| Notes |
- Mum (Dorothy nee Walkley) and Dad (William Ward) married in 1940 They ran a dairy farm in Kumeu and at a later stage they focused on market gardening and growing kiwi fruit.
I was their first child, born on 15 March 1944. Jocelyn was born 2 years after me followed by Gail 8 years later.
Jocelyn and I attended Huapai Primary School. In 1956 Mum and Dad sold their Kumeu farm and moved the family to a large block of land in Orewa.
In 1957 Jocelyn and I recommenced our schooling at Orewa District High School (as it was known then) and were foundation pupils. Dad subdivided and sold a large portion of the Orewa land and used the rest of it for market gardening. Much of our childhood at Orewa was spent helping Dad and Mum harvesting the fruit and vegetables and on many occasions accompanying Dad into the city to Turners and Growers with his produce.
During our time living at Orewa, Dad and Mum bought a little Island in Whangaruru Harbour (just south of the Bay of Islands) called Motukauri Island. I spent quite a few of my weekends accompanying Dad up to Motukauri Island. The other members of the family occasionally made the long journey to the Island but as I was living at home at the time I was the one who was available to keep Dad company on this journey. Dad eventually sold the Island in the late 1960s.
I left school in 1960 to attend the Auckland Business College then worked for Hemingways Correspondence School until 1970 at which stage I decided to travel with Mum and Dad on the 6 week boat trip (Ellinis) to England It was on the Ellinis that I met Vern who was travelling to England on a Scholarship.
We met up with Pat and Jocelyn who had travelled overland through Asia and Europe and Gail who flew over a few weeks later. I worked as a temp secretary while in England and Scotland. After much travelling and visiting relations Mum, Dad and Gail travelled the 6 week boat journey back to New Zealand at the end of 1970 while I stayed on for a few more weeks with Vern and we eventually flew back to New Zealand in early 1971.
Vern and I married on 17 April 1971 then moved to Wellington where he worked as a telecommunications engineer and I worked as a Secretary to the Ombudsman, Sir Guy Powell (first Ombudsman). Our first child, Russell, was born in Wellington on 19 July 1972.
In 1973 Vern was transferred back to the Auckland office. Raewyn was born on 30 December 1974. We built a house in Royal Road, Massey where we lived for over 20 years. Vern left Telecom in 1992 to join UNITEC.
Both our children attended Royal Road School and Massey High School. They both attended Auckland University, Russell obtaining a PhD in Electrical Engineering and Raewyn, First Class Honours Degree in Computer Science. Russell married Novey in 2002 in USA. They have 2 boys and now live in Santa Clara, south of San Francisco where Russell is employed by Google working on ?Street View?. He has just become a United States Citizen. Raewyn married Brendan in 2002. They have two girls. Raewyn is a stay at home mum while Brendan works as a plumber and has been in the same plumbing firm for a number of years. They own their own home in Royal Road, Massey.
We moved house to live in Sturm Avenue, Massey in 1998. We spend a lot of our spare time travelling to our beach house in Onemana on the Coromandel Peninsula.
Vern has now retired from UNITEC and has started a small web designing business.
I am still working at Kaurilands School as a teacher-aide assisting special needs children for nearly 20 years now.
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1944 - (81 years)