Leading from the front issuu

PAT: “A GRACIOUS PRETTY WOMAN
OUT OF MY LEAGUE”
When I met Catherine, she was a respected nursing sister
at Napier Hospital and she loved her vocation. She
had money saved to travel and if I hadn’t come along she
would have been on a ship to London, no doubt about
it. Falling in love scuppered her plans but she regretted
nothing, or so she told me! Luckily within herself, she
was content because for a good number of years, while
bringing up six children (six in eight years!), there wasn’t
much travel going on.
As well as the usual and persistent demands of running
a household of eight, Catherine had plenty going
on outside the home, most of it voluntary and caring for
others. She was creative too and “real” things appealed,
like spinning wool from the fleece and colouring it using
natural lichens which she collected from the trees at
Puketitiri to knit jumpers for everyone; and making useful,
beautiful, rustic pottery pieces for home.
She was one of the first environmentalists that I met.
She knew we weren’t looking after the planet. She knew
plastics were bad and would make kitchen rubbish tidies
from newspaper, much to the kids’ dismay. She knew
adding chemicals to food and household cleaning products
was crazy and dangerous for the health of the planet
and for people too. Her dish washing set up was sunlight
soap in a little metal shaker which we ran under hot water
to make it lather. Again, the kids weren't impressed.
All their friends’ mothers used lovely bright detergent
that came out of a plastic bottle but Catherine wouldn’t
have it in the house. She was staunch on these things
and she was right to be.
It must have been quite hard for her, with me out of the
house a lot doing my thing, but she created her own brand
of activism. When she came across an issue or an injustice
that resonated, she responded in her own way. When
the Hawke’s Bay Harbour Board started making moves to
dredge the Estuary in readiness for developing a Marina,
without having consent to do so, she swung into action.
My communist mate Fred Mace rang Catherine, told
her that dredging was happening near the Westshore
Hotel and asked her to head round to the site and witness
what was happening. When word spread of the
dredging there was an uproar, and the diggers and the
Harbour Board backed off.
In 1975 when five Australian journalists were killed in
East Timor, Catherine’s Amnesty International (AI), activities
ramped up. She embraced AI as a platform from
which she could make a difference as the issues in East
Timor really troubled her. She did all she could within her
Amnesty ‘cell’ to try and affect change. She felt driven
and vital when she was pursuing justice and that made
us all feel proud.
Catherine was a passionate and competent career
nurse who did her training at the Napier Hospital and
was the top student of her graduating year. She was incensed
and incredulous when it was proposed that the
town’s local hospital be shifted to Hastings. She wrote
many letters to the powers that were. She even wrote a
personal letter to Jim Bolger, whose parents lived across
the road from her brother in New Plymouth, expressing
dismay and bitter disappointment. When Napier Hospital
services were finally shifted to Hastings in 1995 following
about four years of strident public opposition, it
was probably a good thing Catherine wasn’t here by that
stage, having passed away the year before. She would
have felt heartbroken.
We both went on a week-long Treaty of Waitangi
Workshop together in 1973, which was a bold thing for
her to do. Afterwards she was grateful for the opportunity
and did some research herself, discovering that often the
Tangata Whenua didn’t give their land away, as many
commentators would have us believe. As well as giving
us more awareness around the Treaty, this shared experience
deepened our relationship.
We were married for 43 years, and had six children
— all interesting and loyal. Through it all, the usual challenges
of life, and the more unusual, Catherine was my
mate. We had a lot of fun together and I wouldn’t have
changed a thing.
Opposite: Catherine’s Apple Pie — a delicious and widely appreciated recipe. Above: Pat on honeymoon at the bach in Taupo;
Catherine ever the gracious hostess, a lot of people have mentioned this to us over the years.
Remembering Catherine 233