The story behind the green sign

Caitlin has entered the Jack T Diamond essay competition. It is a historical research task aiming to increase knowledge of West Auckland. She chose to look at the PIC Camp which is just round the corner from our house.

Here is her essay:


The Story Behind the Green Sign.

Have you ever wandered past that old, worn, green sign? That old worn green sign with the white lettering? The white lettering P.I.C.? I know you have, but the question is have you looked behind the sign and seen all the life gone by? Possibly a giggling Brownie or Scout? Have you heard the music, the noise, the laughter, the happiness, or to you, is it just a group of run down old buildings known as the P.I.C. Camp?

I live just around the corner from the P.I.C.Camp and drive past to school everyday. I have always wondered what stories its withered walls could tell. It was in the kitchen of a house in Parau that the story began to unfold before me. It was talking to Don and Val Rogerson, longstanding residents of Parau, who have seen many changes over the years and were involved in many of them. It was these two who enlightened me to the wonders of the P.I.C. Camp.

It is hard to believe that those once active fields used to just be private land. The land has been owned by five families, amongst them the Jowetts, Mr Dean (from the gardening programme) and Mr McMinoman. Only McMinoman actually lived there. Imagine one small bach on such beautiful, undeveloped land. The five titles covering the whole piece of land have never been combined into one. Perhaps, in the years to come, five families could once again take up ownership and call this part of Parau home.

From Mr McMinoman, the land passed into the hands of the St. John’s Ambulance Brigade. There were heated meetings of the Residents and Ratepayers Association, held in the Rogerson’s house, where many residents were worried about wild children running around, affecting property values in the area. Only three people were in favour, including Don and Val. Don stood up and said ‘Has anyone in this room ever been to a St. John’s Brigade camp?’ When they said no, he said, “Well, I have and they are run properly!” Over the next twelve months the residents watched as the camp took shape, even poring over a model in Don’s living room.

Many promises were made about the camp. They promised to put in a local sewerage treatment plant, which could have been hooked up to many neighbouring houses. This did not come to pass and the ‘biggest septic tank they could find’ was ‘completely useless’. Promises were also made about different clubs and groups using the hall. A youth club was held there, for free, for a few weeks but after a while, the camp demanded £30 a week and the youth club finished. £30 was a lot of money then. “This is St. John’s supposedly being a youth oriented group,” recalls Don.

Youth oriented it may be but there were still some rowdy kids. Val has one memory of walking to her friends, when she met a couple of teenage girls walking in the middle of the road. She remembers saying ‘ you don’t walk in the middle. You’ll get knocked down’ to which they replied ‘Well we belong to the St. John’s Ambulance!’ As Val says, ‘that’s not much good if you are dead!’

Delinquents. That was another word that worried the residents and ratepayers. When a group of ‘glue sniffers’ arrived in the area, Don immediately rang the lady commander to make sure they would be properly supervised. “While they were out here, we never heard a word out of them! There were children from Otara and Otahuhu who had never been to a beach. They brought them out to Parau and they had one on one [supervision] and they hiked to the dam and the beach and from there they never stopped. She [the commander] said ‘We never let them stop. Come half past six, seven o’clock and they are fast asleep snoring.”

So would the next owners of the land be as responsible as the St. John’s? Would they be more willing to open their doors to the community? Well the Pacific Island Church of the Presbyterian Church Newton certainly didn’t charge any less for the use of the hall! Whilst local Samoans raised money around the markets and helped to clear the land, the man who finally signed the cheque did just that and then returned immediately to his pacific island. So he was hardly going to be interested in the local school groups using the hall for sports practice. There were some benefits though. When the P.I.C. camp was up and running you could hear the groups practicing their singing and dancing (which was rather lovely). Sadly this was sometimes at six o’clock in the morning.

Under new ownership, the P.I.C. Camp brought familiar worries. Teens would come down to the bus shelter for a good smoke or a good drink as Don recalls. “It was them who had the beer stash behind the bus stop.” I bet it reminds you of the stash behind the bike shed back in the good old days. When they cleared out an old dormitory someone decided that the best place to dump the old unwanted mattresses was on the nearby reserve, by the pine trees! Of course everyone noticed so the council made them clear it up again.

After all of this the P.I.C. camp slowly became deserted, unloved, disused, derelict and dangerous. The fire service worry that it is a fire hazard, that there would not be enough water pressure to douse the flames if it were to submit to a stray cigarette or lightning strike. It now has been not been used since it was a polling station in the election of 2004. All that remains of it now are the odd dormitory, the remains of a playground long since lost to time and the lonely hall that you can see from the road. This is all that’s left except the memories that will always live on in friends.

Some have memories of receiving a 5-year service medal from the fire brigade. Maybe some remember the ‘do’s’, dances and get togethers held in the hall. They might remember Val running back and forth to his house to check on the election results on the night of a dance. They might remember Tom Dodson and his truck. This was the truck, which would back up to the French doors on exactly the same level as the hall. This was the truck that served as a bar so any spillage was in the truck and not in the hall. It definitely made sure the hall did not reek of alcohol the next day. Or you may even remember an English teacher from Laingholm School up on stage prancing and dancing around singing” Dance around with your knickers in the air”(which certainly sounds like Laingholm to me!) Val and Don certainly remember.

There is a lasting reminder of the influence of the camp from its St. John’s days. The first New Zealand born Governor General, Sir Arthur Espie Porritt, visited Parau to open the St. Johns Brigade camp. The local children were excited, lining the freshly lain footpaths that stretched for 100 yards either side of the camp. Apparently it wouldn’t do for the Governor General to see dirt tracks. They may have been a little disappointed when ‘he didn’t even say boo’ but at least they had the new footpaths, which over the years have grown so long from their special beginnings.

So here we have a large patch of land with an interesting past, a sorrowful, unwanted present and an undecided future. Will the Presbyterian Church ever sell it? Will anyone raise enough money to encourage them to sell? Will the fields ever ring again with the laughter of children or the sound of music? Will it ever be home to more than the odd pukeko or tethered pony? Could it become a focal point for the community in Parau in a way that it never was in the past?



Bibliography


Interview


Rogerson, Don and Val. Long standing residents of Parau and P.I.C. Camp experts
Thursday 31st July 2008


Internet

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arthur_Porritt,_Baron_Porritt
Photograph of Governor General Sir Arthur Espie Porritt
August 2008

www.localhistoryonline.org.nz
(P.I.C. Camp, Western Leader 19th March 2004)
July 2008

My top ten things about our first year in NZ by CAITLIN

1. Ruby, Jess, Ashleigh, and Grace
2. Molly and Pets!
3. The beaches especially Bethells, Armour Bay, Katamatua. Kaitarakihi, Piha and Whatipu
4. School
5. Miss W ( she rocks)
6. Laingholm Idol and me getting into the final
7. Year six Camp
8. Farmers the department store and Spotlight the fabric shop
9. Eating burgers on Christmas day cooked on the bbq
10. Rotorua.
11. Chris and Debs! ( especially when they let us watch Dr Who at their house!)

The Year Six Camp!

On the 16 of September (yes our Year anniversary.)all the year 6’s in the school went to year 6 camp. We went to a place called Kokako lodge and it took an hour and a half to get there. The people at the back of the bus (including me) managed to get from 99 bottles of beer on the wall to 0 Bottles of beer on the wall and it took almost the entire journey!! When we finally got to the lodge we stopped to have morning tea.
We did not do any of the activities that day but we did do something that was called the Hunua Hunt (because Kokako lodge is in the Hunua Ranges) and which team was the winner of the Hunua Hunt would be announced on Skit Night. By the way all the year 6 were put into different teams. The Adventures, The Explorers, The Conquerors, The Challengers and finally TEAM EXTREME (my team)!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

My top ten things about our first year in NZ by REUBEN

1. Our house
2. Laingholm School
3. My distinctions ( and getting the computer games Spore and Thrillville as a present!)
4. The trampoline
5. Going to Gymnastics
6. All the pets ( Molly, Teddy, Tabitha and Touchy)
7. West Wave swimming pool
8. Beaches
9. Wendy's ice cream, in fact ice cream in general!
10. The family being happy ( hopefully)

MY DISTINCTIONS by Reuben

I have been doing lots of exams (they were called Australasian exams) and on 2 of them I got (what do you think… guess) A DISTINCTION!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
One in maths and one in english. This means I am in the top 10% in Australasia