Riddell, Glenys Olwin Interview

This is Caroline [Lowry] interviewing Glenys Riddell on 4th November 2020. Good morning, Glenys, and thanks very much for contributing to our wonderful Hawke’s Bay Knowledge Bank. Looking forward to hearing your story.

Right, thank you, Caroline. Yes – so I was born in Hastings, St Aubyn Street Annexe, which was run by Sister Cooper, on the 1st of May 1939, so it was just at the beginning of the war which was pretty tough for parents in those days. I’ve one sibling who was three years older, and her memory does go back – she can actually walk into that building and show me which room I was in.

My parents were Ethel and Ezra Hawkins. I had maternal grandparents that [who] lived very close to us; they were wonderful. Paternal parents [grandparents] – their names [were] Mary and Joseph. So our faith was … brought up by both parents, so [I] went through Sunday School at Parkvale School and then on to big Sunday School at St Andrew’s, and Bible Class, so I had a lot of faith upbringing;  and still very involved with our church.

When I was about three I got sent to kindergarten [which] had just started in Hastings as a free kindergarten in those days.  So I was sent off on my little tricycle, met a couple of friends down the road, crossed over Heretaunga Street and up to the Drill Hall in Warren Street – all on our own. I didn’t [don’t] remember enjoying it much, because you had to sit on a mat, and [were] meant to have a sleep; and then you had to drink that awful milk. But never mind; when I got to five I was sent to Parkvale School, and that was quite good because my sister was already there, so it was easier. I was taken … my mother wouldn’t take me the first day because she knew we’d [she’d] have a performance from her little daughter, so I was sent with a neighbour; and that was fine. Parkvale … I do have very happy memories of seven years there, reasonable reports, really good teachers. One teacher who I remember very clearly was George Lowe, who climbed Everest with Edmund Hillary. I had him for two years; and we could sidetrack him on a Monday by asking where he’d tramped over the weekend. By then it was morning tea time so you’d lost half the day of school. But in Form 2 there was [were] fifty-two of us in 1952, so every three years we have a get-together of the remaining forty of us; and [there’s] a very close association with those class members.

I loved athletics at school, and that was about the time the Hastings skating rink opened, so my sister and I got very, very involved over there; three night[s] a week we would go over on our bikes to the skating rink and join in the activities over there. And then because my mother had been involved as a Guide – the first Guide company in Hawke’s Bay was at Havelock North – and she used to tell us of the camps she’d go to and the fun she’d had. So my sister had started Guides and so I was allowed to go to Brownies, which was held in St Barnabas’ Hall in what was then Selwood Road; now Windsor Avenue. So I had a great time at Brownies – can’t remember my leaders’ names. And then the St Barnabas’ Hall and church got burnt down, so we were moved to Windsor Park; there was a big old homestead there.

What sort of year would that’ve been?

That would’ve been … I would’ve gone to Guides when I was ten, so it was probably 1949, 1950. And so I went on to Guides, and at that stage our National Headquarters was in Hastings in Queen Street, upstairs, so it was handy for parents to go up and buy your uniform, belts and ties and things. I loved my Guide time and was made Patrol Leader. Then the leaders moved on, and so four of us were sent to Frimley Guides. So we used to bike down to the barn which was in Frimley Park in those days, and Kath Sterling was a great leader. I remember going to a camp in Gisborne on a train; I can’t remember much more about it except the last night we had to pull the tents down so we slept out in the open; and you remember that with the possums running around and that. And another trip I had was on the train to Wellington – the train started in Gisborne, picked up Guides all the way through, so there would’ve been hundreds of us, and it was celebrating I think, forty years of guiding in New Zealand.

Gosh, that must’ve started pretty early?

Yes. We started guiding in New Zealand before England, because Colonel Cosgrove, one of Baden-Powell’s friends, came out and started guiding in New Zealand before England started. So my friends over there are a bit jealous that we were ahead of them, but … they get over it. Yeah. [Chuckle] So we boarded at Mt Cook School, so each day we’d walk down to the Town Hall and practise our pageant, singing all the way and back again. I didn’t do my Queen’s Guide because I wanted to go into leadership, so a friend and I started Karamu Guides and met at the Mayfair School. We had a group of Guides there and that was about the time that biscuits first came into New Zealand, Guide biscuits.

So we’re still in the fifties, are we?

We’re still in the fifties, yes, yes. I remember helping the girls go round with them, and selling the biscuits. I used to love taking them up to Chambers Bush up the Peak; we’d walk all the way up with our haversack[s] on our back[s] and do our hiking, and cook a sausage on a stick, and a bit of damper, and …

Tell me, where were the biscuits made, do you remember, in those days?

Wherever Griffin’s factory was.

So it was in New Zealand?

It was in New Zealand, yes, yes, ‘cause no other country had them. Australia came in after us with biscuits and America with their cookies; they actually still do cookies over there. But they were a good fundraiser.

So I was still involved with guiding until I was ‘bout eighteen, and then boys came on the scene so it was a bit more interesting than [chuckle] looking after ten and eleven year olds. So when I left school I was still at Guides, and my first job was with Shattky and Webber, the optician. A Bible Class friend got me the job, so I was allowed to leave. My mother … I hadn’t mentioned that earlier … when I was three and my sister was six, our father went off to the war and decided when the war was … he had had enough. He wouldn’t come back to our family, so Mum was a solo mother and brought the two of us up with help from Grannies; and we had a great upbringing with her, she did so well – no social security in those days either.

No.

Nothing. She got there; so I was quite pleased when I was able to leave school, ‘cause I’d gone to high school as a twelve year old, to Hastings High School – co-ed [co-educational] in those days. I am going to backtrack there; so when I went to high school I did the Commercial course. Much as our teacher in Form 2 wanted us to take Professional and learn a language, that was not going to be my scene, so two of us argued profusely with our Form 2 teacher and decided that no, we would take Commercial. So during that time I worked in the school office in my fifth form year under Mr Tier, our headmaster, and learnt a lot in that office; and then would go back to other subjects as I was required. And that gave me a job in the holidays with Baird’s Drapers, because Mr Baird was very interested in Commercial girls, and learning Chamber of Commerce and passing exams. So I was sent upstairs, and the chute – I don’t know what they were called …

Oh, I can’t remember what those chutes were called … [pneumatic tubes]

No. But the sellers downstairs would put the person’s money in and then shoot it up, and then I’d do the change and shoot it back down. So that was a good holiday job through him.

So when I left school as I said, I went to Shattky and Webber, which originally was Webber and Shattky before that, down Russell Street; a little dark alleyway there. I was receptionist there. I hated Wednesdays because I used to have to assess the eighteen-year-olds coming in … I was still only probably sixteen … for their military training. They’d try and bribe you, saying, “Well you know, I really can’t see that colour.” So after eighteen months there I was not earning a great deal and so I got a job as a shorthand typist at [the] Transport Department. I think I’d been on two pounds five shillings. [£2/5/-] As a granddaughter said recently, “Was that an hour?” I said, “No, that was for forty hours.”

Tell me, did you learn shorthand at school?

Yes, yes. Yes, that was the main subject. Shorthand typing, bookkeeping, commercial practice – they were your main core subjects. The unfortunate thing – for School Certificate, your shorthand covered fifty percent and your typing covered fifty percent; and I didn’t quite make the shorthand, but that was okay – I still got through in life without that. Yeah.

So my life – four years at [the] Transport Department was actually … I loved it, I loved my boss, my Senior Traffic Officer; [a] lot of the time I was sent over to Napier to help the girls catch up over there, so instead of my bus fare one of the Traffic Officers would give me a ride and things, so I could save my bus fare. [Chuckle] Yeah.

And then 1962 I got married, so that was the end of my working and the end of Hastings because I married a farmer and moved to Onga Onga; raised five children there and of course naturally I wanted the children involved with Brownies and Guides and Cubs. So the oldest boy went off to Cubs with my help, but I wasn’t that happy taking boys. And then the oldest girl – I put her name down for Brownies ‘cause there was always a waiting list – and got involved straight away, with her.

So back into it, as it were?

Back into it, yes … helped; and then when she was ten, ‘cause naturally they didn’t have a Guide leader, so I went into Guides. But I had a lovely unit there, got very involved with guiding, national training, so I was never home.

What were the main differences between when you were there in the fifties, and then the sixties?

I don’t know; the uniform was still very similar, so uniform was still, you know, you had to be efficient where you had the right way, and your badges all had to be right. ‘Cause now you can get away with just wearing a pair of shorts and a sash with no uni[form], ‘cause the uniform’s really gone now.

And interestingly, the uniforms in those days, you were still doing your tramps and doing your camps and things, but the uniforms were not necessarily … [chuckle]

No. No, we had camp uniforms which were more casual so the girls could at least wear shorts and things, so it wasn’t as [speaking together] …

In the sixties you had changed that?

Yes. Yes, it just slightly got a wee bit relaxed, yes. And I remember probably at the end of taking my Guides I used to say, “Well, you don’t need to wear your beret today”, unless it was something official. But yeah, it was a wee bit more relaxed. And then after that OSH [Occupational Safety & Health] came in, so it got back [to] being so strict. I mean I could have my girls swimming in our pool after Guides, and just say, “Well you’re my visitors now you’re swimming”; but you couldn’t do that now, you’d probably need six people to look after one child.

Yeah, so I did that; I got very involved at national level doing national trainings and ran a lot of camps … camps for Hawke’s Bay girls; so we’d have two fifty [two hundred and fifty] girls on our property, and camped with no buildings; men would cart the water for us, and the cooks – the QMs [quartermasters] – cooked on outdoor fires. And then we’d got into Jamborees which were at New Zealand and international level, and the one that we held at Tikokino, we had three thousand people onsite there, just on a paddock. The only building we brought in was for national office to run their computers out of. And I was leader in charge of that, so that was fun. But up ‘til then when I went to a Jamboree I used to … QM I loved; I had a good team of women with me and we loved QM-ing – you’d cook in one marquee for three-fifty [three hundred and fifty] kids, and … yeah, it was good. So guiding has been really special.

And that would have been the time when there were the most people doing guiding.

Yes. That’s right.

So you were actually at the pinnacle if you like, of guiding.

Yes, that’s right. Yes. That’s right, yes. Yes, the numbers were really high then. There was usually a waiting list. When I took Guides at Onga [Onga Onga] I would try and limit my number at [to] eighteen, because I had a daughter who was in leadership with me; but to give them the quality of guiding you didn’t need any more than that. But I was very lucky, ‘cause I fed them in from Wakarara School, Springhill School, Onga School and Sherwood School, so for the first quarter of an hour when these girls arrived they had to catch up on what they’d been doing for the … [chuckle] you know, for the last week. They were lovely kids, you know, ten year olds to fourteen, before they went to boarding school. They were lovely girls.

And tell me, with the big Jamborees, where would all the food come from?

At Tikokino, our person in charge of that got it all coming from … all local; Waipawa and Waipukurau were very good. But you know, you were looking at a town bigger than Waipawa, say, [chuckle] to come on to one paddock. And the programme … the girls would go off and do service, you know, like paint the football gates at Matthew’s Estate; they had a day outing in Hastings and Napier, and so they were offsite some of the time. In Rotorua, Gilmour’s were the ones who would bring the food out to us there.

They’re still going – Gilmour’s – aren’t they?

Yes, they are. Yes, yes.

So and then to cap off my service I was very lucky to be awarded a Hastings City Council Civic Award, which was very exciting. I knew nothing about it; but you don’t do it for the accolades, you do it because you’re getting a lot out of it. Hopefully you’re putting something back in that you’ve enjoyed over the years. And … ‘cause I got involved [in] Women’s Institute; decided I’d take up indoor bowls; we had a big community in Onga Onga. So once I get involved in something I get involved. [Chuckle] And then I went to outdoor bowls which I’m still very involved in as a [an] umpire and coach – I love coaching the new ones coming in. And then my latest one is … oh, I’m still very involved with my church … Probus, which stands for retired people; yeah. So of course, two years in that and I’m president and out again. I enjoy that, we have lots of fun with …

And lots of other guest speakers, and ..?

Yes. Yes, I’m involved; I’m the one that [who] gets the guest speakers, and do [does] the mystery bus trips, so my two jobs are fairly big there. And then I’m still involved with guiding because after you finish leadership you can go into Trefoil Guild. So I’ve got a lovely group of twenty ladies, Havelock North Trefoil Guild, and we meet once a month. This month we’re going to [the] Havelock North Club for a lunch and inviting the Napier ladies over to join us. We had a speaker last month – my niece spoke on Great Ormond Street Hospital where she’d worked. Oh, we went to the library and listened to Veronica speaking and that was interesting. So yes; so I’m still involved with the community there.

What lovely mystery trips have you been on with Probus?

Oh, right – we’ve done Norsewood. So because I know everybody at bowling clubs and the bus people do like their morning tea, we stopped at Waipawa Bowling Club and had morning tea. And then we went to Norsewood School and the children entertained us with their Norwegian heritage; and down to the old pub for lunch, and then over to the factory. So you divide into four, because they’ve got a lovely eel farm there now, the carpenter’s workshop, the shop and the factory itself.

Another time I took them over to Napier to the Aquarium; over the road to what was Cobb & Co for lunch … can’t remember what it’s called now; and then we went to Flaxmere. And the majority had never been onto a marae, so we did the Te Aranga Marae and then the children from Kimi Ora School came over and entertained us, so that was a lovely time. We did notice the children had lovely uniforms and sunhats, so I queried whether they had woolly hats [chuckle] having been involved with tramping; you know, you must wear a hat. So I got the Probus girls knitting, and we delivered a hundred and eighty beanies to the children out there.

Another time we went to Dunedin, [Dannevirke] so morning tea was [at the] Waipukurau Bowling Club that time; to the museum at Dannevirke, a gallery of history … fabulous museum; up to the RSA [Returned & Services Association] for lunch and then down to Fantasy Cave.

Another time I took them somewhere for morning tea, and then out to Severinsen’s Museum at Ashley Clinton. The boy Severinsen inherited Keith Severinsen’s Museum. And then after that you go outside, and he’s made all the old-fashioned shooting things; so there’s targets going in directions and things.

And what sort of museum is it?

The deer and all the trophies that Keith brought back from various countries – it’s amazing, it really is.

Wow … how long’s that been going on, that museum?

Oh, well I used to take my Guides when he originally was at the back of Ashley Clinton; way back at Makaretu I think he was originally, and then the son has moved a wee bit closer. And then we went around to A’Deane’s Bush by Sherwood School for [a] picnic lunch; and then we went down Blackburn Road, and the Bibby family have got a family church there. So having had the Bibby children in Guides and know[ing] the family, we called in there; and it’s a lovely church from the four Bibby families. Then we drove around Lookout Road, Hinerua, because that was our old haunting ground, and back [via] Highway 50.

I can’t tell you about the next one I’ve got planned because it hasn’t eventuated ‘cause of Covid, but it’s …

Well, it’s a mystery, isn’t it? [Chuckle]

It’s a mystery, yes – and you might tell the story. It’s in the pipeline. Then September when Covid came again, I had to knock out … but I’d planned one and they knew about this; so we were going over to RSA in Napier for lunch and then on the Art Deco train that’s not a train; but that’s on hold too. Yeah. I’ll do the other mystery one first, seeing that was just put on hold.

And tell me, have any of your children followed up with the Guides?

Yes, the three – Bronwyn, Nicola and Fiona – all went through their Chief Commissioner badge which was the highest one then; and the two oldest ones, Bronwyn and Nicola, went through into Rangers and went to Government House for their Queen’s Guide. Bronwyn, the oldest, came into leadership with me, and Nicola went and helped with Brownies. Fiona went to Rangers for a wee while but she did Bronze Duke of Edinburgh at Central Hawke’s Bay College. But the girls all did their teachers’ and judges’ exams through highland dancing, through Julie Appleton-Seymour in Waipawa. So we were fairly involved, with the boys playing cricket and rugby; and Michael went off to Hereworth. So I had one at kindy and playcentre and primary school and Hereworth. Yeah. [Chuckle] We were on the road a lot.

So that’s just piqued my interest … highland dancing?

Yes … forgotten about that. Yes.

In the sixties when I was a child, at the Show that was one of my favourite things to watch.

Yes. Yes. Oh, you probably watched the girls, yes, ‘cause Bronwyn was born in ‘64 and she started when she was five. Yes, so [from] 1970 on we were very involved with three age groups.

I wonder if it still goes today, do you think?

Yes, we’ve got a granddaughter that’s [who’s] still doing it; she’s just turned seventeen. So she’s still doing it. Our oldest granddaughter went through Brownies and Guides in Dannevirke, and our grandson did his Queen’s Scout. But at the moment guiding is not strong.

Why do you think that is, Glenys?

The fees are very expensive. They say that they can’t get the leaders ‘cause everybody works; but of course we worked in those days but you fitted it in. I suppose because both parents are working they might have that excuse. And now we’re on to seven days a week retail, and activities going [on]. So you know, we’re lucky, we’re still involved with Trefoil and can still help out where we can; but there’s not many units around that we can help so we just do community work and help. Our project next month is bagging up sweets for the Santa, Kevin Watkins, that [who] drives around with the Santa sleigh; so we bag up about five or six hundred bags of lollies for him. And then we do a lot of knitting for things. Yes – so we’ll wait for the next generation, and see whether they come on to …

So Glenys, let’s talk a little bit about your experience living on the farm in Onga Onga; and you know, a little bit more about your earlier life.

Right. I’ll sidetrack there because my grandparents … my mother’s side … they worked for the Chambers on Tauroa Station. So the five children, my mother being the oldest, were born on Tauroa Station; so they could tell you many a story about getting lost around Te Mata Peak, and just the five little children wandering off – with no houses up there or anything, and you know, nearly drowning one child – and their activities up there until my granddad bought a wee farm down the end of St Andrew’s Road. So my grandparents were still there as we were brought up. It was a shingle road; so my mother rode a bike and had me on the back seat and my sister on the seat, and away she’d go; until one day she got home … and my only doll was a rag doll called Polly … when she got home I’d gone to sleep and Polly wasn’t there. So she dumped us at the neighbour’s, went off back down and found Polly much to my relief, and probably to Mum’s relief too. [Chuckle] So we knew all about farming, so when my sister got to twenty-one, engaged and married a farmer, she moved on to a farm; so I thought, ‘Oh well, I’d better start looking at young farmers too.’ [Chuckles] So … yeah, found a nice one and moved to Onga Onga – three [hundred and] fifty acres, which wasn’t huge. Went through several droughts but managed to raise five children there. And they learnt to help out, because it was fairly busy.

What sort of farm was it Glenys?

We started off with mainly sheep, and then Jim went into full beef. And we were leasing his uncle’s property at Mt Herbert at Waipukurau, so it was early starts. Some days when we were working over there we’d both leave at five o’clock; the children were quite capable of getting themselves to different school buses and we’d go over there and work. And when the last child at seventeen got herself an apprenticeship, hairdressing, that was the time we decided that we would move on and bought eleven hundred acres at Te Onepu, which was off the Raukawa Road, Te Onepu, between Raukawa and Argyll. So we did still have sheep, but mainly bull beef then.

But going back to Onga Onga, yes, we were serviced by Waipawa and Waipukurau. Our trips into Waipawa was [were] mainly for the highland dancing and the boys’ rugby, ‘cause one got into Ross Shield, so that was very demanding, but great for him.

How far out of town were you?

We were about thirty-five minutes on the Wakarara Road; we were very close to the Springhill School. And so every Monday Hawke’s Bay Farmers Waipukurau would ring me for your [my] order so you’d [I’d] put in your small order … your [my] bag of sugar and your [my] bag of flour and bits … and then they’d get the farm order; arrive on Tuesday morning with the delivery; drop the farm stuff at the wool shed; come over with mine. And he was very good, ‘cause I was usually bathing a baby by then, so he’d put the frozen stuff in the freezer. You didn’t get much, it was just the bare [essentials] …

Yes, ‘cause I suppose you were self-sufficient?

We were self sufficient. We’d been brought up being self-sufficient; Mum had to be self sufficient. If you didn’t grow it, you didn’t eat. So you grew it, and you had chooks and things, so yeah, you were self sufficient. I mean, we could use a little bit of land and grow enough peas and freeze them for the year, and [the] same with the gooseberries and blackcurrants and all those things … you had it all.

So it was mainly your dry goods – your flour, your sugar, that sort of thing?

Yes. Yeah. And you had those pull-out bins for those things.

And what about milk – did you have a milking cow?

We had a cow, yes. Well, we started off with one cow and then it got up to four or five; and one of the girls learnt how to milk just in case something happened. And we’d make our own butter … made enough butter for the year; freeze it, beautiful butter. The cream was there, which was good.

What more could you want?

Yes, you had your own meat; reject lambs – we’d come through to Whakatu, pick up the reject lambs and go home with all the fruit and meat in the vehicle and throw the kids in, and [chuckle] … yeah.

And what school did your children go to?

[Cough] The children went to Springhill School which was a little country school; two teachers. And the oldest, Michael, stayed there ‘til he was nine and then we sent him to Hereworth – his choice; his cousin was there and he thought he’d go, so he loved it. And the three girls and the other boy – he was very, very shy; he didn’t want to go to Hereworth so he stayed, but got into Ross Shield. And then Michael came back from Hereworth because we had a college bus put on on our corner, so they only had to bike a mile on shingle and catch the bus. So the five of them all went right through Central Hawke’s Bay College and did very well; there was everything going for them there, the subjects they wanted, the Duke of Edinburgh scheme was going, and they were happy.

So how many kids would there’ve been in the school in the seventies?

At Springhill there was about sixty, so it was quite big in those days ‘cause when the oldest went off there was [were] five went into school as five-year-olds that year, which was quite a lot, so yeah, they had plenty of mates.

And then Central?

Central I think there was about seven hundred …

Wow!

… at the College then, yes. But we weren’t far away from Wakarara School or Onga Onga School, so there was [were] always inter-school things happening; and if you didn’t have enough for a netball team well you borrowed somebody from another local primary school. Then we had the Vet Club in Waipukurau, so that was handy for that; and your other stores so when I took the girls into dancing I could whip into Waipawa Co-Op [Cooperative] I think it was called in those days, and then New World and then Four Square – they seem to change their names. And then when we moved to Te Onepu I was working – I had a job at a bookshop in Waipukurau to get the younger girl into her apprenticeship – so when we moved to Te Onepu I kept that job on for a while so I could get the stuff … [phone rings]

So Glenys, getting back to talking a little bit about your growing up in Hastings.

Right. One of my memories is our maternal grandmother was really good to us ‘cause Mum was quite busy working from home – I’ll come back to that, what she did to get some income. And so in the holidays my Granny would pick my sister and I up, and we’d walk up to Cornwall Park and play on the swings or we’d go to Nelson Park, which isn’t there any more, and sit for hours and watch the marching girls. I would’ve loved to’ve been a marching girl, but at least we got to watch them. And then in the January holidays Windsor Park was full of campers, and they put shows on each night; so there was either a movie or a talent quest or a concert. So we’d go round to Granny’s – she was only three blocks away – and pick her up, take her to the concert and then afterwards she’d return us little girls home again. So that was holidays.

And then when the Blossom Festival started by Greater Hastings in the September, each household was given a programme with a lucky number on it. So we’d gather up some neighbours’ numbers for them, and Granny used to love coming up with us; so we’d go up one side of the street and down the other looking for our lucky numbers, and to this day we never ever found one. The retailers changed the numbers each day so you had to go each day, so Granny would come with us. And then they had Blossom concert, and if you didn’t get in the queue to get your tickets you ended up in the gods. I don’t think they call it the gods any more – I think it’s the upper dress circle – something more posh. But we’d queue for hours trying to get a ticket to the Blossom concert.

And was that at the Muni..? [Speaking together]

That was at the Municipal Theatre in those days, yes, yes. You’d have the two Jacks doing a display, and then the little Sparks girls doing their highland and tap and things. Then we’d go to Greater Hastings’ office and get … somebody would cut out the circles of the pink blossom paper, and we’d take it home … just us two girls … and we’d twist and put them into a box, and then take them back the next day and get some more; so we enjoyed doing that.

Getting back to Mum – she worked for Hunt’s; Westerman’s; and there was another draper. So the boy after school would bring down the sewing for her; so in those days the nappies would come in one big roll of material. She’d rip it off and then she would sew them. And that’s how we learnt to sew straight, edging the nappies. And the bibs were the same … bias binding and the edging. And then the frilly curtains … she used to have to make the frill and put those on. And then the worst job was the holland blinds, and especially if people wanted a scalloped edge. We used to have to stand and help her guide it through the old treadle showing machine. So that machine went late at night; and then what she’d done … the boy would come the next day, bring in the orders and then take it away, so it was something she was able to do from home and get some income coming in.

And I do remember her going off to the IMD [B] which was the Internal Marketing Board which is now where the … oh, I don’t know who’s there now; it was [the] Apple & Pear Board, it’s probably Turner[s] & Grower[s]. And they used to box up the cabbages and cauliflowers to send over to the soldiers. And I remember my Granny coming round on [loud noise] Saturdays and they’d make fruit cakes and sew them into the old flour bags, and they went over to the soldiers somewhere too. Another awful thing they used to do … well the other things weren’t awful, they were good … was they made their own soap with caustic soda and something else; fat. Revolting smell, but you needed the soap to put in your copper on a Saturday and in your shaker for your dishes. So – that was way back in the 1940s; I’m really [chuckle] going back now.

So you remember them sending cabbages, cauliflower, cake, and anything …

And socks.

To the soldiers?

Yes. You couldn’t send them to your own relatives; ‘cause I did have an uncle that went over to Crete and got killed there and is buried in Greece, so I’ve managed to see his headstone. Yeah.

And why weren’t you allowed to send them to relatives?

Oh, I think they just went off from New Zealand general[ly] to wherever …

Oh, I see what you mean, yep.

… they could. Yep.

That’s incredible.

So Heretaunga Street … Mum used to take us up sometimes on a Friday night, but it was probably quite an effort for her because she couldn’t have two little girls walking past the six o’clock swill coming out.

Of course.

There was always a pub … there, there, there … so you’d cross over to miss the Albert, and then you’d cross over to miss the Pacific; cross over to miss the Hastings. [Chuckles] But Friday night up town was special; and Christmas Eve and New Year’s Eve, the whole main street was closed to traffic. So you had hooters and balloons and streamers and … who cleaned up the street the next day? But that was Christmas and New Year’s Eve.

[Speaking together] Fantastic! And was there such a thing as late-night shopping in Hastings?

Yes, nine o’clock.

On a Friday?

Friday night, nine o’clock, yes.

Wow!

When you got a bit older you’d meet a girlfriend; usually Westerman’s was the meeting place, and you had to wait for the train to go through ‘cause it always went through at seven o’clock. No, all the shops were open ‘til nine, ‘cause there was no Saturday or Sunday.

And do you remember there being any restaurants or any sort of ..?

There was the Farmers’ tearooms, and that was where we had our wedding. And there was the Pasadeno and the Rialto. One was above where Blackmore’s were, and one was opposite where Hutchinson’s are now, upstairs. There was your fish and chip shop which had a steak bar beside it; later on there was Adams Bruce tearooms. Oh, and then as we got into late teens the Intermezzo started up by the Regent Theatre … or West End; it changed its name to be a bit posher. And the Windmill, opposite the hospital when the Dutch arrived out in New Zealand they opened, ‘cause they ran the tearooms too. Every block seemed to have a fish and chip shop, and a butcher, and a greengrocer; and then I think – when I did a talk at Probus I think there was [were] probably nine places a woman could go and buy material at. Now we’ve got one … Spotlight. Yeah.

Interesting isn’t it?

Isn’t it? Yes, just how life’s changed.

And of course everything is so much, you know, cheaper now, so people don’t tend to sew.

Oh no. No. No, in those days you had to do all your own sewing. Those shirts with the inset sleeves and collars and buttonholes; and pyjamas and …

Well look, that’s been fascinating, Glenys, thank you very much;  and we’ll look forward to listening to you on the Hawke’s Bay Knowledge Bank site.

Oh, right. [Chuckle]

Thank you.