She is one of the great figures of this nation’s history and a pioneer.

She was excommunicated from her church for a time, but reinstated and allowed to get on with her work of educating children and standing up for the vulnerable.

Mother Mary MacKillop was instrumental in opening schools throughout the Mid North, including Yarcowie, Mintaro, Auburn, Jamestown, Laura, Clare, Peterborough, Sevenhill, Quorn, Spalding, George­town, Pekina and Appila .

The interest in her life has been phenomenal with hundreds of thousands of visitors making the pilgrimage to Mary MacKillop’s birth place, Penola in the south-east.

There have been so many visitors that the Penola council is thinking about building a bypass around the town to cope with the expected numbers of pilgrims which are likely to flock there once it is confirmed that Mother Mary will become Australia’s first saint.

If the restoration of the historic Weikert Cottage goes ahead, on the Sevenhill Cellars and College grounds, then there is a strong possibility the Clare Valley could also become host to even more visitors, keen to see another place closely associated with her.

Sevenhill Cellars is already the most visited Clare Valley tourist attraction, hosting close to 50,000 tourists annually.

Some of these visitors tour the grounds enjoying the tranquillity and peace of the vineyards and spiritual sites, but many come for the winery experience.

For Weikert Cottage to become a place of interest and pilgrimage it needs to be properly restored.

The cottage lost its roof to the Ash Wednesday bushfires in1983 resulting in slow, but ongoing deterioration to the stonework.

Although some work has been done to stabilise what is left, there is still plenty of work needed to bring it back to the refuge Mary MacKillop knew.

Restoring the cottage, built from local stone, is important for the history of our district and something which the community should get behind.

Grant funding and community support could see the building become a focal point for pilgrims and visitors to the region who have an interest in history and in the life of an extraordinary woman.