Good afternoon ladies and gentlemen and welcome to Linnwood once again. As usual, I would like to start my report with "Show & Tell" and I certainly have a lot to show you. Again, we have been very fortunate, with lots more donations to our growing collection.

A copy of the Guildford Presbyterian Chronicle dated August 1949, donated by Mrs Jill Ryan.

• A crocheted milk jug cover and crocheted sauce bottle cover donated by new members Mr & Mrs Don Messer.
• A Booklet celebrating a Golden Jubilee Installation from the Guildford Masonic Lodge dated 1968, together with a computer disk which details the Guildford Lodge's history from its formation in 1918 through to 1991 - donated by Mr Ralph Britten.
• At the last Open House Day, we were given a very old bible by Mr James Collier, a gentleman who just walked in on the day and donated it. Amazing! The bible is in a state of disrepair as you can see - but a truly wonderful book. Unfortunately, it has no family name in it or a date of publication that we can find, but it would appear to be an extremely old one. It would be good to at least have it dated, if we could, even if we cannot afford to have it rebound.
• Also on the same day, Mr Eric Piggott, who had been to previous Open House Days, donated this lovely mantle clock - he wanted to donate it for Trash 'n' Treasure, but we have decided to keep it and put it on show on one of the many mantelpieces in the house.
• Another gentleman by the name of Mr Norman Carroll donated this lovely old wash basin - obviously missing the jug that goes with it - but still a lovely piece in itself.
• The Holroyd Centre at Merrylands which had given us some curtains prior to our last meeting, needed to find a home for some more curtains, so thanks to Diane Jogia at Council (and now a member of FOL), we have LOTS of curtains to try and fit to our windows.
• Some of you may have been into the Guildford West Cake Shop in recent times and seen some old photos of the Guildford Fire Station and officers. When I asked Elizabeth where she had obtained them, she told me that the fire station had them and had let her have them copied - so guess what - I went down and had a chat to them and they were quite happy for me to borrow the 10 photos that they have hanging on the wall - unfortunately, they are still at the camera shop being copied, but I will be picking them up this week - so we should have them on display at the next Open House Day in December. The cost to have these copied is quite high, but I think you will agree when you see them that their historical value makes the outlay worthwhile.
• Mrs Hazel Keepence has donated a coffee maker as a future raffle prize.
• From Mrs Irie Olde (my mum - who is moving and has had to have a major clean-out!!), we have received 2 Kodak Instamatic cameras to add to our collection of cameras - remember these?? - I think we all had one like these when they first came out, a complete set of CLAN newsletters, and a book on the history of the Parramatta Hospitals. Mum has also generously donated quite a lot of items that she could not take to her new home, for our next Trash 'n' Treasure Stall - the storage room out the back is getting REALLY full now with lots of bits and pieces - so we may have to look at having another stall fairly soon.

The generosity of our members with these donations is simply amazing - so to all those who have donated items - a very big Thank You - these donations will ensure that we can continue to change our displays on a regular basis - it's always a bit boring for people to come and visit and see the same things on show all the time - so the more items we obtain, the more we can rotate our displays.

Well, I think that just about covers the "Show" bit - now onto the "Telling" you of what's been happening since our last meeting.

Those of you who were at our last meeting in September may remember that we discovered there had been some vandalism in a storage room underneath the dormitory building. A window was broken, and it appeared that they had found 3 fire extinguishers which they proceeded to spray all over the room. There had also been another attempt to break into the garage at Faulds House.

The incident was reported to the police, which then led to a meeting between representatives from Merrylands Police, the Heritage Office, the Security company and Friends of Linnwood. The police made some recommendations, one of which is a flyer which is to be distributed to all close neighbours of Linnwood - as it had been brought up at the last meeting that residents did not know who to ring if and when they saw anything suspicious on the site. These flyers have phone numbers for both the police and the security company, so if you would like to receive one, please let us know.

As part of History Week, we had Edgar Penzig come and give a talk on our Colonial past - having about 40 people attend on the night. There was a mixed reaction to Edgar's talk, but on the whole it went off quite well. We thank L J Hooker Guildford for their sponsorship of this night, and Deli-Café 350 of Guildford for providing the scrumptious supper afterwards.

I would also like to make mention and pass on our thanks to Stan Thomas, a member of FOL who has painstakingly repaired the broken and replaced missing louvres on one of the doors on the front verandah - thank you Stan for your time and expertise - the door certainly looks much better now.

As part of the Guildford Festival we opened Linnwood on Saturday 18th October, with terrific photographic and historical displays by Merrylands Library, the Friends of Mays Hill Cemetery and Friends of Linnwood, with the added attraction of serving Devonshire Teas - which were a great success with both the visitors and the workers!

We thank the Guildford West Cake Shop for their support of the day, by supplying the scones at a 'special' price. We really did not know if we would have many people come to visit, so made plans to start cataloguing our memorabilia and have a working bee in the garden. We were pleasantly surprised to have about 80 visitors through on the day, including some of the VIP's of the festival, so were not able to do any cataloguing. Our volunteer gardeners were unbelievable - arriving early, ready to do battle with the overgrown garden on the southern side of the house and the area between Linnwood and the dormitory - working all day until both areas were cleaned out. If you haven't been around that side of the house - go and have a look - you can actually see the house now. So to our gardeners: Sue Evans, Flo McMaster, Russ Werner, Winston Tattersall, Adele Donohoe, Adriana De Haas & John Walz, and our volunteers inside, serving the refreshments - Coral Hamilton, Diane Jogia and Yvonne Tattersall, and I sincerely hope I haven't missed mentioning any names - and also, not forgetting our committee members who were there in the thick of things as always - a very BIG thank you - it was a really good day and I'm sure we will be asked by the Chamber of Commerce to participate in next year's festival. The feedback has been very positive.

As part of the Festival, some local young artists were asked to participate in a Community Art project. They attended workshops and were then asked to paint an historical mural on the walls of the Guildford Community Centre. The artists were allowed to choose what was to be painted and after looking at some old photos they chose their subjects - and we were surprised and delighted to learn that they chose "Linnwood" as one of them. If you haven't seen the mural yet, go and have a look, you can't miss it - it's right on the Guildford Road frontage of the building.

We had our Open House Day in October and were very pleased to have the NSW Corps of Marines in attendance. Unfortunately not all of them could make it - car trouble prevented the Marine with the tents for their camp from arriving, but the pageantry of the marines who did attend, and the parson, certainly added lots of colour to the day - and we didn't receive any complaints from the neighbours about the noise of the musket fire. The marines hope to attend as many future Open House Days as possible, so we hope that they will prove to be a drawcard for visitors.

Again, thanks must go to all those volunteers and committee members who gave their time on the day - it is very much appreciated and certainly helps to make these days the success they are.

Next Sunday the 16th we are holding another reunion for past Linnwood girls. You may have seen or read about a reunion held last Sunday at the Parramatta Girls Home - when this was being organised we were asked to also organise one for Linnwood girls and even though we had one in March, some of the girls wanted another one. Again, this will be a day just for the girls and there will only be a couple of committee members here in the background to help with tea and coffee etc. Representatives from CLAN will also be here to offer their support. Hopefully, it will not be too traumatic for any of the women who are coming back for the first time.

Last but by no means least, a few weeks ago, much to my surprise, I received a letter from the NSW Heritage Office informing me that I had been nominated for and selected to receive a NSW Government Heritage Volunteer Award. The awards ceremony was held at Parliament House on Wednesday 29th October and with much pleasure and a lot of nerves, I was presented with this award from Diane Beamer, the Minister responsible for the Heritage Act, along with 24 other recipients. To tell you the truth, I felt a bit of a fraud receiving this award when I heard the details of all the other recipients - many of whom had been working for the conservation of heritage items for many, many years, and others having written scores of books, but then, as it was pointed out to me when I voiced my thoughts, what WE, not just me, had achieved - saving and having Linnwood State Heritage Listed in such a short space of time - was a pretty good achievement for a community who had had no experience in this sort of thing - what we did was pretty special - so, to those who were there at the beginning and to those who have joined in since, please join with me in accepting this award.

On behalf of the Friends of Linnwood I would like to thank Holroyd Council for the nomination and I would also like to thank my husband Peter, Diane Jogia and Councillor Vanessa McNeil for their attendance and support on the day.

Don't forget we have another Open House on Sunday 7th December, to be followed by our Christmas dinner afterwards, so please come along on the day and have a look at what's on show, do some Christmas shopping while you're here - what a great opportunity to do some shopping away from the crowded shopping centres - and if you can, lend us an hour or two of your time to help out on the day - we would certainly appreciate it. There is a booking sheet for the dinner for you to put your name down if you haven't done so already, so don't forget.

Well, I think that's it for the moment, please stay for a cuppa and a chat after the meeting - Thank you.