Restored paintings, old teaching tools, a Remington typewriter, a Raj-era clock and a wooden thermometer were brought out, dusted and put on display at The Oriental Seminary school, where Rabindranath Tagore had once been a student.

The exhibition — Magic of My School — was part of a programme initiated by the state’s school education department and NGO Bichitra Pathshala.

On display were boxes of a variety of seeds and a collection of minerals, fertilisers, nuts and cereals that had been used to teach students since the school’s inception by educator Gour Mohan Auddy in 1829.

“These are priceless teaching tools that had been lying in our labs for years. We plan to restore and use them in future,” said Payal Dey, English teacher at the school and a member of the heritage club.

An old Remington typewriter once used in the school office and a clock that had told time since the Raj were also part of the exhibition. “The clock is 100 years old. Even I had seen it hanging from our library wall as a child. Now, it’s of no use but is a relic nevertheless,” Rohan Ram of Class X said.

From century-old cutlery to a wooden thermometer, the school cupboards yielded a range of interesting artefacts.

One table at the exhibition was dedicated to priceless volumes from the library, the oldest being a frayed-at-the-edges volume of Stories from Shakespeare published in 1821. Next to it stood a copy of the Oxford Advanced Atlas and Chaucer’s Complete Works, both published in the 19th century.

A collection of pictures and photographs from the collection of former headmaster Rashbehari Ray also found pride of place. Among them was a rare picture of a stick-thin Buddha during his penance that Ray had collected from Sarnath.

“Ray had over 300 postcard pictures and paintings collected from different states. He used them to teach children about different cultures and architecture around the country. We hope to use them again to recreate similar interest,” said Chandika Prasad Ghosal, a English teacher of the school and the founder of the heritage club in 2016. The school’s heritage club is supported by Intach.

Around six students of Class X helped restore a painting of Rabindranath Tagore, a former student of the school, dating back to 1979. The painting would hang in one of the corridors and had gathered dust and moisture over the years. The students used their zero hour to brush off the dust, rub the canvas with bread to soak in moisture, help teachers repaint the damaged portions, spray varnish and finally polish the wooden frames. They repeated the process with a painting of another ex-student, Swami Abhedananada, dating back to the 1950s.

The restored artworks were proudly put on display.

The students also captured interesting nooks and crannies of the school on camera. They made a few short films on the heritage of Chitpore.

“As I captured my school in stills, I fell in love with it again. I have been a student here since I was in primary classes. But there are many things that I had taken for granted, like the gold-plated symbol of our institution engraved at the entrance or the tulsi plant in front. It was a pleasure re-learning the history of our surroundings,” said Akash Kurmi of Class X.