75 years of St Michael’s
Published on: Friday, July 01, 1960
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In 1888 William Henry Elton, an S. P. G. missionary from England arrived in the nine-year-old town of Sandakan and chose a hill in the centre of the town as a suitable place for a school and a church. Father Elton was a most determined man. He had been told that it was too difficult to cut away the hill and quite impossible to build in stone, so he decided to carry on alone and take full responsibility.
With the help of one Chinese, Ah Chee, Elton removed many tons of earth and laid the foundations. Attractive grey-green stone was found at Buli Sim-Sim, and as the years passed, granite stone was imported from Hong Kong. After twenty-five years of building. the Church was completed and two schools and a boarding house had been erected. Elton retired to England the following year after only two leaves during the whole of his service, and he left the accounts free of debt.
The church of St. Michaels towers above Sandakan; it has withstood all the ravages of war and with the famous school which lies at its feet it stands as a monument to the work of Father Elton and his successors at St. Michael’s.
The St Michael’s school building.
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