Hawera School

Taranaki Daily News, 15 May 1925, Page 10

Hawera School

Jubilee Birthday To-day

Blockhouse to High School*

Fifty Years of Progress

Founded fifty years ago as the first earnest and concerted effort to sow the seeds of learning in a community little more than a pioneer outpost, the Hawera main school to-day celebrates its jubilee birthday. The occasion will be marked by the gathering together of hundreds of the school’s past pupils, who are revisiting their Alma Mater to do honour to the institution that started their footsteps along the path of education.

from May 15, 1875, to May 15, 1925, is a far cry in any land in a world where half a century’s progress has so changed things, ideas and life itself. ' Particularly marked, however, is the change in a district where in so comparatively short a period a thriving town has evolved from a settlement striving for its existence in the midst of a rugged land hardly yet wrested from the grip of primeval nature. The history of a school is naturally but a supplement to the history of the community it serves, and for that reason an endeavour has been made by a Daily News reporter to delve into the earliest days of the school’s existence in_ order to give the people of to-day an insight into the conditions under which education was then carried on, as well as into the storied rolls of the school's past records. To the old pupils of the school and the early settlers of the district who have generously supplied all the information they could give, the Daily News is deeply indebted. THE FIRST SCHOOL. The first seat of learning in Hawera is stated to have been a building in the neighbourhood of a grocer’s shop, conducted by a Mr. Bullock, but definite details concerning this are not available. The general opinion amongst the older residents is that the site referred to bore a house which was the residence of Mr. F. Dunne, the first master of the present Hawera School, and was not the ■ location of a school at any time. Cer- | tain it is, however, that in 1871 chil- | dren’s tuition was being carried on in : the old blockhouse on the site at pres- ■, ent occupied >by Messrs. Welsh and Me- • Carthy’s building. The blockhouse was built on a small knoll, which has since been removed. Reputed to be the first settler, of those alive to -day, to enter the Pa tea district, Mr. George Bamford, aged 83 years, and now resident on the Main South Road, can remember with remarkable distinctness various incidents in the stormy days of the ’sixties and the ’seventies,* and the circumstances surrounding the foundation of the Hawera • School in the old blockhouse. Mr. Bam- j ford states zthat when he came to Hawera as a surveyor in 1865, he ulti- • mately took up a block of 60 acres, , which is now the centre of Hawera town. ■ Jr- 1869 he first started permanent residence in Hawera, and from corrobora- I tive statements made to a Daily News | reporter by Mr. Quinton Muir, it ap- ■ pears that'in 1870 there were only four ■ houses in Hawera township, one built i bv Mr. Muir, one by Mr. Bamford, and one each by the Middlemas brothers. « The families* of these gentlemen formed t the foundation upon which the school : population was built up. Mr. Muir, par-j ticularly, can count himself as a parent . intimately connected with the school s ; beginnings, for four of his step- . daughters —Marv Holland, Lydia Hol- ; land (now Mrs.' Mat che tt), Eleanor Hol- , land (now Mrs. Charlie Stone), and Ada | Holland (now Mrs- Will Heydon)—were ; amongst the school’s original pupils, while' all of his daughters—Elizabeth Muir. Agnes Muir (now Mrs. Hicks), | Olive Muir (now Mrs. Morrison) and , Ethel Muir (now Mrs. A. R. Harrison) —and his only son, Mr. Albert Muir, were all pupils of the school at a later date. To these names must be added that of Mr. Adam Sargeant, who came to Hawera from Patea in 1875, and put bis children to school in the blockhouse. EARLY TEACHERS.

The first schoolmaster in Hawera was Mr. (Sergt.) Kearney, an old Imperial soldier and war veteran, of whom it is said “that it was his joy to parade with his medals fastened in a glittering row acres? his chest” Mr. W. Douglas, still a hale and heartv resident of Hawera, attended the blockhouse school, and associated with him amongst others were the Middlemas family, Mrs. J. Campbell nee Miss Douglas), and the Turnbull family. There is now no record of the names that constituted the school roll in the early days of its existence, and efforts have been made to compile as full a list as possible of the first settlers and pupils. Messrs. Foulis, Bindon, Milne, Dr. Smythe, Gray and Strong have all visited ti\e school in the capacity of inspector since the advent of Mr. Lee in 1873 The first male assistants at the school were Messrs. Warden, Payne and Nairn, and the first lady assistants were Mrs Horniman and Misses Brunette and Aris. Other prominent figures bn the staff in the earlier life of the school Were Messrs. Goldsmith, Collie, Niven, b. Poole and W. Gibbs, the last two of whom now lie ‘somewhere in France. joo't'od memories have recalled the fallowing names from amongst the schools first pupils:—Svmc. Fantham, Douglas, Muir, Messana, Minks. McLean Tait, Adamson. Livingston. C.....pbeH, Hobbs. Toeker, Hunter, Brown, the Fryers, the Johnstones and the Ogles. Three of these can claim a unique, honour. Messrs. Tom Tait (Waihi Road), J. Minks (Tawhiti Road) and Steve Adamson (Regent Street) were the first, second and third white men, respective!v, to be born in Hawera.

Tn a series of old log books kept by the teachers of the early days, reference is made to a visit to the blockhouse school on April 1, 1875, by Mr. Robert Lee, inspector for the Wellington Education Board. It was his second visit to the school, and the inspector reported “that there was no furniture, and the stats of the school was primitive.” At that time there were 29 boys and girls on the school roll, FIRST PROPER BUILDING. Steps were taken in the same year to elect a proper school building,' and a piece of land, situated where the present Anglican .Church of St. Mary’s now stands, was chosen as the site. Vigorous opposition to tlie use of this area as a site is stated to have been offered, however, by Mr. Tom Middlemas, chairman of the Patea Education Board, and after the timber had been actually stacked on the site .by the builder (Mr. Syme, sen.), the present site on the Mail; South Road at the head of Victoria Street was substituted, and the timber removed there. The objection to the former site was that it was too small to allow of expansion of the school, and was too far away from the -main road for the farmers coming to town on market day to leave their horses in the school paddock.

In 1875 the new school was ready, and Mr. F. Dunne wa/ appointed the first master. On April 1, while teaching was still going on in the blockhouse, the roll was 29 boys and 19 girls. On May 13 business was earned on for the first time in the new building, and b - 1876 the roll number had decreased by one to 47. Mr. Dunne then resigned, and on May 22 Mr. J. Ha rre was appointed master. The roll -must have increased quickly, for on August 17 the first pupil teacher (Mr. William Douglas) was appointed, and he was followed on April 9 of the next year by the first lady pupilteacher (Miss F. Alexander). Classic learning must then have been more highly thought of as fit instruction for primary children than it is nowadays, for it is recorded in the log book on September 24, 1876, that “this morning I gave four boys and three girls their first instruction in Latin.”

Early in 1879 the inspector reported with severity “that no entry had been made in the log book between November 19, 1877, and June 14, 1878.” The omission is unfortunate, because it was during that period that education boards Lad been constituted, and information regarding the changes that took place would be interesting. CONTROL OF SCHOOL. ’

Speaking of his term at the school. Mr. Harre stated on one occasion that the attendance when he was headmaster was between 50 and 60 children. In those days, he said, the (’ducation affairs of the district were administered by the Patea Education Board, which had jurisdiction over the whole area between M aitotara River and Normanby, or Ketelfcarae as it was then named. Bcyc nd Normanby was a terra incognito, a “no man’s land,” inhabited by Maoris, wild pigs and wild cattle.

There were no local committees at I that time, the Patea Board looking after all its eight schools—Kctemarac, Ha-1 wcra, Manutahi, Kakaramea, Patea, I Whenuakura, Waverley and Waitotara.i The chairman of the board was Mr. Tom ! Middlemas. Mr. Furlong (a Hawera ! storekeeper), and Mr. John Milroy weru!

members of the board, and Mr. William Cowern was secretary. Sometimes Mr. Harre had an assistant, and sometimes he had not. The school consisted of one room, and had no ventilators, and Mr. Harre could remember the chairman of the board coming up to the school in a great rage to enquire why the master kept the windows open on such a cold day.

Mr. Robert Lee, the Wellington school inspector, visited the school once a year, and took several days to make the journey from Wellington. As the examination was the only event of importance in the school year, the parents attended the school in force on the eventful day, and took a great deal of interest in seeing the children put through their paces. If this statement of Mr. Harre’s is correct, then it may be assumed that about the year 1878 the Wanganui Education Board must have replaced the Patea Board as the controlling body, for it was from the Wanganui Board that the Taranaki Board took over South Taranaki, in 1916. It seems strange, in face of Mr. Harre’s reported statement, that the first log book, dated 1874, has pasted inside the cover a notice relating to the keeping of the book under the name “Wanganui Education Board,” though, of course, it may have been pasted in at a later date. ’ The election of the first school committee, and the exact personnel of that committee, do not appear to be on record. From observations made at various times in the log book of 1876, Messrs. Andrew Middlemas (chairman), T. Middlemas, Furlong, Douglas and Thomas are mentioned as having visited the school on different occasions as committeemen. NEW REGIME OPENS. Messrs. Chamberlain and Thompson are recorded as filling the position of headmaster after Mr. Harre’s resignation, but their reigns were short, for in 1878 Mr. Muir, described by one enthusiastic old boy at present resident in Hawera as “as fine a teacher and man as ever stood up in shoe leather,” assumed the role of principal. It was in this year that the log book first mentions George Home (now Dr. George Home, New Plymouth) as having passed standard 4. On June 13, 1879, an entry reads: “The attendance during the past week has been poor, owing to Maori disturbances.”

The next headmaster was Mr. Harrison, who filled the position for only a few months.

That prevalent modern complaint, the problem of overcrowding, attacked the school seriously in 1882, and standard 4 was removed to the Wesleyan Church building. Additions were made to the school that year, and the fourth class were soon back again in their old school. January .27, 1896, found Mr. C. A. Strack installed as headmaster, and marked the opening of a 29 years’ regime of a teacher who during his long term of service was to gain the respect and affection of many hundreds of pupils who passed through his hands. At the time of Mr. Strack’s appointment there were eight assistant teachers at the school, and the roll number stood at 285, 146 of the pupils being boys and 139 girls. V Little change took place in the school until the year 1901, when its constitution was changed and it became a district high school. The old school was

pulled down and replaced by a larger and better one, the same one, in fact, that stands there to-day. On January 28, 1901, the district high school opened with a roll of 378 pupils, 20 of whom were entered for instruction in secondary subjects.

IMPORTANT CHANGES. Under the capable guidance of Mr. Strack, the school pursued the even tenor of its existence, practically without disturbance, until during the last decade the attendance again grew too large for the building. Tawhiti (Hawera East) School was opened in Nolantown as a side school to Hawera, for infants only; but within a year or two it was definitely established as a school. It opened with an attendance of about 70, so that the new school did not have much effect on the main school roll. The first step towards the disestablishment of the district high school was made in 1918, when the secondary school classes were moved to the old technical school building. At that time only night classes were being carried on in the technical school. Day classes were soon resumed, however, and the secondary school classes were transferred back to the Hawera School building. The obvious foolishness of carrying on the secondary school courses in two different institutions was soon apparent, and the difficulty was solved by the establishment of the Hawera Technical High School next to the showgrounds in 1919. With this move, Hawera became once again a purely primary school. There were, as has been stated, 285 pupils when Mr. Strack came in 1895, and the roll number was 800 when he left in March, 1924. It is estimated that 7000 pupils were at one time or another under his control, and it was a very large and sorrowful gathering that met in the main hall of the school last year to bid farewell to their old friend and schoolmaster on his retirement. General regret is felt amongst all his old pupils that Mr. and Mrs. Strack will not be able to attend the jubilee celebration to-day. MODERN TIMES. “Whaia Te Matauranga” (Strive for the Highest) is the school motto inscribed in simple black letters at the end of the school assembly hall to-day, and surely the long line of sterling masters and mistresses, the school committees from the date of their institution, the education boards who have controlled the school, and last, but not least, the legions of pupils who have passed in and out of its doors, can look to-day xv ith pride on what 50 years of effort have produced. During recent times, owing to a considerable increase in the Education vote, more money has been available for expenditure on school grounds, and in

three years the committee, aided by geherous subscriptions from householders themselves, has been able to effect improvements to the school environment of which it may justly be proud. Since the year 1922 a sum of a little over £1770 has been spent iby tTie committee, and a brief survey of the work accomplished will show how well the money has been spent. An artistic and substantial concrete wall has been erected along the entire street frontage, and provision has been inade for the building of memorial gates at the end of Victoria Street when funds become available in the future. Over £6OO was spent in grading, levelling, metalling, blinding, .rolling, and tar-macadamising both the eastern and western sides of the school, a total area of 1850 square yards, while paths have been constructed. On the levelling and sowing in grass of the large playing field £2BO

was spent, the clearing of gorse from this area and the fencing of it having previously cost the committee £lOB. Included amongst the other work of lesser importance have been the laying of concrete kerbing and channeling, grading and levelling the girls’ inlay-

ground on the south of the school, felling trees and removing stumps on the east, south and west sides of the school, erecting three sets of drinking fountains and troughs, adding a teachers’ rest-room to the school, turning the old gymnasium into a boys’ shelter-shed, supplying 20 seats in the school grounds, planting boundary hedges and ornamental shrubs, erecting a set of swings, making and planting flower beds in the front lawn, and erecting temporary wooden gates at the front entrance. The next work of magnitude the committee contemplates carrying out is the laying down of a tennis lawn, wlpch is estimated to cost £l5O.

To-day Mr. Strap’s successor, Mr. F. A. Bates, exercises his influence over 675 children. In addition to himself, there arc 13 assistants and five pupil-teachers and probationers at the school.