On the first day 12 pupils attended and by the end of the month 42 names were on the roll.
One of the early entries in the first minute book records that 15th February, 1882 [1892?], Mr. T. Robinson and others received 16/- for saving the school from fire.
By 1893, the school room was over-crowded but the Education Board ignored an application to have a second room added, and the School Committee decided to resign and to request the residents to withdraw their children from the school. The threat was not carried out, and in the following year, 1894, the additional room was granted and completed.
Miss Jillet was the first teacher in the new room. The following year saw Mr. Collie in charge as Head Master and taught Standards I to VI. He wielded his authority and maintained discipline by administering corporal punishment as circumstances required, which was quite often, and not soon forgotten.
Miss Glasgow and Miss Dinan had charge of the infant classes A, B & C, in what we called the small room.
The writer together with his twin brother Robert, began school there in February, 1898, and Miss Dinan was our first teacher. (She died in 1966).
I have very happy memories of those first 3 years (one year in each class). Both these two ladies were really nice and got on well with the children and were well liked by them, which meant a good start.
We did not know then that worse was to follow.
During that first 3 years in the infant classes I do not remember either Robert or myself ever getting caned – not that we were any better than any of the rest in the room – by no means. Maybe being twins, the only pair at that time in the school, and possibly the first, and so much alike, we quite unconsciously drew a good deal of attention. We probably found a soft spot in our lady Teacher’s heart and might even have been fussed over a bit. Fortunately teachers were not in the habit of kissing their pupils, so we escaped such an ordeal. Whatever virtues or advantages we had by being twins in the small room were not recognised when we passed into the standards and were transferred to the big room, where we found a tall man with a big stick.
We had not witnessed the big boys getting their medicine before, we had only heard about it. As we were now growing up and the atmosphere seemed to be getting a little more stiff, we entered the arena with some diffidence.
Mr. Collie left the year after we started, 1899, succeeded by Mr. A.M. Feist who continued until 1909. The new master was a disciplinarian like his predecessor and could write the word discipline in figurative language on either the right hand or left hand or both, of the pupil who transgressed any of the school commandments.
On the 15th April [1907] the school was burnt to the ground, and unfortunately most of the early records went up in smoke. We older boys figured out that it would take several months to build a new school. And we looked forward to a good long holiday.
Were the mothers pleased at the prospect? I wonder. The School Committee and the Education Board’s views conflicted somewhat with ours, and the second day after the fire, desks and other materials arrived from Wellington, and lo, our much looked forward to holiday was reduced to one day. The Education Board was certainly quick that time, and school restarted in the 17th April in the Public Hall where I completed my school days at the end of the term December 1907.
The new school was ready and opened on the 3rd February, 1908.
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