As a special Anzac Day service beside the rusting hulk of a Fraser Island shipwreck draws nearer, excitement at one North Otago school is building.
Seven of Maheno School's 53 pupils - DeArna Mooney (11), Libby Robb (12), Fenella Ballantyne (11), Joshua Kinnaird (12), Kase Robb (10) Thomas Ballantyne (12) and Clark Ewing (12) - will travel with their parents and principal Ryan Fraser to Fraser Island, Queensland to take part in Anzac Day commemorations at the site of the wreck of NZHS Maheno.
Maheno served as a hospital ship in World War 1 carrying wounded soldiers from Gallipoli and France.
In 1935 the ship was decommissioned and sold to Japan for scrap, but ran aground on Fraser Island during a cyclone while being towed north from Australia.
The school came by the bell via the Union Steam Ship Company, which gave it in 1967.
Mr Fraser said a group of children from the school travelled to Wellington at the time, to collect the 40kg bell and it sat outside Room 1 for many years.
''It was the actual school bell, so it was rung numerous times daily.''
The bell was retired some years ago, and hung in the school's hallway.
''It's got cracks in it, so there was a mechanism put in it so it couldn't be rung anymore.''
Six months ago, Mr Fraser received a phone call from Russell Postle, a member of the Brisbane High Rise Rotary Club.
The club was organising a large World War 1 commemorative service on Fraser Island, and had learned the bell was now owned by Maheno School.
''He said he'd love for the bell to be rung and to be reunited with the ship.''
The club also expressed an interest in having Maheno School pupils attend to act as custodians for the bell and be part of the service.
The school accepted the invitation and started fundraising for the trip.
''Since then it's been amazing. I've had so many phone calls and messages ... about people's connections with the bell,'' Mr Fraser said.
He would love to hear more stories if anyone had them.
The group would spend about a week on the island, during which time the children would ring the bell alongside the ship's wreck at a ceremony on Anzac Day.
''It hasn't been rung for years, so that will be really special.''
The school and pupils had become very excited and proud to be involved in what was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for the children, Mr Fraser said.
Clark Ewing (12) said he was looking forward to hearing other people's stories about the Maheno and seeing the Maheno wreck ''because it will be huge''.
It will be the first time Thomas Ballantyne (12) and Joshua Kinnaird (12) have been to Australia.
''I'm looking forward to swimming in the ocean and seeing the Maheno wreck along with being part of the Anzac service,'' Thomas said.
''[I'm] just excited about seeing what it is like in Australia,'' Joshua said.
Kase Robb said he was most excited about going on an aircraft for the first time.
Mr Fraser said the involvement of the pupils would have a longer lasting legacy.
''The way I see it is these children, in 20 years' time, are going to be carrying on that Anzac tradition of organising services and passing on their beliefs and values to their children.''
The bell itself was already in Queensland, at the Olds Engineering foundry in Maryborough, where replicas are being cast.
One replica will go to Fraser Island and the other to the Queensland Maritime Museum in Brisbane.
The original will be returned to Maheno School following the Anzac Day service.
Peter Olds, of the foundry, told the Fraser Coast Chronicle, the bell was ''a sacred item'' and ''this ship is quite a legend - it is a very significant item of the bond between New Zealand and Australia which started in World War I and how the Anzac name came about,'' Mr Olds said.
''The Maheno rescued thousands of people and this bell would have been heard on shore, as well as by all those on board.''
At a glance
• Maheno
• Length: 120m
• Width: 15m
• On board: Eight wards, two operating theatres, medical team of five doctors and 61 orderlies from the Army Medical Corps, a matron, 13 nursing sisters, and chaplains.
• Built in Dumbarton, Scotland, in 1905, the passenger ship, named for the small North Otago town of Maheno, operated on the transtasman run between Australia and New Zealand for the Union Steam Ship Company until it was converted to a hospital ship at the outbreak of World War I.
• New Zealanders contributed to the cost of its fit-out and just four months after the Gallipoli campaign started, it was anchored off Anzac Cove as a 335-bed floating hospital with room for many more wounded on mattresses on its decks. From August to October 1915, small tenders carried 2350 mostly Australian and New Zealand injured soldiers to the ship.
• The ship did regular runs to hospitals in Malta and Egypt before it set sail from Gallipoli for the final time on October 8, bound for Southampton with patients requiring major surgery.
• When the Anzacs transferred to the Western Front in France in early 1916 Maheno was once again in action bringing wounded soldiers back from Fromelles and the Somme.
After the war the ship was returned to its former luxury liner status and made six New Zealand-to-England voyages.
• With the invention of cleaner, faster and newer engines, Maheno was soon not in use and was sold to a Japanese shipping company for scrap metal.
• On July 8, 1935, the decommissioned and stripped Maheno, ran aground at Cathedral Beach on Fraser Island, off the coast of Queensland, while being towed from Australia. Attempts to refloat the ship were unsuccessful and eventually it was left abandoned on what is now known as 75 Mile beach.
The Bell
• Used on WW1 hospital ship Maheno.
• Given to Maheno School in 1967 by the Union Steam Ship Company.
• Used as school bell for many years.
• Frail and cracked, now takes pride of place in the school's hallway.
• Has been sent to Australia for replica castings to be made at the Maryborough's Olds Engineering foundry.
• Will be rung by Maheno School pupils, at the site of shipwreck in April as a part of WW1 commemorations, before being returned to the school.
