Manawatū Conversations

Keith Clark, Part 3. Marriage, parents approval, wedding and reception. Moving to Palmerston North, teaching at West End School for 3 years, 1950s. Wife working, then family. Travel to work. Description of pupils, teachers. Discipline. Class size (47). Making teaching resources. Moved to Blenheim. Became principal of school. Extra weekend and evening work. School fundraising.

Keith Clark, part 2. Wartime, Kokatahi Band dances. Getting home late at night. To Christchurch Teachers College. Sport, athletics, bowling to Murray Chapple. Teaching, getting a strap for discipline. Bonding system. To Bulls as a reliever, then sole charge at Kaitieke, near Raurimu. Pupils going to school by horse. An injured kiwi. Meeting up with future wife. To West End School, Palmerston North and marriage (on 5th January 1952). Lesley teaching in a school at Ohakea. An Austin 7 car. Found a flat in Longburn. Lesley taught for 27 years in total.

Keith Clark, part 1. Born in Richmond, Nelson. Great-great-grandparents arrived there in 1842. Moved to Karamea, whitebait, eeling, 1930s. Hokitika and West Coast. Independent childhood, hunting, sharing community, no power. Father was dairy factory manager, prize butter maker. Lots of chores. Wartime, few young men, so shooting rabbits, etc. for farmers. School 50% Maori. Learned Maori techniques, eeling, etc.. Skipped levels at school so in high school at 12. Biked 6 miles to school. Cadet unit, marksman, testing rifles for home guard. Bren gun squad at 15. Joined the home guard. Off school to work mornings in the dairy factory. To Canterbury University at 16. Went hunting, bad weather, seriously ill. To Auckland to recuperate then back to factory. Started teaching. Given sole charge 9 pupil school position at 17 to see if fit enough.

John Ward on his radio station and QSM. Awarded QSM in 2005, linked to broadcasting own classical music radio station since 1998. Covers Palmerston North and Feilding. Mentioned in North and South article in 1999. Setting up the station, system, regulations, aerials, reception. Building own equipment. Classical music styles/interpretations. Music interest since childhood, now mid-80s. 30 variations on the Eroica symphony. University of the Third Age (U3A) groups. Station played in the Square (classical music to deter young people). Getting a civic award, 2004, then the QSM.

Patricia Keiller on the Caccia-Birch family. The Birch brothers coming to NZ, 1860s, leasing land in upper Rangitikei. First European settlers in the area. Merino farming, cob house, gorse hedge. Marriages, wife from Yorkshire, expanding the house. Only cob house remaining in the North Island. Link to Caccia family, an Italian Count. Erehwon. Caccia-Birch name. Keiller connection. Freehold purchase finalized in 1905. Family disputes and rifts. Nga Tawa school. Purchase of Woodhay (Caccia Birch House), later gifted to the nation. Maintenance and future use of the house. Later family movements. Hair ball from a cow’s stomach.

Stu Schwartz, Part 4 of 4. Jewish background growing up in New Jersey. Bar mitzvah. Customs around death. Jewish food. Youth organisations, B’nai B’rith. Jewish community in New Zealand. Kosher food sources. Son is an Orthodox Jew. The role of Cohens. Female rabbis. Visiting Israelis. Intermarriage, conversion.

Stu Schwartz, Part 3 of 4. Collecting kiwiana for over 25 years. Range of items, comparisons to the US. NZ citizenship. Gathering kiwiana. Te Manawa collection, Museum Society gathering linked stories, digitisation. Concept of a Swartsonian museum of kiwiana. Donated military uniforms in the US. Range of items collected. Cataloguing systems. 100,000 items so far. How to present items. UFOs and other unknowns.

Stu Schwartz, Part 2 of 4. Establishing the Taylor-Jensen Fine Arts Gallery, 1997. Gallery content and objectives. Involving the artists. Paul Dibble and others. Jack Register. Public artworks on display in Palmerston North. Stone sculptures in the Square. Support for local artists. Galleries, classes, Square Edge. Textile art, ceramics. The Schwartzonian for kiwiana. Hangars. Archaeology.

Stu Schwartz, Part 1 of 4. Coming to Palmerston North. Director of museum and science centre about 1991, interview process. Early adjustments. Opening. Some issues. Museum approaches. Museum in a Box. Museum Studies at Massey University. Science Centre water room. Better use of the river.

Peter MacGillivray Part 6 of 6 (parts 1 and 2 recorded 3 months earlier). Massey class reunions, classmates. Alumni Association. Graduates networking. Changes in Palmerston North – railway through the Square. Bought a house nearby. Became hostels manager. Shops in town, tearooms. In childhood, shopping from farms with home delivery (Wairarapa). Paying in stores. A&P shows. “Manchester” (sheets, etc..). Retirement. Wildbase. Dr Dry and Drysdale sheep. Buying a farmlet.