AUCKLAND PATRIARCH

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXV, Issue 23161, 6 October 1938, Page 14

AUCKLAND PATRIARCH

MB. GEORGE- GEE'S LIFE NINETY-SEVENTH BIRTHDAY SECRET OF GOOD HEALTH The last survivor of a family of nine who. migrated from London to New Zealand in 1851, Mr, George' Gee, who resides with*his daughter, Miss Gee, at Castlebar Private 'Hotel, celebrated his ninety-seventh birthday -omf Tuesday; Although ill recently, he received mainy visitors during the day, arid talked with animation of'the past. , . . Mr. Gee was a boy of ten when the family made, the four months' voyage to New Zealand in the Canterbury Association's ship Sir George Pollock. On the vessel was a girl of ten, Ann Elizabeth Wood, also' travelling with her parents. In 1862 the two married and had five children. Mrs. Gee died in 1919. The descendants number 23, comprising 13 grandchildren and ten great-grandchildren. Mr. Gee saw the foundation stone of Ghristchurch Cathedral laid in 1866 by Bishop Harper, and the turning of the first sod of. the Lyttelton tunnel by William Scfton Moorhouse, the Superintendent of Canterbury Province. About 30 years ago he arid his family came to Auckland and, except for a brief period spent at Tauranga, Mr. Gee has -lived in the city ever silica. "I have seen the beautiful sailing ships driven off the sea," 'he said. "I have seen' the horses driven off the streets, and (with a chuckle), I might say Ithat I hava almost seen the camels driven off the desert by new means of transport, l but I doubt if we are any happier foj\all the mechanical progress. I come of long-lived stock—my father, incidentally, had the freedom of the City of London —but I attribute my good health tjo a good upbringing. Proper care and nourishment in childhood have much to do with founding a good constitution." Mr. Gee is serenely happy and, although his sight prevents him reading the newspapers,, oitt* of his sons, now well on in the seventies, reads them to him every day, and the patriarch takes a keen interest in general affairs.