said it was awesome to know the roots of the kindergarten.
“We’re here obviously supporting it, the team, the children on a regular basis including Donna our area manager who is here supporting Jenny the lead teacher at the kindergarten but to find out the history and understanding from you how it was built and how the history dates back to 1962 is fascinating,” he said.
“I think it was just awesome to understand the work that went in by all those individuals to get it up and running, we are lucky that we’ve had people like Ray who have put their hands up to start something like this off and we hope to keep the legacy going.”
In the preschool, a memoir by Fred Gaudion telling the story of how the story all started is still on display:
He recounts that the Mt Evelyn and Lilydale Preschools had a three-year waiting list and there were no other preschools in the area.
Initially, the committee thought they’d have to rely on council and government grants to fund the project long-term and were feverishly fundraising in order to show the now-defunct Lilydale Council their commitment to secure a council grant, then use that money and their own to secure a government grant, which would be awarded ‘two to one’, essentially tripling the funds raised.
The donation by PJ Mould changed things however, as it was given free of charge and allowed for construction to commence straight away.
