FOLLOWING IN family footsteps

In the April 2018 issue of Dio Today, we profiled the Phillips family and their 60-plus years of combined Dio schooling. Now we’ve discovered three more fifth-generation Diocesan families. Deirdre Coleman shares some of their school-day recollections.

Left: Lunchtime sunbathing - a favourite summertime activity for generations of Dio girls.

Below left: Patricia Rogerson’s 1938 school testimonial letter from headmistress Eliza Edwards.

Below: Mabel and Harry Rogerson (seated) with their daughters (L to R) Patricia, Glenn, Nancy, Mary and Lesley.

difficult define. from May 1904 to May 1905. ‘Early pupils’ are generally considered those who attended in Dio’s first decade as a school.

A crucial decision

Dio alumna and parent Olivia Kirkpatrick (PY2000) may well have the School’s largest family of past and present students. Her extended family tree features 40-plus Dio alumnae or current students from both her mother’s and father’s sides, as well as her mother-in-law.

Had it not been for the decision of Olivia’s great grandfather, Harry Rogerson, it might well have been St Cuthbert’s laying claim to this extensive family of students. Harry and his wife Mabel sent the eldest of their five girls, Nancy, to St Cuthbert’s (Mabel’s former school). Nancy was bright but young for her year, and St Cuth’s wanted to hold her back. Less than impressed, Harry withdrew Nancy, announcing that he would be sending her and his four other daughters to Diocesan. Nancy’s siblings Mary Laurie, Lesley Truscott, Patricia Hemus and Glenn Shaw (mother of past Diocesan Old Girls’ League president Georgina Shaw) went on to have daughters, or daughters-in-law, who attended Dio, followed by their own daughters and granddaughters.

The first generation in her family to attend Dio, Olivia tells us, was her great aunt Kathleen (Kitty) Ryder (Rogerson). Kitty was the above-mentioned Harry’s half-sister. She was a pupil at Dio for the 1916 school year and was followed by her daughter Janet Ryder (PY1952),

HEMUS/KIRKPATRICK FAMILY TREE

Kathleen (Kitty) Ryder (Rogers)1916

Janet Romanes PY1952

Bridget Greensill PY1984

Kitty Greensill PY2018 her granddaughter Bridget Romanes (PY1984) and her great granddaughter Kitty Greensill (PY2018).

While most of Olivia’s Dio family are from her dad’s side, her mum, Pene Hemus (Jonas) was a first-generation Dio student. She attended with her sister Fiona, and cousins Pip and Leonie Willis, whose daughters are also Dio alumnae.

Now, the fifth generation, Olivia’s daughters Maggie and Florence are at Dio in Years 7 and 5 respectively and may hopefully be joined by their younger cousins Honor and Olive.

“There’s such a lovely sense of tradition associated with Dio for our family,” says Olivia. “Mum and Dad got married at Dio and my eldest daughter was christened there.”

Games beneath the Norfolk pines

Sarah Shorter (1977–1989) has seen both her daughters Sophie (PY2021) and Jessica (PY2019) progress through the Senior School and excel in the pool at swimming and water polo. Her nieces Jaime and Lauren are former Dio girls too. It was Sarah’s great grandmother Jessie Douglas (1905) who was the first of five generations of Dio girls.

Jessie’s daughter-in-law Elsie Shorter (Tattley) attended Dio (1923–1930) with her sister Cecilie, followed by Elsie’s daughter-in-law Jenneymae Shorter (Salter, 1956–1964).

Jenneymae says that class captains wore a star like a sheriff on their uniforms and posture badges were given out for standing straight. She remembers making houses under the Norfolk pines, the same trees that her daughter Sarah would eventually play under when she went to Dio as a fourthgeneration student.

“I started in Lower Preps (now called Year 1) and left partway through 7th Form,” says Sarah. “Dawn Jones was headmistress that entire time. Mrs Ryde was my art teacher and she taught Jess and Sophie. I had Mrs Corlett as my PE teacher. She won gold in the long jump at the 1952 Olympics.”

“The two swimming pools were outdoors on the same site as the current Aquatic Centre. There were ham-andcoleslaw rolls from the tuck shop and we only had four houses.”

Shorter family (L to R) Sarah Shorter, Jenneymae Shorter (Salter) and Jessica Shorter-Robinson; (inset) Sophie Shorter-Robinson who is studying in the USA.

Shorter Family

Jessie Douglas 1907

Elsie Shorter (Tattley) 1930

Eric Shorter

Paul Shorter Jenneymae Shorter (Salter) PY1964

Sarah Shorter PY1989

Jessica Shorter-Robinson PY2019

Sophie Shorter-Robinson PY2021

Phillips Family

Annie Dunn (Gibbons) 1909-1910

Moira Jean Phillips (Dunn) 1940-1951

Julie Wood (Phillips) PY1975

Constance Phillips (Craig) 1904-1908

Paul Phillips

Patricia Lowther (Phillips) PY1976

Emma Dalton (Lowther) PY2000

Damp togs, climbing ropes and skits for Miss Shrewsbury

Patricia (Trish) Lowther (Phillips) and Julie Wood (Phillips) attended Dio during the ’60s and ’70s. The sisters have early Dio student family members on both their mother’s and father’s sides, and our April 2018 article recounts the Dio recollections of their mother Moira. Trish recalls some school-day memories of her own that might sound familiar.

“In summer, my favourite past-time was swimming at lunchtimes in the outdoor pool and hanging our togs on the lines hoping for a dry pair for PE later in the day. We’d sunbathe with coconut oil slathered on our legs and uniforms folded up high enough to prevent a tan line. I remember an occasional frown from a passing teacher.

“Our blue woollen hats spent a lot of time folded up in our bags and made for some very interestingly shaped heads when donned to go home. There was detention at the gate if you didn’t have it on.”

Blessed with lifelong friends, Julie treasures her Dio years. “I’m most proud of the fact that my grandmothers, Connie and Dorothy, my mother Moira Jean, my sister Trish, her daughter

Emma and now her daughters Isabella and Scarlet are all Dio girls,” she says. “We’ve all loved being girls of ‘the DHS’. The girls today are insanely fortunate to have the level of facilities, breadth of curriculum, standards of teaching and pastoral direction that Dio offers now.”

Julie remembers the farewell concert the Junior School put on for Miss Shrewsbury. “Each year performed a skit, and we did drawings that went into a big book for her – all terribly naive and unprofessional compared with today’s events.

“The intermediate school was a long block of four classrooms where the allweather hockey field is now. There was still an orchard and garden behind Miss Robertson’s house across the path from the music block. I had piano lessons there with Miss Dowding and Miss Hutton ruled the music world.

“We played tennis on School House lawn and the old gymnasium had a trampoline, climbing ropes, leather-topped vaulting boxes, and wooden balancing beams. Hockey, athletics and cricket were held on the lawn by Dilworth.”

Fond memories of Miss Jensen

For Joanna West (Kingston, PY1963), attending Dio meant following in the footsteps of her mother Patricia Kingston (Duthie, PY1939), her aunts Joan and Pamela, and her great aunt Joyce Duthie (1909–1915).

Joyce won the divinity prize at Dio and received a book embossed with the Diocesan crest that the family donated to the Archive.

“After school, Joyce remained a spinster and lived in Upper Hutt,”

West Family

Joyce Duthie

1909-1915 Son

Pamela Holland (Duthie) PY1937

Patricia Kingston (Duthie) PY1939

Joanna West (Kingston) PY1963

Hilary West PY1993

Naomi Reeve

Joan Naismith (Duthie) PY1936 recalls Joanna. “She was always rather bossy, but she was a beautiful knitter and would make clothes for my doll.”

Of her mother and aunts, Joanna says: “Mum was very sporty and led the choir. She was beautiful and had a lovely voice. Her two sisters were much more academic. Joan went to Auckland University at 16 and did a Bachelor of Music.”

Joanna speaks fondly of Miss Jensen, a much-loved history, Latin and English teacher from 1937 to 1964.

“She had a lifelong friendship with our family. Miss Jensen was Mum’s 5th Form teacher, and her ambition was to teach me also, but we moved to Dunedin when I was 12. She used to holiday with us at Ta¯wharanui and would do side stroke in the surf in her green woollen bathing suit. She sewed white lace across the top of it to make it more glamorous. Her fiancé died in the war, and she lived into her 90s but never married. Our bach, Possum Cottage, had no running water or showers and only two bedrooms so the whole family had to sleep in one bedroom so Miss Jensen could have the other.

“In the year that I would have left Dio (1963) if I’d stayed, she gave me a copy of the book she’d given her whole graduating class. It was The 10 Commandments. I still have it.”

Patricia died before Joanna’s daughter, Hilary, started at Dio so never got to see her granddaughter attend. Now, Mimi (Naomi) Reeve, Hilary’s daughter is in Year 3.

“Mimi thrived from the moment she started at Dio,” says Joanna. “She knows she’s a fifth-generation girl but doesn’t really understand yet what that means.”

Painting a complete picture of the multi-generation families who have attended Dio is no easy task. Memories fade, names and events are forgotten, and stories get lost as senior generations pass away. What’s more, with female students, matching maiden and married names to school records and connecting different branches of family trees can be problematic. In some cases, we’ve included alumnae’s attendance dates, elsewhere we refer to their peer year (PY). See page 80 for an explanation of this.

If you know of any any fourth or fifth-generation Dio families, please contact Abby McWilliam in the Diocesan Development Office: amcwilliam@diocesan.school.nz