MORE “OLD-TIMERS” OF EARLY CHRISTCHURCH.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 18938, 7 December 1929, Page 21 (Supplement)

MORE “OLD-TIMERS” OF EARLY CHRISTCHURCH.

ST JOHN’S CHOIR HAD SOME NOTABLE VOCALISTS (By A. SELWYN BRUCE.) When one sits down quietly to dream of the town of 50 or more years ago, it is strange to find how some small cue will induce one’s mind to recall the faces and figures of so many people who have long since crossed the Great Divide, and were apparently blotted out from memory. My two previous articles have been received so kindly, that numbers of contemporary old timers have asked for more. Oliver Wansey. I suppose I have only got to mention Oliver Wansey’s name to recall a rather picturesque old chap with black ‘‘stove pipe" hat (what a lot of people wore them in those days!) and a heavy grey tweed suit and elastic side boots, carrying on his land agency business, and incidentally causing much mirth by his grotesque attempts to lure the citizens into voting for his entry into municipal politics. And that other political aspirant— Eden George, the photographer, with his lithe figure and perennial smile almost concealing his sportive eyes, approaching the Anglican Cathedral authorities with an offer of £IOOO to allow him to advertise his business on the slate roof of the Cathedral. George’s mind revolved round greater possibilities than poor benighted Christchurch could offer, and he ultimately transferred his blandishments to Sydney, with so successful an issue that he was enabled to shape municipal politics in that city until his death not many years ago. His wife will be remembered as the daughter of Mrs Butler, who kept a milliner’s shop in Manchester Street, near the present Clock Tower in 1865, and resided next to the Rev Habens, in proximity to the Christchurch Club, Worcester Street. Dunning the Fruiterer. Everyone remembers old Dunning the fruiterer, with the “wall” eye, in business in a shop on the site of Barnett’s chemist’s shop, and later on where Stewart Dawson and Co. are now located in High Street. Old Dansy Cant, with his grizzly beard and fore and aft peak hat, with] cart specially built for transporting dead animals to his piggery. And old Peagram, the milkman, with his weird “shat-a-cooee" cry when publishing the fact of his presence at one’s back door with his milk can. And we recall old Rook, of the “Times” Company, where he was reader for so many years, always in his seat in the transept of St John’s Church, and signifying the fact in a manner which caused subdued merriment to us boys in the choir! His ruddy face and UlllllinillllllllllllllllllU

well-oiled hair, and his “dot-and-carry-i Dne" walk as he did duty with the offer- J tory bag will be easily remembered. Those bags were very handy when actual coin of the realm was scarce, and many a button found its way into the vestry by this medium, with the result that we had to use nails to attach our braces to our trousers. We couldn’t use coat buttons because they didn’t “ring” as we dropped them in, so our trousers had to stand the racket I St John’s Choir. And St John’s Choir enables one to envisage figures and faces long forgotten—Melchor Winter with his sweet tenor voice easily audible above his fellow choristers, and Rochfort Snow and Alfred Evans, and Stevens, and Jacobs and Charlie Morris and Waters —all good tenor singers, and those two lovely altos, M'lntosh and Smith, adding so materially to the beauty of the rendition of the musical portion of the service. And such basses as Jim Knox —a perfect “wind-bag,” with his curly head and-long flowing brown beard, and Jim Anthony, and Bill Anthony, and Fred Hobbs and T. M. Gee, and Geo Cliff—all men for whom we had great admiration because of the interest they took in their work. The boys of those days—Bob Turton, Mick Fisher, Fred Lake, George Pengelly, “Madam” Ward Fred Pollock, Jack Costley, Holly Bruce and Harry Bruce and others vied with one another as they warbled the psalms and canticles. Many well-known citizens were regular in their attendance at St Johns, and one recalls William Wilson, Dr Deamer, Sir Cracroft and Lady Wilson Alick Wilson, Richard Westenra, Loughrey, Albert Cuff, Charles Wellington Bishop, W. Maples, “Alphabetical” Graham (so known from his parents having burdened him with four Christian names), Noble Campbell, Hesketh, Henry Thomson, Fred Hobbs, A. G. Howland, Henry Allison, Henry Lake, Major Francis, William Godso, Theakston, H R. Webb, Charles Kiver, Thomas Bruce, W. H. Hargreaves and others. A Mysterious Nickname. A name long since forgotten was Frisbrook the grocer in the corner shop over Colombo Street Bridge. Frisbrook was familiarly referred to as “Flying Peter,” but for what reason I have no idea. His old shop was tenanted for many years by Jones, the bookbinder, and was only recently pulled down. Joey Carder was a well known character both in Lyttelton and Christchurch, his services being requisitioned for every benefit concert. His star item was “Maid of Athens.” Another familiar figure was W. J. G. Bluett, the auctioneer and erstwhile parson, with his ferocious countenance and monocled eye; and Tommy Goodyer the rotund cabby of the City Hotel stand, who was of such enormous proportions that it was asserted that all his stable’s staff were requisitioned to solve the difficult problem of hoisting him up into his seat on the cab. And there was the patriarchal looking old architect Mountfort, with snow iiiiiiiiiiiiiiiitiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiniiiiiiiiiiiniiiiiiiiiiiiin

white long hair and beard, who, when he was walking, gave one the impression that he was tallying the number of yards from his home to his office. . Another well known and respected citizen was Hebden, of the “Times” Company, who met with an untimely death by being jammed between the bus he was travelling home to Linwood on and the verandah of Mrs Collins’s drapery store at the south-east corner of East Belt and Cashel Street, the accident being caused by the driver turning round to whip a boy off the back step of the bus. And old Turton will always be associated with Ballantyne’s delivery cart and the Volunteer Fire Brigade, of which he was superintendent for many years in succession to William Harris. Everyone remembers old Heyder, the clever locksmith and brass wind musical instrument repairer, in both of which lines he had no equal in the town. Many a safe and strong-room door lock succumbed to his wiles, for he was a wizard at such jobs. We can see him now, riding in from his home to work on the old draught horse in true military style, never rising to the trot, but bumping roughly over the four-mile journey. And old Carey the cobbler, of Gloucester Street, will be recalled as he sat on his stool, his last between his knees, plying his waxed thread, and so deaf that one had to strain 'one’s vocal chords to maintain any conversation

with him. And Neate the grocer, patriarchal looking at 50, with heavily white bearded face and frock-coated suit, always ‘‘in the pink,” and always “neat.” An Early Midwife. Many old-timers remember Mrs Chaney, the maternity nurse—a prototype of one of Dickens’s mid-Victorian characters, who, when nursing a case where Dr Frankish—a shaven faced stripling—was the medico, replied in answer to some suggested alteration in the method she was pursuing, “Get away you beardless boy, vat do you know about it! ” Melville Walker, with his black soft felt hat and walrus moustache and monocle, notoriously untidy, and his namesake the Hon E. W. Walker with plain stove-pipe hat and eternal pipe will both be remembered. And Bob Belgrave, the coloured proprietor of the Rising Sun Hotel at Lyttelton and afterwards of the Crown Hotel on the South Belt, was a popular landlord of the sixties and seventies. Valparaiso Jack Morgan was a well known character whose recital of his adventures capped those of Sinbad the Sailor—they were the product of a highly developed imagination, but he had told them so often that he believed them himself! A Grindstone Story. J. S. White was a well known contractor who for some years conducted a general store at Kaiapoi, and the following story told me by himself regarding his store-keeping days is worth placing on record. In his store doorway was a grindstone which one of his shop assistants sold, but forgot to charge up, and when, a day or two afterwards, White noticed it had gone, he asked the purchaser’s name. The assistant was quite unable to remember who he had sold it to. Whereupon Mr White charged up a grindstone to every customer who had an account in his ledger, with the result that he was paid for 32 grindstones! What a picturesque personality was George Willmer, with his flowing white locks and beard—the settlement’s earliest bard, and a good all-round sport. Willmer was a cricket enthusiast to the end of his long life, and was a familiar figure on the Hagley Park grounds, being, in spite of a physical disability, a batsman of more than average skill. There are numbers of others one could recall, but space forbids, and I leave that pleasure to some one of my readers who have revelled in names long since lost to memory and have been enabled to envisage personages that have not been remembered by me.