Frances Mary Richardson Currer collections of Richard Heber which were larger than Currer's. Heber and Currer had a close relationship and Heber was bailed out by Currer when he had financial difficulties. It has been speculated that Currer was a benefactor of the Brontë sisters and this is the reason that Charlotte Brontë chose the nom de plume of "Currer Bell" for her novel "Jane Eyre". It is thought that she gave the Brontë sisters' father £50 to assist them when he became a widower. Currer did donate money to the Clergy Daughter's School that the Brontë sisters attended as well as funding the
Bronte House in 1909. In 1935 the Ebsworths tried to interest the NSW Premier Sir Bertram Stevens in the NSW Government buying the house. For a time after World War II it was occupied by the Bronte branch of the Australian Red Cross (two rooms and the kitchen at the house's rear) and used as offices. In 1848 Austin Ebsworth, a bachelor, sold it to Waverley Council who seem to have acquired it as part of an exercise to consolidate the valley leading to Bronte Beach as parkland. Council owned and operated it in various uses for some years. It suffered from