MR T. H. GIBLING.

Star (Christchurch), Volume LXIV, Issue 940, 9 December 1933, Page 22 (Supplement)

MR T. H. GIBLING.

Early Settler to Celebrate Ninetieth Birthday. Mr Thomas Henry Gibling, who is at present living with one of his daughters, Mrs J. R. Williams, of 9 Denman Street, Sumner, will celebrate his ninetieth birthday this week-end with a big gathering of his relations and friends. Of his sixty-eight years in New Zealand, he spent the greater part in the district about Kaiapoi. When interviewed yesterday he chatted about the old days. Speaking of his birthplace, Norwich, England, he said that he was one of a family of thirteen. ‘‘My father,” he said, “must have been a wonderful manager. He brought us all up well and gave me a good education till I was fourteen years of age. How he did it, I don’t know,” he continued, “but he managed to see that we all ,had two suits of clothes.” Continuing his narrative, he said, “I left the Old Country sixtyeight years ago by myself. We arrived in Auckland on the Lancaster Witch after an uneventful voyage, during which only a few children died. I found it very difficult to get work in Auckland and then came on to Christchurch.” Mr Gibling talked with pride of the old days in Canterbury when the first drains were being put in and when he worked for the late Mr Marmaduke Dixon. “In those days,” he said, “I often worked in water up to my waist. I don’t think anyone ever had better health.” For some time he worked in the Oxford district. On one occasion, when

he wanted to get to one of Mr Dixon’s farms at Irwcll, he set off in the evening and reached it on the following morning. “Mr Dixon,” he said, “was a good boss. You were always sure of your pay.” Incidentally he remembered that Mr Dixon was a very reliable weather prophet. Mr Gibling ultimately took over a farm at Clarkville and did so well that he lived a retired life in Kaiapoi for many years. Mrs Gibling died two years ago and latterly he has resided with his daughter in Sumner. His other daughter. Mrs IT. Arps, lives at Kaiapoi, while one son, Mr G. Gibling, lives at Woodend and the other, Mr T. W. Gibling, in the Auckland district. He has eleven grand-children and seven great-grand children. Many of these will greet him on the occasipn of his ninetieth birthday. “Many of my friends,” he said, “tell me that 1 might live to be a hundred. But what would be the use? I might be a nuisance,” he concluded.