Whanganui City College History

Please note the acknowledgements listed below of other establishments who have kindly allowed us permission to use their photographs as part of this presentation:

Auckland City Libraries Heritage Collections:

Mr Armoury and staff photo by Charles Mann 1912 Ref 1122-ALB218-35

A smart North Island cadet company: boys of the Wanganui Technical College in training at the racecourse. Photographer: Allan, John Milne. AWNS-19270106-16-05

Pupils from Wanganui Boys’ College 1893 NZG-18940407-0316-03

Wanganui as an educational centre. Auckland Weekly News; Photographer - Denton. AWNS-19010815-05-01

Group of Wanganui College old boys who attended from all parts of the Dominion. Photographer F.J Denton . AWNS-19090422-16-03

The gift of the Old Boys of the Wanganui College. Photographer - The New Zealand Graphic. NZG-19120410-0031-03

£35,000 involved - Wanganui's big college for boys. Photographer: New Zealand Graphic; Watkinson. NZG-19100727-0032-02

Museum of New Zealand - Te Papa Tongarewa

Boys College, Wanganui circa 1905, Dunedin, by Muir & Moodie. Te Papa (C.012652)

For more historical items of interest relating to the technical school in Wanganui dating back to the 1890s, click on the website link below......

https://tinyurl.com/y7ty2yvz

The panoramic photo above centre shows a whole school group. The year is unknown - maybe early 1900s?  The photo was donated to the school by Tui Miller.

Click the link  to read the newspaper article reporting the appointment of Mr Armour to the role of Principal of Wanganui Technical College in 1911

Laying of the FOUNDATION STONE for Wanganui's new Technical College - read the newspaper article from 16 February 1911:

https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/WC19110216.2.3

The photographs below are from the album presented to Mr Varney in 1912....

The dedication contained in the front pages of Mr Varney’s Album (Oct 1912) reads:

Dear Sir

We, the citizens of Wanganui, including your fellow workers on the staff of the Wanganui Technical College, with past and present students thereof, have learned with sincere feelings of regret that you are severing your connection with that institution to identify yourself with another equally important movement for the betterment of the young people in another part of the Dominion.

We desire to place on record the great service you have rendered the community in your efforts to further Technical Education in this town and surrounding districts.

The old Technical School became a live institution from the day you assumed control and your work has culminated in the fine organisation that exists in the present Technical College, the high reputation of which is known throughout the Dominion.

We would refer to the fact that not only your powers of organisation but also your many excellent qualities of heart and mind, your high social character and personal integrity, your sympathetic attitude towards the youth of the community, have all concurred to your success in the sphere of technical education.

We recognise that these very qualities will make your new work the great success your old has been, and we feel assured that technical education will still have an ardent champion in you as the leader of the social movement with which you are now identifying yourself.

It is unnecessary to put into words the history of your educational career in Wanganui. That history is recorded in epitome in the series of photographs contained in this album. We would like, however, to refer to the happy relations that have always existed between yourself and the Education Department, relations that could only exist between an efficient servant on the one side and an appreciative employer on the other.

Our best wishes for the welfare and prosperity of yourself and the members of your family go with you to your new home and knowing you as we do we have no misgivings as to your success in the work to which you have put your hand.

The album was signed by:

Charles Mackay - Mayor of Wanganui 

F. Pirani - Chairman of Education Board

G.D Braik - Chief Inspector

F.M Spurdle  - Chairman Technical College Committee

Chairman Builders Association

Joseph Arnold  -  Chairman of Plumbing Association

David McFarlane - President of Chamber of Commerce

E Crow, E.H Clark, C.T Cox  -  On behalf of Technical College Staff

With regard to the Technical College being established - in the index of 1912 the Chief Inspector of Schools, G.D Braik had written this about  future possibilities a boy may consider:

……the allurements of engineering, if that were his bent, might lead him to contemplate such achievements as the Forth Bridge, the Panama Canal, the great electric works on the Niagara, and fire him with an ambition to render some monumental service to his country…..

1912 Technical College Football Team:  (see photo below)

Back Row:  L .Bruce, L. Stewart, J. Heise, L. Wood.

2nd Row:  F. Pyne, A. Downer, A. Lockett, J. Deem, R. Bowen, C. Svenson.

3rd Row: Mr Stewart (coach), J. McNaught (Vice Captain), A. Collier (Captain), C. Todd (sec), R. Hughes, Mr Armour (Principal)

Front Row: F. Blundell, M. Smart, J. Kilgour, H. McDonald, B. Delves.

For more CLASS PHOTOS BY YEAR GROUP click the link below:

https://wakelet.com/wake/l_l9iKOdNjM1zFHFUiIb5

Ex college students who went to war - click on the link below.....

PRO PATRIA - For the Country

To read some biographies of past students from the 1960s years, click the link below:

https://techoldies.weebly.com/6a-1956.html

The story of the piano at Whanganui City College

As told by long serving former teacher, Chris Donaldson.

The old Grand Piano is a Bluthner, which was Colin Horsley's (Jennys uncle) touring piano back in the early 1970's. 

He came to Whanganui soon after the hall was finished, and gifted that piano to the school as his world tour had finished. The new Yamaha was also gifted by him after an approach by Craig Smith, then the Board of Trustees chairman at WCC. Colin was originally contacted for advice, and his response was to buy a new piano. He sent a list of two or three options, including a steinway. The school opted for the least expensive option. There should be an engraved plate on the piano. 

Around the same time, he gifted a Steinway to the Whanganui Male Choir while around 20 - 30 years ago he advised on a Steinway for the Opera house. The story on that one is that the container being used to ship that piano to New Zealand was one of a number that fell off the ship, so insurance then paid for a replacement.

Footnote to the story:

Colin Robert Horsely OBE (23/4/1920 - 28/7/2012) was a New Zealand classical pianist and teacher who was based in the United Kingdom all his working life.  He was born in Wanganui. From 1936 he studied at the Royal College of Music in London.  Horsley was appointed an Officer of the Order of the British Empire in the 1963 Queen’s Birthday Honours.

Some random newspaper reports - click to open links below:

1918 - Scholarship Successes

1922 - Appointment of Newton

1929 - Demolition of a building...

1934 - University Results

1942 - Stolen Property

1943 - Newton retires

1947 - Presentation to Mr C.C Day

INDEX:  Click the link below to view an index of the names that appear in 

"The Short History of the Boys District High School, The Boys School, The District School and The Victoria Avenue School in Wanganui, 1979 - 1932.

https://freepages.rootsweb.com/~sooty/genealogy/1879-1932wanganuischools.html

A TIMELINE of the school and the name changes..... 

The development of Wanganui Technical College mirrored the changing awareness of the curriculum needs of secondary education in early New Zealand…..

1892: Wanganui Technical School opened, in response to the need to provide instruction for art, technical and industrial skills. The old District High School on Victoria Avenue was dismantled to make way for the new building.

1896: The building was extended to add more classes to accommodate clay modelling, needlework, woodcarving and carpentry.

1899: Literature, languages, mathematics and experimental science were added.

1910: The wooden Technical School building was demolished and a new school was built in Ingestre Street.

1911: The renamed Wanganui Technical College opened. Pupils from the Technical School transferred to the new College.

1912 - 1922: Compulsory evening classes catered for students under the age of seventeen who were not attending school. By 1914 there were 792 enrolments. in 1918 a sixth form class for boys was established for those wishing to study for further exams such as accountancy professionals.

1933: The recently closed Central Infants’ School buildings and grounds were handed over to cater for the growing Technical College roll.

1957: The roll was closed to girls; the last girls finished at Technical College in 1962. 

1960s: A major rebuilding programme began. By 1961 work had started on a new gymnasium and plans had been approved for a building to accommodate one thousand students.

1964: Wanganui Technical College was renamed 

Wanganui Boys College 

1994: The school became co-educational again and was renamed Wanganui City College (now Whanganui City College).

Whanganui City - A summary of the school’s Principals  (and evolution through the years….)

1864:  Alexander McMinn - an Irish-born journalist who had arrived in Auckland to cover the New Zealand Wars accepted the position as first headmaster of the Wanganui Grammar School. He left in July 1866.

1866:  William West, an earnest and evangelical Scot became the next Principal.

1873:  A girls school was erected to adjoin the original grammar school, which then became a boys only institution.

1877: Passing of the Education Act established 12 regional educational boards allocating Wanganui its own board which then oversaw education in the area for the next 110 years.  During this time a new boys’ school was erected in Victoria Ave in 1978, and in 1880 a new school for girls in Queen’s Park was built.

1892:  Technical School was opened.  David Blair, Scots born and English educated became the Director.

1896: Additional buildings were erected to accommodate the increasing numbers. Mr Blair resigned in 1900.

1900: David E. Hutton became the new Director.

1905: Arthur Varney accepted the appointment as Director of the Technical School and of Manual and Technical instruction. He remained in charge for the next seven years.

1912:  At 31 years old, a youthful W. A. Armour took up the Principal’s post. He was remembered for wearing his academic gown as he hurried along the corridors with large sleeves flapping! A student joked ‘that one day he would take off! By 1914 the first world war had been declared. In this same year Armour moved on to take a post as Headmaster at Napier Boys High School. 

1915 - 1922: George Park. Formerly from Christchurch, Park was regarded as a man of vision, strength of character and vitality. He started his term with a roll of 140, and when he left the number had grown to more than 400. He had won the confidence of both pupils and staff. The school had developed a fine community spirit, and the tone of the school had been developed. During these years the first world war had a significant impact with over 34 staff and past students killed during involvement at the front in France and at Gallipoli. In 1922 Park moved on to an appointment as Principal of Seddon Memorial College in Auckland.

1922 - 1944:  Mr I.E. Newton became the next Principal. His previous experience was as a senior assistant at Christchurch Technical College and as Director at Napier Technical College. His time saw the impact of the polio epidemic and the disruption created by the significant Murchison earthquake. The prospect of another war was signalled, and eventually 146 former staff members and students had died on the battlefields.

1944 - 1953:  The John Dash years - this time saw the return of peace, the death of a King and the crowning of a Queen.  Dash was noted for his versatility, vigorous personality and enthusiasm. He was an advocate for the development of character and school spirit also demonstrating a particular affection for rugby and the Pipe Band.

1954 - 1967:  Cecil Day presided as the Principal over these years. Day had attended Gonville Primary School, Victoria Avenue School and then Tech.  His family home was on Ingestre Street. During his Principalship there was a teaching, administrative and support staff of more than 90. Wanganui Boys’ College at that time was one of the largest entities in the city and as big as any secondary school elsewhere in New Zealand. The school was so successful in this era that the roll had reached nearly 1000 in 1958. 1957 was a significant year as it was the last year girls were able to enrol at the school until 1994. From 1961 the school only catered for boys.  It remained known as Wanganui Technical College until 1964, when it then became known as Wanganui Boys’ College.

1968 - 1983:  Colin Noall was acknowledged in the community as a ‘kind, wise, gentle and generous gentleman’. During his leadership the school undertook upgrading of the buildings (including the tower block), extending the grounds and expanding the apprentice and adult education classes into an independent community college (which later became the Wanganui arm of a larger tertiary institution based in Palmerston North).

1984 - 1999:  The Ian Hamilton years. He faced the challenge of falling school rolls and huge changes pending the management of education at a political level. His tenure saw the redevelopment of the hostel, the return to co-educational status, the development of a ‘School of Music’ which was established in 1994 and moved into  Purnell House, but later sold to the Polytechnic in 1998.  Academies in sport, engineering and motor mechanics were also established. By 1989 ‘Tomorrow’s Schools’ education sector reforms were in place. These years saw a boom in sport resulting from the expansion of the sporting facilities. In 1984 the new swimming pool was built and the gymnasium extended. The library was developing as high-tech learning centre with the installation of computer software and networking of the administration computers. 

1999 - 2007:  Brian Woolhouse - was hired for his professionalism, his ability to motivate others, his knowledge in systems and procedures and the energy to develop and establish a sound foundation for the new millennium. Graphics and design technology was becoming an important curriculum component. The school roll at this time was around 500 - 550, with 25 - 55 international students. His involvement in the wider Wanganui community included being a Justice of the Peace, a member of the Rotary Club and the Sister City Association, chairing the UCOL Wanganui Regional Advisory Committee, and becoming involved with the schools’ rugby administration. Brian continued his career in education in the Middle East.

2008 - Present - Peter Kaua. His family connections pointed him from Rotorua back to Whanganui. During his appointment at Whanganui City College Te Whare was erected in 2010 with its unique carvings telling the story of school’s history and pointing to the future. The school has reverted to horizontal tutor classes enabling students to develop their own cohorts, and the military academy was also established in 2010. His mantra for the school is to promote an atmosphere of whanau, a village concept where students, teachers and parents have to work together to break down negative perceptions.

This digital story collection has been curated and presented by Lynda Sisson, Librarian at Whanganui City College