[5] The first headmaster of the college, Brother Anthony O’Brien addressed the school upon its opening: The greatest desire and ambition [of the Brothers] would be to bring up the young entrusted to their charge as good Christians and good citizens, able to fill any position…assigned to then in after life, and to hold their own against all comers in the fairest and in one sense the youngest of the Australian colonies[1] Initially at CBC Perth only day students were enrolled, but due to population growth in Western Australia during the gold rush period, pressure was put on the school to accept residential boarding students, the first of which were enrolled in June 1896.

[6] The site had physical limitations and in 1917, headmaster Paul Nunan saw the necessity to acquire much larger property away from the city centre to accommodate the whole school.

[8] In 1936, at the instigation of Paul Keaney, the superior of nearby Clontarf Orphanage, 62.4 hectare (154 acre) were purchased from the Manning family at Mount Henry Peninsula at Salter Point on the Canning River at a cost of £9,925.

The Aquinas College foundation stone was laid on 11 July 1937, and the new campus opened in February 1938 with 173 boarders and 55-day pupils.

[2] Shortly after, the council expressed interest in purchasing the CBC site to allow for the widening of St Georges Terrace and Victoria Avenue.

The Foundation stone of the 1895 West Wing, the original school bell and eight of the ten chapel windows were taken to Trinity College.

[3] In the early days of CBC Perth music, dancing and elocution were available as extras, over and above the mainstream subjects and sport.

These cultural activities, whilst presented in the college prospectus as worthy additional refinements, had a very marginal position in the schools early years.