Volunteers wanted: Rochester Historical and Pioneer Society president Kaye Speers, secretary John Foster and assistant secretary Dot Moon are asking more people to join them. Photo: Aidan Briggs
Photo by
Aidan Briggs
Rochester is in danger of losing any remembrance of its history if more people don’t consider volunteering, according to Rochester Historical & Pioneer Society secretary John Foster.
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“The main thing is (the current volunteers are) all getting a bit older, and we’d hate to lose all the information here,” he said.
“The information we’ve got here is unreal, and it’s all Rochester’s history from day one, so we don’t want to lose that.
“We’d love some more volunteers to come along and start learning about this place’s history because not enough local history is taught nowadays.”
Valuable: The Rochester Historical & Pioneer Society has a huge trove of items showcasing local history. Photo: Aidan Briggs
Photo by
Aidan Briggs
Mr Foster said there is a range of jobs that people interested in helping out could do, from mowing the lawns or cleaning to cataloguing information and doing research.
“If someone is interested in one particular thing, they can concentrate on that. We just want to get more people in here volunteering,” he said.
Rochester Historical & Pioneer Society president Kaye Speers, who helps run the historical society, said they’d have to give away many of the Rochester artefacts if they had to close up the building.
"We have some very valuable and interesting items, and they should stay here, but we can’t do this forever, so we’d have to hand them over to other historical societies,” she said.
“Of course, that’s if people want them. They are items about Rochy’s history, so they might just be gotten rid of if we close up.”
Passion: Rochester Historical & Pioneer Society president Kaye Speers restored this old carriage. Photo: Aidan Briggs.
Photo by
Aidan Briggs
Volunteering can be an absolute joy, and Mr Foster and Ms Speers have loved it over the years.
"I love it when somebody comes to you and they want to know about their great-grandfather or something, and you go through the papers and can put a story together of what they did when they were here,” Mr Foster said.
“We did the other day for people from Adelaide. They came in, and I had about 60 pages on their relative. Their great-great-grandfather was a councillor, and I got to show them all the things he did. That gives you a lot of satisfaction.”
If people are interested in getting involved, they can call John Foster on 0409 842 233 or email j-lfoster@bigpond.com.
Alternatively, the Rochester Historical & Pioneer Society is located at 98 High St. Rochester and is open between 9am and noon every Wednesday and Friday.
