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On Wednesday June 7 2017, students from Berhampore and St Francis de Sales Schools planted 1500 trees on Council land just west of the Paekawakawa Reserve in Island Bay. Members of the Southern Bays Historical Society joined the children, a host of WCC Park Services Workers, Mayor Justin Lester, Peter Jackson from the Tenths Trust, Deputy-Mayor Paul Eagle, Councillors Iona Pannett and David Lee, members of the Paekawakawa Reserve Trust and other interested local people at the opening ceremony, and brought along a display board to give those participating an insight into the history of Arbor Day in the Southern Suburbs.
New Zealand's first Arbor day planting was on 3 July, 1890, at Greytown, in the Wairarapa, and the first official Wellington planting was in August 1892, when pohutukawa and Norfolk Pines were planted along Thorndon Esplanade. At that time Island Bay was part of the Borough of Melrose, and according to WCC minutes not only was Arbor Day, 4th August 1892, declared a public holiday for the planting of trees and shrubs but residents of Melrose were asked to observe this day by planting some flora. Arbor Day has therefore been observed in this area, albeit somewhat spasmodically, for 125 years.
Pre 1940 New Zealand was largely forested, and the first 50 years of European settlement saw most of these forests disappear in flames to create farmland. Arbor Day was used to make people more conscious of what they were losing, and to try to repair some of the damage. The stated aim of many tree planters in the past was to “beautify” the landscape, or provide plantations from which future wealth might be derived. Today we are much more likely to talk of conservation, and more care is taken to plant trees that would have grown and flourished here in pre-European times.
Local Arbor Day plantings are mentioned in old newspaper accounts:
Evening Post, 21 July 1908
The Parade at Island Bay is being inspected today ... with a view to having it improved by two rows of trees along its length.
Evening Post 20 July 1909
For tomorrow, Arbor Day, arrangements have been made for tree planting at the following places: ...Duppa Street Reserve, Island Bay; [renamed Wakefield Park in 1912]
Evening Post, 18 July 1910
Island Bay and the Terrace Schools have made application for plants.....
1910 WCC Minutes
Island Bay School was given 170 trees to plant on Arbor Day.
Evening Post 21 June 1912
The volunteers [to act with the Council and Mayor in making Arbor day a success this year] were the Island Bay Church,...
Evening Post 10 July 1913
Trees to be planted at Island Bay School on Arbor Day: 27 pittosporum, 12 coprosmas, 200 matipos, 1 ash, 2 pohutukawas, 2 silver matipo, 2 laurels, 1 Buddlea Golbosa, 3 cabbage trees, 6 veronicas, 1 laurestinus, 100 privets.
Evening Post 14 July 1913
Working “Bee” at Island Bay
On Saturday afternoon about 16 willing men gathered to assist the head-master (Mr C N Haslam), members of the school committee and the older boys at the school in planting the Island Bay School grounds....About 150 shrubs were planted on Saturday and 300 more will be put in on Wednesday next..... the shrubs and trees are being supplied by the City Corporation. The Mayor [Mr J P Luke] is to be asked to plant a commemorative tree when he visits the school on Arbor Day, about 3pm. The beautifying committee of the Island Bay Municipal Association is co-operating with the school committee in this work, and is also promoting a scheme for the planting of the zig-zag at Cam street, off Eden Street.
Evening Post 14 April 1916
Tree planting was attended to on Arbor Day [ie in 1915] – mostly hedge shrubs – which are doing well. [From an Island Bay School Committee Report.]
Evening Post 6 August 1935
Under the auspices of the Wellington Beautifying Association, the first planting is to take place tomorrow at Island Bay. The Society has arranged with the City Council to make use of an area sponsored by the Island Bay Electors' Association. The whole of the western side of the Parade, Island Bay, is to be planted with pohutukawas and ten children from the Island Bay School will each plant a tree, which will ultimately be marked with the name of the child. The cost of this first effort, £2 10s, has been donated by Miss Acheson, late infant mistress of the local school.
In 2017, the pohutukawa planting is still in living memory. Daphne Nicol, now living in Derwent Street, remembers planting a tree between the Presbyterian Church and Tamar street when she was seven years old. Her class was escorted by Miss Acheson, Island Bay School Infant Mistress, and “we all felt very important”. This would have been before the planting reported in 1935 as Miss Acheson is by then described as the ‘late’ infant mistress.
Evening Post August 7 1935 Caption: ARBOUR DAY IN WELLINGTON. Joyce Standen planting the first tree on the Parade, near Dee Street, Island Bay, near Dee Street. Inset, Mrs. Knox-Gilmer planting a tree at Wellington Girls College
Same one? Pohutukawa as seen from the Dee St intersection with the Parade today
Arbor Day at Berhampore School, 1916
Arbor Day at Berhampore School, 1916
Robin Hyde, pupil at Berhampore 1915-1918, describes in The Godwits Fly how “Mr Bellew”, the headmaster of their school, loved trees and tried to fight the emptiness of the raw clay around his newly built school by getting the children to dig their own little garden plots. He also taught them about the duty of preserving their heritage of native bush, which they never saw as it lay miles away over the hills. His favourite day in the year was Arbor Day, when he always managed to conjure up a Member of Parliament to talk to the children and to plant a native tree. The Top Girls, Standard Six, sang
'Bird of my native land, beautiful stranger Perched in the kauri tree, free from all danger.'
“Bird-of-my-native-land was supposed to be the tui, but none of the children had ever seen one, or a kauri tree either.”
Planting the Parade
Planting the Parade
Does anyone know who planted the ti kouka (cabbage trees) along the eastern side of The Parade around or by 1912? Were they an Arbor Day venture? Were they the result of the inspection mentioned in the Evening Post, 21 July 1908? In a 1926 photograph they were flourishing, but by 1930 they were gone.
Alexander Turnbull Library. New Zealand Forest Service 1950s
Planting Paekawakawa
Planting Paekawakawa
A photograph dated 1918 shows extensive erosion in the gully planted 99 years later for Arbor Day. When the school children participated in Arbor Day planting this year, therefore, they were observing a useful and time-honoured custom.
Photos: Éva Kaprinay
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