Births

Lucy James (2012) and Bernie McLeod welcomed Rupert George McLeod, born 31 October 2023.

Vale

Acknowledging, celebrating and paying tribute to the Grammarians who make up our community is important to us. We are honoured to remember the lives of our Melbourne Girls Grammar alumnae and other community members.
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Jennifer Bourke (Sanders, 1951) 20 September 2023

June Dawkins (Clarke, 1942) 26 October 2023

Barbara Dohle (Simpson, 1945) 20 May 2023  

Joan Hiller (Warnock, 1943) 26 August 2023  

Rosemary Mangiamele (Cuming, 1960) 12 July 2023  

Janet Seymour (Blackwood, 1956) 2 August 2023

Alison Williams (Walker, 1945) 26 August 2023

Jennifer Bourke (Sanders, 1951)

Information provided by her daughter Judy, her cousin Mary Legge and her friend Jan Wilson

Along with her cousin, Mary Legge (Duffield), Jen started in Morris Hall as an eight-year-old in 1942, joining her elder sister, Margaret. Within a month, they found themselves evacuated to Marysville. She had happy memories of her time there, developing lifelong friendships and a love of the bush. Jen left school at the end of 1951, having been a councillor and experiencing the beginnings of student democracy under her much-admired Headmistress, D J Ross. She completed a course in physiotherapy, later specialising in rehabilitation. After some time overseas, Jen worked at the Austin Hospital, which was developing as a major spinal hospital, where she was involved in experimental work with acute spinal injury cases. She organised Friends of the Austin Hospital to give patients some outings and entertainment at weekends.

Jen met her husband, Brian Bourke, at the Austin where he had come to teach debating to some of the patients. In time, with the arrival of four children, Jen gave up work to support them in all their endeavours, particularly riding. The family set up a cattle farm at Portarlington, which Jen ran while Brian, a barrister, was working. Jen was very involved in the local community. Among many interests, she attended the Anglican Church and encouraged ecumenical and shared services. Always interested in children, Jen was tireless in her support and encouragement of improvement in children’s literacy. A great reader always, she established book groups through the CAE. Jen was a hardworking, hands-on farmer and was respected in the district. With a strong interest in the arts always, she and Brian later in life established a wonderful sculpture collection on their property. Across countless issues, Jen was always generous with her time and money and made a significant difference to people’s lives. She is remembered for her compassion, her loyalty to her friends and family, her practicality and ability to ‘get things done’ and above all, for her wonderful sense of humour and enjoyment of life.

Janet Blackwood (1956)

Information provided by her husband, Terence Seymour

Janet followed her aunt Margaret Blackwood to Merton Hall in 1949, completing Year 12 in 1956. She was always grateful to have been at the School under her Headmistress, D J Ross, whom she admired greatly. Janet enrolled in Agricultural Science at Melbourne University, graduating in 1961. After two years with the Melbourne and Metropolitan Board of Works in the water testing laboratory, Janet spent the next three years overseas. For a time, she worked at Australia House promoting Australian wines which, to her delight, involved extensive travel through England. Further travel in both Eastern and Western Europe was followed by a year learning Italian in Perugia. With an interest in desert citrus growing from her degree, she then spent three months in kibbutzim in Israel. Janet returned home at the end of 1966 via Japan and was then employed by the Department of Agriculture preparing technical journals for fruit and wine growers.  

In 1974, Janet married Terence Seymour, whom she had met through the Department of Agriculture. While she was supposed to resign as a married woman, she continued to work using her maiden name, until finally resigning for the birth of their son, Julian, in 1976. A second son, Alastair, followed and Janet happily remained home with her children. Later, she completed significant voluntary work with the Breast Cancer Foundation and the St Andrews Op Shop. She leaves a legacy of a full life, and her husband, two sons and three grandchildren. Janet was delighted that the School community chose to honour Margaret Blackwood in naming a House after her (Batman House was renamed Blackwood House in 2022). The photograph shows her receiving the news of the decision, dressed accidentally but most appropriately in yellow!

Barbara Dohle (Simpson, 1945)

Written by her daughters

Barbara Simpson was born January 20, 1928, at ‘Sazli’, Dunkeld Victoria to Leigh and Mary Simpson, their second of three children. Schooling was done by a governess at home until she was 11. Then it was Alexandra College and then off to Melbourne Girls Grammar. When the School was requisitioned by the air force, Barbara and the rest of the School set up camp in Marysville.  

Years of farming, working alongside her father, was interspersed with obtaining a Diploma in Horticulture at Burnley Horticultural College and becoming a trained wool classer. Marriage to John Dohle followed in 1961 and raising 3 daughters whilst developing a successful farming enterprise near Dunkeld. Their Polwarth sheep stud was well known for its prize-winning sheep and excellent wool.

Barbara always had time to assist her local community. She volunteered with The Red Cross, Church Guilds, Mothers Club, the Dunkeld Arboretum, was a tireless worker at the Dunkeld Museum. She and her husband were both life members of the Hamilton Pastoral and Agricultural Society, and she was a keen volunteer at the Dunkeld Information Centre.

In 2009 Barbara was presented with an Australia Day Award in recognition of her service to the Dunkeld Community. At 85, in 2013, she was further recognised by the Victorian Council on the Aging as a Senior Achiever Award winner. Both awards were richly deserved. Her community service was not just something she did, it was who she was.

Rosemary Mangiamele (Cuming, 1960)

Written by Margaret McNaughton (Atkins, 1955), her second cousin.

Following her school days at MGGS, Rosemary completed a diploma of Occupational Therapy. She was awarded a scholarship to be the sole OT at the Sale Hospital in Gippsland, during which time she also established an OT Department at the Traralgon Hospital. This brought her into close contact with the struggling Indigenous communities in the area, for whom she developed great compassion. Compassion was also developed through her mother’s long association with the Royal Children’s Hospital in Melbourne and involvement with the rapidly growing multicultural life of post-war Melbourne. Rosemary, herself, became employed as an OT at the RCH. Attendances at international OT conferences encouraged her to widen the scope of the profession here, and she was appointed Senior OT at St Vincent’s Hospital in Melbourne where she worked for eight years.  

Rosemary met Sicilian Giorgio Mangiamele in Melbourne and, after visiting him in New Guinea where he was working, they married and she took a position in the psychiatric department of the Port Moresby Hospital. They returned to Melbourne in 1982 and Rosemary developed her love of painting, especially when visiting her younger sister, Julie Vidal, who had settled in Sweden. She loved to use art as an important therapy in the treatment of her patients.

Rosemary’s husband, Giorgio, was a highly regarded creator of short films in the Italian Community in Melbourne. He died in 2001 and Rosemary spent many years researching and collating his work.  Rosemary quietly pursued many diverse interests, including her lifelong interest in Indigenous Australians. In 2006, with a group of non-indigenous women, she spent a week in a Central Desert community, participating in women’s sacred ceremonies. Rosemary lived a very full and active life, filled with a lifelong love of the arts.  

Alison Williams (Walker 1945)

Information provided by her son.

Alison came to the School for her final two years of schooling, attending as a day girl from Balwyn. Her elder sister, Margaret, was also a student at the School from 1936-41, as were her two nieces, Gill and Helen Lincolne. Alison married Stanley Williams and they had three children, Julie, Mark and Scott. She kept in touch with the School throughout her long life, especially through the Nepean Branch of the Old Grammarians. Very much a family person, Alison was 95 at her death and will be missed by her three children, five grandchildren and seven great grandchildren.