Helen Mayo in a group bringing Josiah Symon idea of Adelaide women students college – St Ann's – to reality in 1947

Three of the earliest students (top) at St Ann's College for Adelaide University women students opened in 1947 in the Borugham Place, North Adelaide, home (bottom right) bequeathed by Sidney Wilcox. Josiah Symon and Helen Mayo (bottom left) were among key figures in achieving the college.
Images courtesy St Ann's College

Josiah Symon and Helen Mayo were key players in getting St Ann’s College opened in North Adelaide in 1947 as the first residence for Adelaide University women students.

The university’s lead in being Australia’s first to admit women undergraduates in 1881(far ahead of Cambridge University in 1948) wasn’t matched by solving the accommodation problem in Adelaide for female students from the country or interstate.

Symon and Mayo were both members of Adelaide University council. In 1914, Mayo had become the first woman university councillor in Australia and continued in the role until 1960. Lawyer and politician Symon was credited with suggesting in 1924 that South Australia should have a women’s college. (The state’s first college, St Mark’s at North Adelaide from 1925, was for males only.)

In the 1930s, Mayo, with other well-connected graduates Dr Violet Plummer, Dr Constance Finlayson and Kitty Pauline Price (wife of Grenfell Price, first master of St Mark’s College, opened in 1925) worked to turn Symon’s idea into a reality. After being approached by Plummer, businessman and benefactor Sidney Wilcox of the wool brokers Wilcox Mofflin gave ₤5,000 and bequeathed his Spanish-style house on Brougham Place, North Adelaide, to Adelaide University to set up a residential college for women.

Originally established in 1939, with Mayo chairing its council (until 1959), St Ann's College didn’t officially open until 1947 because  World War II intervened. There were 16 initial student residents in 1947, including women returned from war service, some of them having lost husbands or boyfriends in the war. Thirteen were  housed at Brougham Place and three in a Melbourne Street, North Adelaide, cottage.

St Ann's College grew to accommodate nearly 200 student residents, with academic tutors and residential tutors. From the 1970s, it accepted male students and those from all three South Australian universities in the 1996. St Ann's remained an entirely independent and private not-for-profit college, with no church, university or government backing. More than half its residents were from rural South Australia, with more than a third from interstate and the remainder from overseas.

Each September, the college celebrated the birthday of Josiah Symon as a founder. Two of Symon’s daughters, Eleanor and Kilmeny, were generous supporters of the early college. Other significant supporters included Roma Mitchell, Bob and Rosemary Hill-Ling, Bob and Cathy Kennedy, Gemma Bronkhurst, Dr Rosemary Brooks and Simon Stevens.

In 1973, the Adelaide University council accepted a gift of $2,350 from the family of Kitty Pauline Price to set up a scholarship in her name to commemorate her services to the university and affiliated colleges, especially St Mark's and St Ann's. Constance Finlayson also had a scholarship in her name.

A spacious dining hall and common room added to St Ann’s College in 1961 was named to recognise of Dr Helen Mayo for her service to the college. This was the first building constructed specifically for the college and the first built with government assistance.