Invercargill
The weather continued to be brilliant. Cold nights, but lovely warm, sunny days. It's quite dark in the mornings so we are tending to sleep in a bit.
Today we set out for Invercargill after breakfast - about 61 kms away. The plan was to visit the museum at Southland Boys' High School, then find Mitchell St. where Dad was born. We were pleased to find a city map on the outskirts of the city, as we had no address for the school.
We were made to feel welcome at the school. The office lady gave us the key to the museum and pointed us in the right direction.
This museum is well worth a visit. It had booths with various themes: staff, sports' teams, historic buildings, roll of honour, dux board, scholarship board etc etc. There were old photographs,old documents and artifacs.
We found my grandfather's name on the dux and scholarship boards. (Matthew Alexander) His younger brother William featured too, on the scholarship board. Both were also involved in cricket, rugby and soccer.
Having just travelled 61 kms from Gore where the family lived, we realised that Matt and William must have lived away from home to attend highschool. (1903 - 1908)
We found this info and painting about a boarding facility that was built about that time. Maybe they lived there.
After an hour or so of looking around we drove to Queen's Park to have lunch.
The next place to find was the street where Dad was born. (After marrying, Matt returned to Southland to teach; first of all at Gore High School as 'Commercial Master' 1914-1916, then as a science and mathematics master 1916-1923.)
Kath, Dorothy and Dad were all born while they lived at Mitchell St. (1916, 1917, and 1920 respectively.)
There were quite a few old houses in Mitchell St so we took photos, of possibilities hoping to identify it at a later date.
1 comment:
I have been hunting for a list of duxes for SBHS and came across this post! Found my father's name which is very cool. Thank-you :)
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