MARGARET THOMAS (NEE KOKAY)

INTERVIEWER: PAMELA SMITH

DATE: 7 OCTOBER 2008

[NOTE: THIS IS A TRANSCRIPT NOT AN ABSTRACT WITH TIMINGS]

TELL ME ABOUT YOUR EARLY LIFE? TELL ME ABOUT YOUR DAD?

He came with his mother and father from HUNGARY in 1912. He was about ten and they came from this place in HUNGARY called CSONGRAD and they came here and there was already one HUNGARIAN family here and a man called STEVE RACZ. I don't know why he came here but maybe we think he came for goldmining or something. It could have been that he was on the run from something. He came here round this 1912 time and two or three families came after that as well and they all settled up the GROVEBURN but the interesting thing was that the men weren't related, they were related by the women. The women were my GRANDMOTHER and her half-sister and he was a half-brother and they all had the same mother but they had a different father and they were CATHOLICS. That's quite interesting and other families came, the KOLLAT family came and VICTORIA KOLLAT was a cousin of my GRANDMOTHER and my AUNT. So they were kind of related by the women not the men. They came from the same town CSONGRAD in HUNGARY. Here in TUATAPERE is the first recorded place where Hungarians came in New Zealand. Those families came and now it’s only me and my son GLEN and LES KOLLAT. Mum came from over the hill at OTAUTAU and she came over to live just after they were married. Her heritage has a little bit of SCOTTISH in it. It was a wonderful combination, HUNGARIAN and SCOTTISH.

WHY DO YOU SAY THAT?

The FEISTY EUROPEANS and the FIGHTING SCOT (laughter) and yes it was interesting. Yes that is how Dad came here and his family and Dad over his years in his life made a big impact in the town. He contributed in the town in one way or another. He really died before his time in the sense he was a self-made engineer and he would have really liked the age if he could have lived ten more years. He was seventy three when he died and Mum was a similar age so we are not long livers. Dad had a heart attack and he had a heart condition for a long time. He didn't look after himself.

The HUNGARIANS were interesting. The family first went to LAKE MICHIGAN but the mother actually came to NEW ZEALAND with two children, my father and AUNTY ILONA. AUNTY ILONA never had any children and Dad had four children. However, the mother she had a lot of pregnancies and each time she was pregnant she went back to HUNGARY from the STATES and they all died and Dad and AUNTY ILONA were the first two. Now we have come to the conclusion that they were RH negative. That's what we are. The more babies that GRANDMOTHER had it just didn't work. She had eight pregnancies. When she came to NEW ZEALAND, that was it. No more babies. But before they came she had moved backwards and forwards between THE STATES and HUNGARY. But at the same time when they left HUNGARY two of Dad's uncles went to the STATES and on one of my trips overseas I stayed with them. One family stayed in CHICAGO and one stayed around LOS ANGELES and they were Dad's cousins. My AUNT never had children and was always deemed that she had a woman's complaint. The conclusion we came to was that she was RH negative. She married twice and the first marriage she married a CATHOLIC so there would have been children. You never find out these things until after it is too late to ask the questions. I have a photo of my GRANDMOTHER when she was pregnant before she came to NEW ZEALAND. It was in amongst the photographs that AUNTY ILONA had and after she died it went to Mum and after she died we had all these photographs that didn't have names on them. (Went to look at the photographs).

There is a MONUMENT in the middle of WELLINGTON that has a huge big paved area and they asked HUNGARIANS to record names but the HUNGARIAN people that they tend to focus on, were those that came in 1956 after the revolution. In the one book that is recorded that there are a couple of families down south and they were potato growers. (Laughter).

TELL ME ABOUT YOUR FATHER? WHAT DID HIS FATHER GO TO?

His father worked in the SAWMILLS and he quickly applied for land. He died of PNEUMONIA in his early fifties. They lived up the GROVEBURN and were known to have a wonderful garden and grew STRAWBERRIES and GRAPES and all sorts of things in the little micro climate up there. Dad worked in SAWMILLS and his father died and a row developed between the mother and my Dad and the farm was left to the mother. The mother sold the farm and instantly went off to live in INVERCARGILL. Dad stayed here and he bought land in PAPATOTORA ROAD. The mother and sister came back and lived in a little house on the property. (laughter). The sister married into a family of DOLANS first and that marriage didn't last long. I just knew her for many years when my GRANDMOTHER and her lived in a house in MCMASTER STREET then out of the blue she married a man called GARNET EVANS. I think he had children but they never had children together. He died and she later had a stroke and she persevered and battled, she should not have lived on her own. That was in the years that I was going to HIGH SCHOOL and I used to have to cut her hair. Her speech was affected and her life was complicated. She didn't walk on a ZIMMER FRAME like they do today she pushed a push chair and that was how she learnt to walk again and she lived by herself for many years. After she died that was when all these photographs came home. I didn't take much interest in them then.

Dad didn't talk about his HUNGARIAN life only to HUNGARIANS. He wanted to be a BRITISH CITIZEN. He loathed and hated the COMMUNIST WORLD and what was happening to his beloved HUNGARY which he remembered as a child. It didn't help when they went back to HUNGARY in 1956 and they were caught in THE REVOLUTION. Dad went against the advice of the BRITISH AUTHORITIES and Mum and him had to be rescued and so Mum and he hid under a tarpaulin in a RED CROSS TRUCK. Us kids lived here and they were away on a world holiday for five months and they were on a boat and went to HUNGARY. They were in this town called CSONGRAD and some of those people rode on a bike to this BRITISH CONSUL and took a note that enabled Mum and Dad to be rescued. I remember coming home from school one day to AUNTY BESSIE'S house she lived across the road, she was no relation, and there were a lot of other people there and they were all crying. We wondered what had happened and we thought someone had died. They were crying because Mum and Dad were safe. We didn't know that they weren't safe. We had been shielded. It was in the papers but we were shielded from it. I must have been about eight and ILONA six and that was the first time Dad had been back. He was terribly disappointed. He used to speak in many parts of NEW ZEALAND about COMMUNISM and had letters in the paper. He didn't go back to HUNGARY for a long time. It would have been the early sixties before he went quite regularly and Mum went a couple of times. I have been a couple of times.

Dad bought this land that was a REHABILITATION BLOCK for those after the war. Dad was really an ENGINEER but had no formal training and he built this gravel crushing business and he made roads. That was quite unique. The first road that he built was with a wheelbarrow and horses and he built THE GROVEBURN ROAD with a contract with the WALLACE COUNTY COUNCIL. He progressed to buying trucks and equipment. This GRAVEL CRUSHING PLANT, he used to go to rivers and bucket loads of gravel would go up. He had no power so he invented generators and things so this gravel crushing business could work. One day he had a row with the WALLACE COUNTY COUNCIL and the plant arrived home never to be used again. I think it was over a contract or something. It was self-sufficient. He employed a dozen men. They lived in these caravans that they pulled by truck. We called it a camp. Everything came home to a paddock on the farm. The farm had a road right up the centre of it. That's where the equipment was put. They were gradually sold off as people wanted them. He must have had a terrible problem with tax as he sold stuff off but it was never used again. His main opposition was this firm CROOKS which is still in use today.

While Dad was away at this GRAVEL CRUSHING SITE Mum was at home managing the farm and having babies. And she kind of did the farming. There were four children in three years. Just a year between VERONA and l, eleven months and between LES and I and exactly ten months between LES and ILONA. Mum was never pregnant again. Only years and years later she had a HYSTERECTOMY. I recall on a couple of occasions she went to hospital and I recall being told that it was as a result of all these babies in rapid succession. When we were kids Mum was always on the farm helping and he was at the site. We always had a KARITANE NURSE and we had a house cow and didn't matter what happened Mum religiously milked that cow. Never ever did I see my father milk that cow. I declared that never would I have a cow. She had jersey cows. The cow was called CHEEKY. It was important that the cow got in calf as I guess that we relied on the milk. When Mum and Dad became more affluent they employed a married couple and they sometimes had the milk. We lived in an old wooden house and I remember in the wash house which was a new bit of the house along with a new bathroom and Mum got a deep freeze and the milk used to sit in big enamel bowls on top of the deep freeze. Sometimes she separated the cream but we always got through the milk. After THE REVOLUTION we used to have REFUGEES stay with us and Mum learnt to make COTTAGE CHEESE. That was quite... like I've made COTTAGE CHEESE now but she wouldn't have anyone to show her. She made COTTAGE CHEESE because in HUNGARY that was what they had. I remember eating as a kid lots of junket and custard and used up the milk.

WHEN DID YOUR FATHER BUILD THE NEW HOUSE?

In was in the early sixties. 1962 or something like that. He designed the house, no such thing as ARCHITECTS for him, and he drew up the plans and things and DICK and JOE EVANS built the house. It was quite a big house even on today standards and it had central heating but no fireplaces. In the kitchen it had a little enamel coal range for when the power went out. When I lived there I used to actually keep it on because it used to keep the living part of the house quite nice and warm. One significant thing about the house, well there were a number of things, but one thing was that he built a FLAG POLE and he flew flags all of the time. Usually the UNION JACK but he would sometimes fly the HUNGARIAN FLAG. He thought he should fly flags so that is what he did. Yes that was a bit unusual.

THE OTHER THING YOU HAD A BIDET?

No we didn't have bidets. No. (Laughter). We had normal hand basins and we had lower hand basins. That was for washing your feet so that you didn't have to put your foot up in. You know Mum and Dad grew up in the era and I guess we did too, that nobody bathed every day. We all bathed on SUNDAY night and we all shared the same water. Well I guess I hate to think about this. I dare say for our parents they probably didn't have a bath even once a week. They actually learnt how to wash properly. They learnt how to keep themselves clean with a basin of water. So that is how we got those sinks for washing feet. Actually they were very useful for bathing babies in. They were a bit lower. But it did have a URINAL. Out the back part of the house there was a URINAL and a shower and a toilet and a foot basin and a hand basin. That was for the workers. You know if we had people who worked that was their bathroom. But it did have a place to wash your feet. I think that was a hang up from something from Dad. They wouldn't have had water and a method of heating. I remember when we stayed at AUNTY BESSIE'S house when Mum and Dad were away, she took us over to our house for our SUNDAY NIGHT bath, where my UNCLE was living while Mum and Dad were away. She didn't have a bath at her house. I don't know how they had baths. I think they must have had baths in a shed or something. They had a TIN BATH. I can't recall them having a bath. Probably they just had good washes. Kids today don't seem to be able to do. They have to have gallons of water in the shower.

When I was growing up we always had new cars. Usually we had two. Many stories about the cars. Most notable was when we hit the train at the OTAUTAU CROSSING. I must have had been about eight or nine then and VERONA and I and we had a HUMBER SUPER SNIPE built like a tank. Dad used to have to go to INVERCARGILL twice a week to get parts for the plant. Dad liked loud music way back then and the OTAUTAU CROSSING, that had trees right down either side and he would swear to this day if he was still alive, that the train never blew its whistle. So it was the trains fault. It ploughed into us at the side of the car and moved us two hundred meters up the railway line. So that was a smashed car totally and some people came and picked us up from OTAUTAU and brought us home and then they decided that I should be checked out by DOCTOR ELDER so in the other car so off we went to DOCTOR ELDER where upon it was discovered that I had a really mangled, crushed up shoulder. So I went to HOSPITAL where I stayed for something like three months. (laughter). Meanwhile Dad fought the authorities about the accident and ended up having a court case with the RAILWAY DEPARTMENT saying that they never blew the whistle and it was their fault but of course he lost. I have no information about that at all but if that wasn't enough he then insisted after the insurance paid out that he wanted the wreck as well. So that was another battle. So the wrecked car sat up the swampy bit on the farm up the lane and it was still there when I left the farm I suppose it is rusted away now. Needless to say he bought another HUMBER SUPER SNIPE but we always had good cars. The one we had the crash in was green and the new one maroon. One other time he bought a DE SOTO and it was a tealy blue and it was especially to go camping. He bought a DE SOTO and a big trailer, all the camping gear and a huge big canvas tent that was like a CIRCUS MARQUEE. It had three rooms in it, no centre poles, it was a very complicated thing. Every camping gear that you could wish for, METAL STRETCHERS, SLEEPING BAGS and LILOS; and we haven't been camping yet. We never ever went camping. (laughter). I don't know why we didn't go camping. When I was very young he started buying land and built houses in QUEENSTOWN. I daresay camping was pretty primitive. To this day I don't like camping but I have never been. We never went.

Mum and Dad first built this little house in the CAMPING GROUND in QUEENSTOWN. This little house was called BOLLERTON after a lake in HUNGARY then after that he built two more houses in QUEENSTOWN. One was called VERONA VILLA and one was called MARGARET HAVEN and they existed until after the death of my Mum and all of the assets that Mum and Dad had were deemed to have to be sold so the QUEENSTOWN property was sold. It was bought by a developer and pulled down. MARGARET HAVEN was shifted away but VERONA VILLA the only bit that is still there is the big retaining wall. All of the earth and stuff that was taken out from that site built CORONATION DRIVE in the lower part of the gardens in QUEENSTOWN. Dad still had all the machinery and he took hundreds and hundreds of metres of stuff and built that road in QUEENSTOWN.

Then he had land and sections in FRANKTON all round by the lake. They would be very nice to have now. Consequently when I was a kid we frequently went to QUEENSTOWN. My mother couldn't drive so we would have to be taken up and Dad would come backwards and forwards and he was pretty flamboyant my father. He would start tooting a block away just to let us know he was coming. He would be sounding on the horn. We spent a tremendous lot of the summer up there. Which of course we loved and I still love the CENTRAL OTAGO region. We loved it up there. I had my first sort of boyfriend in QUEENSTOWN he came from CHRISTCHURCH I was probably standard five. It was a nice place to be. We would spend all our time playing around the lake. Mum and Dad weren't there it was just safe.

WHAT INFLUENCES HAVE IMPACTED ON YOU?

I watched Dad who was an immigrant came... he was always just the wrong age to go to a war. He was ostracized by many members of the community as it was deemed that he had something to do with the GERMANS during the war and but that never stopped him. He was too young in HUNGARY and he came here and he was in the HOME GUARD. A lot of men found that quite difficult as they didn't understand that HUNGARY and GERMANY were quite different. Anyway I watched Dad persevere and never give up and try, try, try, again. If he couldn't do something he got somebody around him who could. SYD HARVEY who is still alive often talks about the things that he welded and made for Dad. Dad would say I want this and people would jump. Another person who used to do a lot of stuff for him was ALBERT FLUERTY. Dad persevered, he never gave up. I think about this as the years went by.

I suppose when we were kids it was deemed that we had a lot of money. That was not reflected in us kids. If you had any pocket money it was earned and it was accounted for. His money values were... you couldn't waste anything. Nothing could be wasted about your time either. Time was valuable. I remember glorious days down at TARAMEA BAY on a SUNDAY maybe that was where he made contacts as well. Nothing was wasted. I remember when I went off to HIGH SCHOOL I had to go out and get a job so I wouldn't be embarrassed about my bike. There was no way he was going to buy me a bike to go to HIGH SCHOOL without earning it. There is perseverance and I think he instilled in me from a very early age his love of the community and people. Realizing that other people could offer something and being able to draw on that. He taught me from a very early age although I never thought this as a kid that he could operate as a team and he had that ability and it was transferred into everything he did. He was very tough. We all had to be accountable to him I remember I was engaged to be married and I still had to tell him where I was every five minutes of the day.

Drawing on and being part of a community and I remember when they built the school hall and three men represented different areas and Dad was in charge of country. There was a country princess and it raised a huge amount of money for the hall. It was about being part of a team, taking people along with you. Not always having to do all of the work. Recognizing that other people had something to offer. Although he did not tolerate fools. Would tell them if he thought that. He was pretty racist sometimes. Because we lived slightly out of the town we didn't run wild in town. Mum and Dad loved the pictures and we used to go every week. Twice sometimes at the weekend. We always had the same seats and they were reserved seats. First row on the balcony. It was a bit of a ritual. We worked on the farm and learnt to swim in the creek. It never occurred to us that we could walk there. We had no need to.

WHEN YOU AT PRIMARY SCHOOL YOU REGARDED TUATAPERE AS A TOWN?

Yes it was our town. We had a postal box and every day the mail had to be collected. The grocery shopping was done here. When I was a kid the grocery shop and the butcher shop came to your back gate. The grocery shop delivered then it was only when I was standard five and there were more shops and you went in to them. I played SATURDAY netball, we went to the pictures, we participated in community things, show days and the sports and when Dad became involved in local body politics we went out and about more. He was the elected riding member for the WALLACE COUNTY COUNCIL.

At the back of the farm was a backwash of the WAIAU RIVER and we loved playing in it. We walked, then rode our bikes down there, then took the tractor and trailer. The kids in the neighbourhood all went down there. Mum was always involved in one thing, WOMENS DIVISION. In her latter life she was very active in her own right. Up till then she was a shadow of Dads. I went to school here right up until secondary school. I had this blood condition and I was treated with kid gloves. It was deemed that this was the best place and I had the best doctor.

TELL ME ABOUT DOCTOR ELDER?

When I was kid and I had numerous times when I was involved with DOCTOR ELDER and Mum would ring and he would arrive or come and sometimes he would come in the middle of the night. He would leave a prescription or medication. I remember he was very good with Dad's heart condition as Dad didn't look after himself and he would go to bed and DOCTOR ELDER would come in and out. We really didn't know what that was like in comparison to today.

THE TRAIN, WAS IT PART OF YOUR LIFE?

When I recall the train it didn't take passengers. I don't ever recall going on the train only when we took the PLAYCENTRE kids to ORAWIA when that line was closing down. Dad frequently had goods coming out on the train. It was never a passenger train but Dad used to tell the story of how he went to RIVERTON this day and went to the DOCTOR TROTTER HOUSE and he cut his tonsils out and he took the train home again. (Laughter). I don't know if it was right or not. When I got my tonsils out I haemorrhaged and nearly died. I certainly couldn't have caught a train home. My memories of the train are of the goods as opposed to people.

WHAT ABOUT CHURCH?

Yes church. Well Dad was an ATHEIST. Mum wasn't, she was a good CHRISTIAN METHODIST woman. Although some of his . . . he gave a lot of money to ST PETERS SCHOOL in GORE as he had been brought up a CATHOLIC. We were all baptized METHODISTS. Mum and Dad were married in the METHODIST CHURCH. There was never a minister lived here. He would be stationed at OTAUTAU. He would come once a month at two o'clock on a SUNDAY afternoon. How dare it interrupt our SUNDAY; but never mind we would go. There were probably six or seven people there and all of us and Dad would go and he would go to sleep and snore. We would all sing along with the other ladies. However, one of Dads really good friends was FRANK GLEN who was a minister here. They used to spend a huge amount of time at our place and so did the CATHOLIC PRIESTS so while Dad had this atheist views he certainly had many hours of conversation with them. It would probably be about evolution. I don't recall being part of it, VERONA I bet she was, but I don't ever recall being part of it.

So we went to CHURCH and participated in the CHURCH. He was kind of like AN ELDER in the CHURCH and here he was an ATHEIST. It was a lovely little METHODIST CHURCH where the POLICE STATION is now. The METHODIST CHURCH was one of the buildings used as a school room at one time. It was pulled down. We were one of the families that went there. There was a huge TOTARA CHRISTMAS TREE and lovely church service. The MINISTER would come and have lunch first then we'd go to CHURCH and Dad would snore and Mum would sing, she had quite a nice voice.

WHAT ABOUT SPORTING AND RECREATION ACTIVITIES?

I always played sports at school. BASKETBALL etc., but when I went off to HIGH SCHOOL and boarded during the week you weren't part of the HIGH SCHOOL teams as you were only there during the week and you weren't part of the teams here. I actually found that quite difficult that the kids who went off to INVERCARGILL I think we were ostracized. I believed that those here thought that we thought that we were too good to be part of the LOCAL SCHOOL. I don't know why we went off to town to school. We went to JAMES HARGEST. Certainly when we came home at the weekend we were treated a little like lepers. My friend JANETTE who we both went to PRIMARY SCHOOL together here and then we went NURSING together, well her and I have often talked about it, she had a different view again. We were talking about the coming up NETBALL JUBILEE and those in the photos and the bus team. In order for us to keep playing BASKETBALL those who went away on the bus made up a BUS TEAM. We never practiced or anything but we must have been part of the local competition. I found that quite difficult really. I found that from the third form up I hardly associated with those I had gone through all my primary days with. The local boys didn't seem to mind us but it was very strange about the girls. The people that I associated with in the weekends they were people who travelled on the bus with you. I had a bond with them. Only many years later has the bond with the people I went to PRIMARY SCHOOL has that resurfaced again. In a way today, I look at the kids today and they go away to other SECONDARY SCHOOLS and they come back and they play in the SATURDAY RUGBY TEAM and SATURDAY NETBALL. They are welcomed with open arms. Certainly there are less kids so they want them. They are treated quite differently. I found that quite hard. So in my HIGH SCHOOL years I didn't have lots of close friends it was only when I went nursing that you were able to form relationships again. When I came back home again to live permanently after I was married and I had children, then it was different for want of a better description I was being a LEADER in the COMMUNITY I wasn't trying to fit into the COMMUNITY.

WHEN YOU MARRIED YOU MARRIED BARRY AND YOU HAD A FARM?

He came from the NORTH ISLAND and we initially bought THE NORMAN FARM on the GROVEBURN ROAD and we also bought some property at the coast. After my father died we managed the home farm for Mum and shifted and lived in that house, and when she died the farm had to be sold so we didn't buy it. The GROVEBURN FARM was sold but we still had the farm at ROWALLAN and I recently sold it to my son. BARRY loved that land and for GLEN it's a homecoming really and he wanted to get there and raise his children there. GLEN travelled the world shearing sheep for ten years. TRACEY came from TAIHAPE so they settled in TAIHAPE had their children had a big shearing contract and other businesses with the intention of coming back to the farm. They have been home just over a year and they have built a lovely new home on the farm. His father would be really pleased and GLEN and the kids and TRACEY just love it. The kids are twelve, nine and seven. They all go to school here and love it.

WHAT IS DIFFERENT ABOUT THEM GOING TO SCHOOL THAN WHEN YOU WENT TO SCHOOL?

They don't have to drink cocoa! (laughter). I have just been reading about that in an old book. I have been doing a bit of research myself about the trophies etc. there are not a lot of records from the WAIAU DISTRICT HIGH SCHOOL days. The subjects and the way they are taught is different. Still reading, writing, arithmetic but just taught differently. We had all those sporting opportunities and the kids have that today. I think that kids are more mobile today and that allows them to participate. In our small community if there is no MUSIC TEACHER then you get in your car and drive to where there is a MUSIC TEACHER. In our day there would have been a MUSIC TEACHER. People are more mobile, they are on the go all the time travelling.

There isn't any PUBLIC TRANSPORT here. There is a SHUTTLE from TE ANAU and back.

Catch it here at 9 o’clock but it leaves INVERCARGILL an hour after it arrives. No public transport to go to INVERCARGILL for the day and I find it extremely difficult for my job. I require kids to go to SIT and they can't drive and their parents can't take them. They are almost disadvantaged. There is no public transport. I say to people who live in cities and they say the buses aren't at the right time and I say but you have a choice. You have a bus and a taxi but we have nothing. I can't get kids to catch the SHUTTLE to do courses at SIT and come back at night. In days gone by, people caught the H&H BUS or the NEWS BUS for the day. The elderly people have their own little bus to run into INVERCARGILL.

It is very difficult. We are very lucky as the CHEMIST SHOP in RIVERTON still own the little GIFT SHOP here in TUATAPERE. You can fax your prescription through and they will deliver the medication to the GIFT SHOP. You are limited there. There is no bank like there was when we were kids. It is quite difficult living without a bank. There isn't any public transport here. There is a SHUTTLE from TE ANAU and back. Catch it here at 9 o’clock but it leaves INVERCARGILL an hour after it arrives. No public transport to go to INVERCARGILL for the day and I find it extremely difficult for my job. I require kids to go to SIT and they can't drive and their parents can't take them. They are almost disadvantaged. There is no public transport. I say to people who live in cities and they say the buses aren't at the right time and I say but you have a choice. You have a bus and a taxi but we have nothing. I can't get kids to catch the shuttle to do courses at SIT and come back at night. In days gone by, people caught the H&H BUS or the NEWS BUS for the day. The elderly people have their own little bus to run into INVERCARGILL

It is very difficult. We are very lucky as the CHEMIST SHOP in Riverton still own the little gift shop here in Tuatapere. You can fax your prescription through and they will deliver the medication to the gift shop. You are limited there. There is no bank like there was when we were kids. It is quite difficult living without a bank.

TELL ME ABOUT THE DOCTOR?

Well we're lucky about the DOCTOR but once again the COMMUNITY actually sorted out the DOCTOR problem. The COMMUNITY owns the practice and they hired the DOCTORS so that we have the DOCTORS. There is a MEDICAL TRUST that runs the MATERNITY HOSPITAL but it is well used and a number come and deliver somewhere else and come here. I had babies here and they went straight to the BASE HOSPITAL but I got good care. Since my children have been having babies and grandchildren have been having babies these little places like WINTON and here are wonderful. KATRINA had a baby at NEO NATAL at SOUTHLAND HOSPITAL and they were very good but when SUZANNE had her baby there I couldn't get her home quick enough and give her a few more days here for proper care.

There has never been a time when we haven't had DOCTORS. Sometimes we're down to one. They have PRACTICE NURSES and they can do routine stuff; TRAINED MIDWIVES as well. That is very good for a little COMMUNITY.

DO YOU THINK THIS COMMUNITY HAS A COMMUNITY SPIRIT?

Yes I think it is harder to keep. Much harder to keep and it changes because for a long, long time our population has stayed the same and the people in the COMMUNITY who cared about the COMMUNITY would get together to get things done. Now our people in the COMMUNITY are different. They are more mobile the dairying boom should be really good for us, those people aren't really tied to the COMMUNITY, some are good but others have absolutely no intention of becoming involved in the COMMUNITY. They are itinerant so they only here for a short term and they move on. Lots of things like the PLAYCENTRE, I worked really hard to get that PLAYCENTRE established, the LOCAL THEATRE GROUP they have a hard job to survive to get people to be committed. But there is a core group of people who think we should have a SCHOOL JUBILEE. They are not the ones who have the kids at the SCHOOL now. It is the older ones and it is quite hard for a COMMUNITY to survive. We have a lot of people who travel every day to work in INVERCARGILL. Can you imagine that? Finishing and having to drive home.

A few years back I did a huge amount of work for NZEI and spent an amount of time in WELLINGTON and when I was coming home and got to INVERCARGILL I still had an hour’s drive at a hundred kms on lonely roads and in WINTER. I hated it. That was another aspect of my life that was quite interesting. NZEI honoured me and made me a fellow within that organization which is quite prestigious.

MARGARET HOW DID YOU GET INTO THAT AS YOUR QUALIFICATIONS ARE IN NURSING?

Well I got involved in PLAYCENTRE, then at school when the kids were there as parent help. One day I was there as a VOLUNTEER as a PARENT HELP taking pottery and I realized that I had thirty five kids and not a TEACHER in sight. I felt that my time was worth something and so I negotiated to be paid and it kind of just grew from there really. I had more than twenty years being highly involved in the UNION MOVEMENT work at a local and national level. Quite a lot of travelling overseas presenting at women's seminars and things but became involved in that, lot of that about treatment of women being treated fairly and also of parents. I became a TEACHER then. I was involved as a parent at PLAYCENTRE. I see parents now days at the JUNIOR SCHOOL but I don't see them at the SENIOR SCHOOL unless they are there to complain about something. It becomes uncool to have your parents around. I decided that working at the school as a parent was worth something as well that I had a skill that they wanted so why didn't they pay for it?

SO YOU ARE STILL INVOLVED THIRTY YEARS LATER SO WHAT ARE YOU TEACHING?

I teach HOME ECONOMICS to the SENIOR SCHOOL and I teach FOOD TECHNOLOGY to the MIDDLE SCHOOL I manage the GATEWAY PROJECT, CAREER COUNSELLOR I do quite a lot of counselling with the senior girls.

WHAT IS IT LIKE BEING A WOMAN GROWING UP IN TUATAPERE?

I used to say and still say that the first time I worked together with a group of people that absolutely in order to achieve things for the greater good of our kids was PLAYCENTRE. Nobody was paid. When you get into the environment where people are paid and there are different levels, some people find that very difficult to manage. I never worked again until I got involved with NZEI which as a member driven organisation which is a huge team of people. Never did I work with such a strong group of people, PLAYCENTRE first then at that level NZEI. I grew up in an era where it was harder to do things as a women like for instance when we were NURSING, you couldn't be married and continue to train. Let alone have babies or anything. Those things just couldn't happen. Today people have babies within their career paths and it doesn't halt it. So for me living in a small town growing up in a small town, a fiercely NATIONAL TOWN POLITICALLY, I believe a lot of the women were subservient. They were very pleased to stay at home on the farm and the only thing they had to worry about was making scones when the stock agent came. Whereas I grew up when that wasn't enough for me and I think that was one of the reasons my marriage didn't survive only I left my run a bit late. I was in my forties. I then had to get a job to survive. I think it was difficult for us to forge a life that could be for me. I used to say that I wouldn't go to POTTERY CLUB until the kids were at school. The POTTERY CLUB was just for me I didn't care about anybody else it wasn't taking guides or going to rugby or netball or carting horses around the country or whatever or what BARRY wanted me to do. If I could make money out of pottery that is what I would still be doing. I think it was hard for women it is much easier for women now. Not the same obstacles. My mother she only went to WOMEN’S DIVISION and it was on the same day each month. It was the second TUESDAY of each month at 2pm. She went with MRS HAMILTON as my mother didn't drive. I could almost guarantee that Dad would say, "but you can't go to your meeting today as I want to get the lambs in, I need you there in the yards,"(he would be all over the countryside to meetings) but she would never give in. She would have her meeting and her and MRS HAMILTON would talk in the car out the front for hours on end and it would drive my father berserk. They would just talk and talk. That's what I would get from being in some organization or doing something that was just for me. Whereas as for Mum she stuck at it she could have easily given in. I think still a lot of people of my generation and more perhaps older than me it was hard for them, it is easier now. How many wives of farming or business men, how many are waiting at home answering the phone or baking the scones waiting for the stock agent to phone. None. Not in your sweet Nelly!!! It's different today as we all have to work. It was difficult too. It was difficult for groups of women to socialize too together by themselves. If a group of women went to the pub by themselves it was pretty awful. Why are those girls here? Today the young ones are here there and anywhere. It was hard and maybe we got involved in things that gave us the power and the strength and satisfied our inner being by being and doing things in the PLAYCENTRE MOVEMENT or whatever, but it is much easier now. Like women never went into pubs in those days. In the last few years I have done quite a lot of traveling and have been by myself and I don't care, I enjoy my own company. You don't need someone else to do those things. I have a group of friends who are artists and as it happened they come from DUNEDIN and they own a little house here, they are gay women. Let me tell you the flack I have about them. They are just a nice group of women. When you are talking to people and you introduce them and something might come up and you say "No, that is her partner" and all of a sudden they are different. The old stereotyping comes in, if they could just allow women to just be by themselves. That was a battle with me. It's different with the young people now days.

HOW DO YOU SEE THAT YOU CAN LIVE ON IN TUATAPERE IN YOUR OLD AGE?

I can see now that as long as I live here I can be alright. VERONA my sister and I we talk about this a lot. She is determined to retire the day she is sixty five. I would see now that as long as I lived here that would be alright as long as I am able to drive. We have medical services here, we will get better with technology and I will have to do ghastly computer banking and stuff like that. The trouble is when you are in a little town like here with a house with no mortgage that is not going to buy you a house anywhere else, you are at a disadvantage. Do you want to take a mortgage and things again?

YOU MUST HAVE A LOVE FOR THE AREA?

You have to like here. Being on the road all the time, going to INVERCARGILL. I don't have that need. I like to go to INVERCARGILL for the pictures or a show and do all those things but I find it just as pleasant to walk along the beach or walk along the track with my crippled knees, or wander around THE CEMETERY because it's the last place to be. I don't have a need to. I like THE COMMUNITY. I love THE LITTLE TOWN.

IS IT THE PEOPLE AND/OR THE ENVIRONMENT?

It's the environment and it's the people that you know. One day you wake up and you know that you are some of the older people in the town. Sometimes if I'm over at HELENS having a coffee or something she gets lots of people in there often they have a connection to the place. Sometimes they ask me about what happened around the town. I think it is important for people to have roots.

This stuff I have been doing. We have a booklet with the criteria for the prizes and trophies for the end of year at school. Because the school has changed two or three times a lot of this stuff has been thrown out. There is no record. However the criteria needed to be updated. Originally MALCOLM GARRETT did it. Probably about thirty years ago. I have been going through it and I decided that I wouldn't just retype it I would explain a little bit of the history about it. What was the LANGMUIR CUP for fishing? Who were THE LANGMUIRS? Also the recipients of the prizes. There is a KOKAY CUP for public speaking. In actual fact it is a good idea to have your name preserved by donating a trophy to the local school. It does rely on the fact that someone does know who were THE KOKAYS? It is important to write it down in this criteria what it was and how it came about. I am the person at the school who has been there the longest. Now if I wasn't there this history that is on the trophies, that history kind of goes. Well to me I think that is really sad and shouldn't happen. People need to know. So the document which was about six pages is now eighty pages. That history can't be lost. I ask the kids at school. What do you think THE KOKAY CUP is? "Oh I don't know.” Unless the history is written down somewhere it just goes.

A few years back the EASONS had a reunion and we wrote a book and updated our family and it was only about the forty eight grandchildren of my grandparents. That was really good. It forced us to write down the history we already knew and families need to keep doing it. At the time of THE SCHOOL JUBILEE I want some families to write down their family history that can go on display that we had for THE CENTENNIAL. It is hard to get families to do it. It is not in one place. It is scattered around but nobody has a clue where it is. If they don't do this they don't know. I think of all the people who went off to the war like my mother's family and they are all dead, one didn't come home. If we don't remember