A chorus of laughs – the Sextet

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1900s, 1910s, 1920s, 1930s, 1940s, 1950s, 1960s, 1970s, 1980s, 1990s, 2000s, 2010s, capping, graduation, music

The 1962 Sextette in traditional clown costume. Back from left: Doug Cox, Alastair Stokes, Terry Wilson, Peter Chin. Front: Roger McElroy, Gus Ferguson (pianist), Ian Robertson. Photo by de Clifford Photography, courtesy of Peter Chin.

The Sextet has been entertaining audiences at Otago’s capping show with beautifully-sung and witty words for over a century. Given its tendency to come close to the line – and sometimes to cross it – with offensive subject material, it seems only appropriate that its origins were not ‘politically correct’. The capping show itself dates back to 1894, when the University of New Zealand authorities banned public graduation ceremonies after becoming fed up with riotous student behaviour at these supposedly formal occasions. That prompted students to develop their own capping carnival of dances, concerts and processions, while the official graduation ceremony, when reinstated, became a much more seemly affair.

The capping concert soon became a hit with both students and the public, offering amusing commentary on the life and personalities of the university in particular, sometimes extending to the rest of Dunedin and the wider world. Alternative lyrics set to popular tunes were one of its standbys. One of the Sextet’s most famous old boys, conductor and composer Tecwyn Evans, researched its history as an honours project in 1993. He traced its origins to the appearance of ‘Coon’s Quartette’ at the 1903 capping concert. Presumably they made themselves up in ‘blackface’, then popular but later heavily criticised for its racist stereotypes. A review of the 1905 capping concert noted that ‘a coon tableau and a cake walk by a quartet of coloured gentlemen went well’.

The 1903 quartet was followed by various 4 or 5-man combinations, with the first 6-man singing group appearing in 1912. By 1919 the Sextette (as it was known until 1966, when it became the Sextet) was a regular feature of the capping concert, famous for its cheeky words sung with angelic voices. An ODT review of the 1923 concert noted ‘their rendering of topical verses was to many the very best item of the evening. In their first appearance they made play behind great song books of ’Varsity blue. Their songs when they appeared in evening dress in the second half were particularly clever and most amusing as one after another unburdened himself of the confession of the murder of some professor or other equally undesirable person. They also successfully burlesqued the Sistine Choir, and were rewarded with the most prolonged and emphatic applause of the evening’. The tradition of appearing in clown costume for some items and in evening dress for others quickly developed, though occasionally they branched out into other outfits.

The 1948 Sextette dressed as Victorian clergy to fit in with the theme of the capping show, ‘Dunover, or Cargill Rides Again’ (in honour of the centenary of the Otago colony). Left to right: Ninian Walden, John Somerville, Linley Ellis, Brian Neill, Ritchie Gilmour, Michael Shackleton. Photo courtesy of Michael Shackleton.

The Sextet, like the capping carnival, took a break during World War II. When the concert recommenced in 1945, getting traditions going again with no experienced seniors to help proved tricky. Concert director David Cole (future dean of the Auckland medical school) noted that ‘we could only find a quartette the first year but the sextette has reigned supreme again since then’.

The 1952 Sextette, from left: Linley Ellis, Richard Bush, John ?, Keith Monagan, Michael Shackleton, Brian McMahon. Photo courtesy of Michael Shackleton.

Writer James K. Baxter, who was Burns Fellow at Otago in 1966 and 1967, was a fan of capping shows, ‘chiefly on account of their vigour and their freedom of satire, both of which the country sorely needs’. In a review in the notorious but short-lived student publication Falus, he commended the 1967 production as more sophisticated than usual, though it did mean that ‘the sheer drive of spontaneous gutsiness was not so strong’. Fortunately, the ‘casual energy of Sextet provided a counterpoint’. Their performance included a ‘Geering interlude’ – presumably a commentary on the well-known theology professor, who was tried for heresy that year – among other things. ‘The alternation of wide-open satire with straight singing broadened their presentation … I think they were indispensable’, wrote Baxter.

The 1959 Sextette in action. Back from left: Bob McKegg, Jim Cleland, Alastair Brown. Front: John Burton, Peter Chin, Meikle Skelly. Peter Foreman was the pianist. Photo courtesy of Peter Chin.

Members of the Sextet were chosen for their vocal skill. Shy young first-year law student Peter Chin headed along to the audition for the large capping chorus with some friends from school in 1959. At the audition, talent-spotters suggested he should audition for the Sextet, and he was to sing with them for 3 of his 5 years at university. Becoming part of this elite group provided him with an instant introduction into student society. Chin – a future mayor of Dunedin – later became a well-known performer in local productions. The abilities of the Sextet have, naturally, varied from year to year, but there are some very famous names among the old boys, with vocal stars Roger Wilson, Martin Snell, Simon O’Neill and Jonathan Lemalu all lending their talents to the group during their university days. Although the performances have been a cappella for many years, in the past the group had a piano accompanist, and generally sang in unison rather than with the harmonies which became a feature during the 1970s.

The lyrics, also, varied in quality from year to year; sometimes the Sextet wrote the words themselves, and sometimes they received help from others. An anonymous article in a 1991 graduate publication noted that the content varied ‘from the traditional to the topical and from the harmless to the emphatically unsuitable’. Certainly the level of sexual innuendo in the lyrics grew and became more explicit, and in 2010 Rape Crisis criticised the Sextet for trivialising rape and sexual abuse in some lyrics.

Because the capping stage was open to men only until 1947, the Sextet started as an all-male group, and so it determinedly remained. In 1966 the show featured an all-female vocal group, named the Sextette, in addition to the all-male Sextet, but it proved a one-off. The ODT reported that ‘the girls do a good job, but their voices are not strong enough and most of their words are lost’. Finally, in 2001, a new female a cappella group – the Sexytet – debuted at the capping show, becoming a regular feature. The women’s group, which settled on ‘1950s housewife’ costumes, performed witty and smutty songs in beautiful harmonies, as in Sextet tradition.

The 1963 Sextette enjoying themselves backstage. Back from left – Terry Wilson, Jenny Black, Peter McKenzie, Alistair Wright. Front – Gus Ferguson (pianist), John Sayers, Peter Chin, Bob Salamonsen. Photo by Alan Stuart, courtesy of Peter Chin.

Through the years the Sextet has provided a lot of laughs to a lot of people. And, though they often put in a lot of work practising, the singers have clearly enjoyed themselves very much too (with a notable exception in 1993, when they were pelted with beer cans when performing as a warm-up act before a rugby test match at Carisbrook). Video of performances by Sextets and Sexytets of recent years can be found on Youtube – viewer discretion is definitely advised!

The 2014 Sextet. Through the years the clown hats have been lost, but more make-up added. Photo by Daniel Chew, courtesy of OUSA.

The class of 1946

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1940s, graduation, recreation, sports, student health

Waiting for the capping parade to start, 1946. Image courtesy of Arthur Campbell.

1946: New Zealand’s population drew close to 2 million, the long war was finally over, Prime Minister Peter Fraser led the Labour government into a fourth term, Southland held the Ranfurly Shield and The Best Years of Our Lives beat It’s a Wonderful Life to take the Oscar for best picture. But what was life like for Otago’s 2440 students? I recently stumbled upon a survey of a large group of students, which provides some fascinating insights into their lives.

The survey was carried out by the recently-established Student Health Service. The medical school had been carrying out medical examinations of its own students for a while, but in 1946 the university decided to open a general practice health service for all students. It was initiated by the Preventive and Social Medicine Department and partly funded by a social security grant allocated for each student who signed up; it aimed to combine ‘preventive and therapeutic work’. By the end of its first year the service had signed up 736 students, and carried out a statistical analysis of 614 of these, for whom detailed records were available. The information, therefore, covered a quarter of Otago students of that time. It wasn’t a fully representative sample, though. Unsurprisingly, medical students were over-represented, accounting for 53% of the survey, when they were 28% of all Otago students. Home science students were also over-represented, being 20% of those surveyed when they made up just 8% of the student roll. On the other hand, only 15% of those in the survey were arts or science students, at a time when they made up 37% of Otago students. Presumably students at the ‘special’ schools, such as home science, were more likely to sign up to student health as they often came from out of town, and did not already have a local family doctor. The involvement of so many home science students helped sway the gender of the survey, which was 40% female when only 27% of Otago students were women.

A group of dental students clean their pride and joy, 1946. Image courtesy of Michael Shackleton.

The data reported on the physical, mental and social well-being of the students. In an effort to measure the impact of the students’ early environment and class background, they were asked about their home locations and father’s occupation. These reflected New Zealand’s strongly urbanised culture. Just 13% had grown up in the country, and a further 7% in a ‘village’, while 78% had ‘town’ backgrounds. A remarkable 44% had a father with a professional background, 28% were in business, 13% in farming and just 14% in trades. At the 1945 census, just 10% of married men engaged in the workforce were classed as being in ‘clerical and professional occupations’, so it is clear that the children of the upper echelons of society were greatly over-represented at the university. Ethnicity was not recorded, but birthplace was, and 93% of the students had been born in New Zealand – internationalisation had a long way to go! Most of the others had been born in Britain, while a few came from Australia, central Europe, China and the Pacific. 10% of students in the survey lived at home – presumably that included the 6% who were married – and 46% in residential colleges. Flatting was yet to take off in popularity, with just 4% of the sample in flats; 39% lived in ‘digs’, or private board.

The shadow of the war loomed large. The ‘SS War Bride’ was the science students’ float for the 1946 capping parade. Image courtesy of Arthur Campbell.

The shadow of the war loomed large, with 10% of those surveyed having served overseas with the military; this ‘might have a considerable bearing on physical and mental health’, noted Archie Douglas, the student health director. It also had quite a bearing on student life. Tom O’Donnell, a future medical professor and dean of the Wellington school of medicine, was just 16 years old when he arrived to study at Otago towards the end of the war, and recalled that the few returned servicemen in his class provided some welcome maturity. In 1946, a third of the second-year medical class had served in the war. Miles Hursthouse, who was in that class, noted that it ‘became known in that and subsequent years for the dedication and hard work of the students’. The older men, like him, ‘were realising a lifetime ambition and worked like blazes for it, thus stimulating the younger ones to keep with or beat us academically’.

One of many popular physical activities of 1946 students – tramping. Image courtesy of the Hocken Collections, Otago University Tramping Club records, 96-063/036, S15-592b.

But it wasn’t all work: 64% of the students played at least one sport on a regular basis and 41% participated actively in clubs and societies. Reports in the Otago University Review reveal that 1946 was a great year for sports clubs. The boxing, cricket, golf, harrier, ski, soccer and tennis clubs all had successful years, and rowing, after a ‘lapse of some years’, ‘assumed its rightful place in the sporting life of the University’. The rugby club had more members than ever before and fielded 8 teams in the Dunedin competition; 6 players represented Otago and medical student Ron Elvidge, captain of the A team, was selected for the All Blacks. Other clubs and societies had varied success. The Review noted that the photographic society had come to a halt but the literary society had staged a comeback; the debating societies were ‘moderately active’. A new chess club was waiting for chess sets to arrive; the game had ‘a large following’ in the medical school. A new musical union formed a ‘long-needed union between the various musical groups’, with regular ‘gramophone recitals’ and several chamber music recitals in Allen Hall. A piano recital by Lili Kraus, a Hungarian Jew recently released from internship under the Japanese, was a highlight of the year. The dramatic society and dramatic club both staged productions, including The Black Eye, The Spartan Girl, Orange Blossom, a section from The Taming of the Shrew and a play reading of Blithe Spirit. ‘Ill-considered criticism is sometimes levelled at the Drama Club’, suggested OUSA’s intellectual affairs rep, but it ‘works under many difficulties’. The biological society and medical history society flourished, as did the Christian groups, which maintained ‘a continuity for which other societies contend in vain’.

The health service made an attempt to assess the ‘mental hygiene’ of students with a scale measuring their ‘temperament’. A creditable 43% were described as ‘calm’, 39% as ‘average’ and 17% as ‘nervous’. The nervous perhaps included the 8% classed as heavy smokers (’more than 10 cigarettes a day, or the equivalent in pipes’); a further 36% were ‘light’ smokers, while 56% didn’t smoke. Physical examination of the students uncovered a range of physical ‘defects’. The most common – each affecting 17% of the study group – were ‘thyroid’, ‘previous respiratory illness’ and ‘vision unsatisfactory’ (17% wore glasses regularly and 4% for reading – according to my optometrist those are very low percentages compared with today’s student cohort). The most common reason for students to consult the health service was a skin problem, while the greatest cause of acute sickness was ‘the feverish attack labelled flu’. Another problem ‘constantly calling for diagnosis and treatment’ was ‘the possible appendix’.

The School of Mines float for 1946 featured ‘Paddy’s Band of Angels’, a reference to recently-retired cabinet minister Paddy Webb, who declared that ‘the people should take their hats off to the miners’. The capping parade was a popular public event. Image courtesy of Arthur Campbell.

Infectious disease loomed large in the histories of 1946 students. The ‘common cold and its complications is the outstanding ailment of the student group’, reported Douglas, but many had previously suffered more serious infections. Half had experienced mumps, and more than half whooping cough and chickenpox, while a remarkable 95% had suffered measles. A smaller number had survived scarlet fever, diphtheria and polio. Pneumonia and rheumatic fever were the most common causes of the ‘serious illness’ that 9% reported as part of their health history. The threat of tuberculosis – for which the first effective drug treatment, streptomycin, was only discovered in 1944 – was a constant concern. 10% of students had been in contact with TB within their own family. The clinic conducted 270 Mantoux tests and 72 were positive, indicating those people had been infected with TB, though they did not necessarily have active disease (‘latent’ TB being more common). The other main tool of tuberculosis screening – a chest x-ray – was provided to 309 students.

The class of 1946 was clearly a hardy group. Though they came, on the whole, from relatively privileged backgrounds, these young people had grown up during an economic depression, recovered from a range of potentially life-threatening or disabling illnesses and survived a long war (some of them on active service). They worked hard and many of them played hard. The capping carnival – which had been on hold during the war years – was revived in full in 1946 and enjoyed by both students and community. There was an air of conservatism among students: one of the most controversial issues on campus in 1946 was a campaign to overthrow the traditional exclusion of women from participation in the capping show. Women remained behind the scenes in 1946 but would finally appear on stage at the 1947 show.

The cast of the Knox Farce, ‘Cameo and Mabelette’, performed at the 1946 capping show. Image courtesy of Michael Shackleton.

I don’t suppose the director of the student health service had historians in mind when he compiled his report on the clinic’s first year! Nevertheless, his broad-ranging analysis has survived to provide a fascinating window into the lives of one generation of Otago students. I am grateful to him, and also to some former students of 1946 – Arthur Campbell and Michael Shackleton – who have shared some of their photographs from student days.

Early Chinese students

Tags

1920s, 1930s, 1940s, 1950s, 1960s, Aquinas, Asia, Chinese, dentistry, graduation, law, medicine

Dr Kathleen Pih, photographed by J.J. Webster, Dunedin, c.1930. Image courtesy of Presbyterian Research Centre, P-A154.19-59.

Chinese students have a long history at Otago. I’ve posted before about the big impact that Colombo Plan students from Asia had on the university from the 1950s to 1970s – many of them were Chinese Malaysians. As the Colombo Plan wound back and private international students grew in number, Malaysians remained an important presence on campus. The late 1990s also saw the beginnings of an influx of international students directly from China – their numbers peaked at 700 in 2005 and remain substantial today. But there is, of course, a long history of Chinese migration to New Zealand and the earliest Chinese students at Otago were homegrown – people who had been born or raised here.

I recently had the privilege of talking with two well-known members of Dunedin’s Kiwi Chinese community – James Ng, medical doctor and historian of the Chinese in New Zealand, and Peter Chin, lawyer, singer, and former mayor of Dunedin. Both have fond memories of their Otago student days and generously shared some insights into the Chinese community at the university. James Ng came from Ashburton to Otago to study medicine in 1954 – he describes himself as being at the tail end of the first wave of New Zealand Chinese university students. That wave resulted from the changing demographics of the Chinese community. For many decades immigration policy prevented the settlement of Chinese women in New Zealand, so many Chinese men here remained single or left families behind in China. When restrictions were reduced during World War II more women and families arrived in New Zealand. Peter Chin, who started his law degree at Otago in 1959, was born in Dunedin as part of the “baby boom” resulting from the influx of Chinese women to this country in the 1940s.

While some pioneering Otago Chinese trained in professions such as dentistry and law before these became university courses, and Norman Lo Keong graduated in engineering from Canterbury, the University of Otago’s first Chinese graduates were in medicine. The honour of being first goes to Kathleen Pih (Pih Zhen-Wah). Born in 1902 in Antung, China, she came to New Zealand in 1908 with her foster mother, a Dunedinite who had been working with the China Inland Mission. Special permission was required from the Governor-General for Kathleen to gain entry to New Zealand. She went to primary school in Waimate and had her secondary schooling at Otago Girls’ High School, enrolling as a university student in 1921. After graduating in medicine in 1929, she returned to China as a missionary for some years. She later completed specialist training in ophthalmology in London and married anatomy professor Francis Chang of Shanghai.They worked in China, Singapore and Hong Kong before retiring to New Zealand in 1969.

The next Chinese student at Otago was Roy Ting Shang Law, who commenced his medical course in 1937. He finally graduated in 1947 – this was a period when many students took extra years to complete their course, and the fact he had to work to support himself and his wife obviously didn’t help the progression of his studies. Dr Law established a very successful general practice in Wellington and this had quite an impact on New Zealand’s Chinese community. Once they saw how acceptable a Chinese doctor could be to wider society, they were happy to encourage their children to study medicine. James Ng’s parents were initially reluctant for him to undertake tertiary study, thinking business offered better opportunities, but Dr Law’s success swayed them to allow their son to come to Otago, albeit not to study in the field which originally interested him – geology!

The health sciences remained the most popular Otago courses for Chinese students, attracting people from all over New Zealand. Douglas Ngan Kee of Whanganui became the first Chinese dental graduate in 1950. The specialist courses in mining and home science also brought Chinese students to Otago, while arts and law attracted a smaller number, most of them southerners. By the 1950s Otago was also enrolling students from Fiji’s Chinese community, while the Colombo Plan brought Chinese students from elsewhere, notably Malaysia.

Jocelyn Wong, an arts student from Masterton, and Peter Chin, a law student from Dunedin, are at centre front of this group of students at a St Margaret’s College ball in the early 1960s. Image courtesy of Peter Chin.

There was no special club or society for Otago’s Chinese students, though many took part in activities of the local Dunedin Chinese Association. Some also participated in the International Club, which was mostly run by European women students. Other than this, they took part in activities according to their personal interests – for instance, James Ng joined the tramping club. Like many out-of-town students he also mixed widely with others by living in a residential college, thriving at Aquinas, where he was one of the founding residents.

The biggest priority for Chinese students was their studies – their reputation for diligence is a long-standing one. Extra-curricular activities came second to work, and Peter Chin notes that he was an exception in his generation for the extent of his involvement in campus activities. His first year was “a disaster” academically but a great success socially thanks to his talent for singing. Along with a few school friends he auditioned for the capping chorus, and as a result was asked to audition for the sextet. Becoming part of this elite group provided him with an instant introduction into student society. He sang with the sextet for 3 of his 5 years at Otago, and also became capping chorus master. In his final year he served on the OUSA executive, having been selected as their business manager, a role traditionally held by a law student.

Peter Chin (right) with the sextet c.1962. Image courtesy of Peter Chin.

In the 94 years since the remarkable Kathleen Pih first became an Otago student, many of New Zealand’s Chinese community have followed in her footsteps. My thanks to James Ng and Peter Chin for sharing memories and photographs of Otago student life in the 1950s and 1960s, along with some stories of their predecessors!

Covering capping books

Tags

1920s, 1930s, 1940s, 1950s, art, graduation

Rocket science and rock and roll featured on the 1957 cover, drawn by Harold Coop. Image courtesy of Harold Coop.

“What a year to be illustrating! Rocket science was just being taken seriously, and rock and roll had arrived.” So recalls Harold Coop, who created the cover of the 1957 Capping Book. This annual publication started out in 1926 and soon became an important feature of capping. It included a list of the graduates and the programme of the capping show, but the main appeal lay in the rest of its contents, which consisted of cartoons, comic verse and various satirical articles, running to a total of 64 pages. There were also advertisements for many local firms, with ads especially created in a suitably comic tone. Students sold copies to the public as a fundraiser and it became a very popular publication, with a print run in the tens of thousand in the 1960s.

A good cover was of course critical to sales, and the Capping Book editors clearly went to considerable trouble to ensure they had something colourful, witty and topical to help sales. Often they employed a commercial artist for the job. For instance, the 1929 cover, featuring a stylish group of young men and women perusing the Capping Book, was by Peter McIntyre. McIntyre, then still in his teens, would become a very well-known New Zealand artist; he studied briefly at the University of Otago in the 1930s. Some 1930s covers were drawn by Russell Clark, then employed as an illustrator for Dunedin publishing firm McIndoe, and later also a respected sculptor. Marguerite Cotton, who drew the 1939 cover of a colourful Michael Joseph Savage clutching a “social security” diploma, boasted a Diploma of Fine Arts. Political leaders – national and international – often featured on covers of the late 1930s and early 1940s; earlier and later covers were more likely to highlight student life.

On John Hinds’s 1935 cover, the obligatory graduation cap appears on a skull. From the blogger’s collection.

But not all Capping Book covers were drawn by professionals: all three featured on this post were the work of Otago medical students. Harold Coop, who drew the 1957 cover, graduated in medicine in 1958. He got the illustrating job because others were impressed with the cover he had drawn previously for the medical student publication, Digest. During a long medical career, specialising in ophthalmology, he continued his interest in art; his largest public work is an illuminated entrance mural at the Auckland School of Medicine. From an earlier generation of medical students come some of the 1930s covers. John Hinds’s health science connection is evident in his choice of a skull as subject. He graduated from Otago in 1937, then became a specialist chest physician. Denis Rogers, who graduated in 1939, drew the 1937 cover; he later became well known as mayor of Hamilton. Of course, it wasn’t only medical students who could draw: the 1946 and 1947 covers were both by Pam Sinclair, an Otago zoology student.

The 1937 cover, by Denis Rogers, is most notable for its distinctive art deco-style font. From the blogger’s collection.

In the early 1980s the Capping Book and its cover became part of a major dispute, reflecting the battle between conservative and radical factions on campus. Some students (and others) were unhappy with the racist and sexist humour which had pervaded the publication for many years …. but that’s a story for another time.

The oldest alumnus?

Tags

1920s, 1930s, dentistry, graduation

Ian Chirnside, photographed by Ali Clarke in April 2014.

Ian Chirnside, who is now 106 years old, has a pretty good claim to be Otago’s oldest surviving graduate! Certainly it’s unlikely that there are any earlier university staff members out there, because he started working on campus when he was just 14 years old, in 1922. I recently had the great privilege of meeting Ian. He has an impressive memory and enjoyed chatting about life at Otago in the 1920s and 1930s.

Ian grew up in Dunedin, the sixth in a family of eight children. Like most working class children of that generation, they all left school young to earn a living and help support the household. Ian and one of his brothers tossed a coin to select between two job possibilities. The brother took the foundry job, and Ian’s future was sealed when he became “the boy” – the lowliest technical assistant – at the Dental School. He had a wide range of tasks. There was plenty of cleaning, including scraping the wax off the students’ benches. Other tasks were more exciting: some of the students were frightened of the blow torch used to melt gold for fillings, so Ian dealt with it for them. He also learned to develop photographs. When the School was short of suitable specimens, it used photos for teaching and one of Ian’s tasks was to print a set of copies for each student. He became interested in photography and had his own box brownie camera. This was swept away in the big Leith flood of 1923, when water covered the roads and the Dental School (the building which is now the Staff Club) was left overhanging the river. The dental students clubbed together to buy Ian a replacement camera.

Dental School staff and students in 1922 or 1923. Ian Chirnside is the young boy third from the right in the second row from the front. He had been sent away to exchange his usual brown jacket for a white one, so he wouldn’t spoil the photo! Photograph courtesy of Ian Chirnside and Annabel Rayner.

Another of Ian’s duties was to serve as messenger boy for the Dean, H.P. Pickerill: “at the time I thought something of it,” he recalls. Pickerill was a major figure, and not only in dentistry. He was one of the pioneers of plastic surgery during World War I, bringing some of the badly wounded men he treated back to Dunedin after the war for further treatment. But it seems he could also be a little absent-minded, because Ian regularly biked out to the Pickerill home in Ravensbourne to collect something the Dean had forgotten, such as appropriate clothing for a formal dinner at which he was to be guest of honour. One interesting duty he carried out for Pickerill was to turn on and off the wall switch of an electric knife used during surgery!

Ian Chirnside, aged 16 (left), and his brother Alan, aged 14, as technicians at the Dental School. Photograph courtesy of Ian Chirnside and Annabel Rayner.

Ian loved working at the Dental School, finding the students and staff very friendly. When he was promoted his younger brother, Alan Chirnside, became “boy” in his place. The brothers decided they would like to train in dentistry themselves, but as they had no secondary schooling they first had to study to obtain matriculation (entry to university). After work, they would run home to Maori Hill for tea and then run down to the King Edward Technical School night classes, often arriving late. Their determination and hard work paid off in the end, with Alan graduating in dentistry in 1938 and Ian in 1940. Ian has fond memories of his student years, especially of capping. The government, town council and taxi drivers (especially Red Band Taxis) always got “a bit of a rip” from the students. One year he drove an old-fashioned buggy in the capping procession. He borrowed the buggy from the Oval, one draught horse from his father (who worked with horses) and another from the grocer who lived nextdoor. Ian and another dental student dressed up as “hayseeds” for the occasion. They managed to get caught in the tram rails, which were the same width as the wheels on their buggy. Later they parked outside Arthur Barnett’s store “for the sake of the girls,” putting down a piece of grass turf to try and prevent the horses from wandering off!

After graduating, Ian spent a few years away from the Dental School, including some time spent in military service with the Dental Corps in the Pacific. In 1945 he returned as a lecturer to the place he loved so well, remaining until his retirement in the early 1970s. By that time he had evolved from the junior lackey without any secondary schooling to an associate professor, complete with doctoral degree. He saw many changes over his long career, the most significant technical development being the arrival of the fast-cutting drill. Ian continues to take an interest in the world of dentistry. His eyesight is not too good these days, but his daughter reads him articles about new developments. He is especially intrigued by the use of robotics in teaching!

 

Capping processions

Tags

1940s, graduation

A group of students relax before taking their met office-themed float on the 1946 capping procession. Photograph courtesy of Arthur Campbell.

As we have just completed a series of December graduation ceremonies, it seems a good time to remember one of the graduation customs no longer with us: the capping procession. This carnivalesque event, involving political satire, cross-dressing and crazy musicians, had its beginnings in 1899 when a group of students drove through Dunedin in a horse-drawn vehicle playing “mixed instruments” during capping week. It gradually evolved into an event with multiple floats parading through the streets, watched by large crowds. Participants begged donations from spectators for their chosen charities. Groups from various faculties and residential colleges put considerable effort into creating their floats.

“Paddy’s Band of Angels”, featuring the notoriously balding cabinet minister Paddy Webb, perform for a large crowd at the 1946 capping procession. Photograph courtesy of Arthur Campbell.

The School of Mines “SS War Bride” float from the 1946 procession. Photograph courtesy of Arthur Campbell.

I am grateful to Arthur Campbell, Emeritus Professor of Chemistry, for sharing these wonderful snapshots of the capping “procesh” of the 1940s, during his Otago student years. Capping celebrations were suspended from 1942 to 1945 thanks to the war, so the 1946 procession was a great occasion. In this period, capping floats often reflected current events and political controversies; later they were more centred on the university and student life.

A “tram” from a late 1940s procession. Photograph courtesy of Arthur Campbell.

The “Grand National Orchestra” prepares to take part in a late-1940s procession. Photograph courtesy of Arthur Campbell.

Procesh flourished through the 1950s, 1960s and 1970s. By the late 1980s students were starting to lose interest in the event and public tolerance of the procession declined due to the “excessive” behaviour of some participants. Its demise was perhaps inevitable as the number of graduation ceremonies increased and capping became a less important annual event; orientation took over as the major student festival.

A dental student float from the late 1940s. Photograph courtesy of Arthur Campbell.

After a recess through the 1990s, the procession was reinstated by OUSA in 2000, but did not survive as the major event which students and public had once enjoyed. Do you have any memories to share of capping processions?

Procesh was generally a well-lubricated event. This late-1940s trio were on a float seeking “heftier handles for Highlanders”. Photograph courtesy of Arthur Campbell.

Expanding graduation

Tags

1950s, 1990s, 2010s, graduation, international students, Malaysia, Maori

Yesterday, as has happened many times before, a large group of people, all dressed to the nines, gathered outside the Dental School. They then paraded down George Street to the Dunedin Town Hall, where they received their University of Otago degrees and diplomas. As ever, the Otago Daily Times published the names of the graduates, along with a story featuring a particularly interesting or quirky graduate. This time around it excelled itself with three stories: one about family members graduating together, another about the first graduate of the new Master of Fine Arts (theatre studies) degree, and the inspiring story of a law graduate who overcame special challenges to get where he is today.

As the booklet published for each graduation notes, the essential features of Otago’s formal graduation ceremony took their present form in the 1920s, though there have been various small changes and one particularly notable one: since 1995 there has been a Maori element, with a welcoming korero from the Maori orator on behalf of tangata whenua.

Dental graduates Peter Dodds, Bill Hunter, Elaine Harrison, Colin Martyn, Doug Lloyd & Colin Moore on the cathedral steps. They were capped at Otago’s first December graduation in 1951. Photograph courtesy of Elaine Donaldson.

Undoubtedly the biggest change to Otago’s graduation over the years has been the ever growing number of ceremonies. Until the 1950s there was just one graduation per year and it was a major event for both university and town, with other festivities alongside the formal ceremony making up the ‘capping’ season. In 1951 Otago added a second annual ceremony in December. This was to cater for medical and dental graduates, who seemed to find it particularly difficult to return to Dunedin for May graduation. Now they could graduate in person immediately after their results came through, before departing Dunedin for places far and wide.

As the university grew, further ceremonies became inevitable. In 1951 there were just over 2000 students at Otago, but by 1991 there were just over 12,000 students and over 2000 graduates per year. This large number of graduates, along with their family and friends, could not squeeze into the biggest venue in town, so around this time a second May ceremony was introduced, making a total of three graduations per year. After that, further changes came quickly. In 1993 the university added another ceremony in July (in subsequent years in August). In 1995, following student complaints about being refused the opportunity to graduate in December – a ceremony at which health science students continued to have priority – a second December graduation was added.

A piper leads the official party into Otago’s first Malaysian graduation, held 26 April 1997 in Kuala Lumpur. From University of Otago International Office records, MS-3522/002, S13-561a, Hocken Collections.

A more innovative change happened in 1997 when the University of Otago held its first graduation outside Dunedin – in Kuala Lumpur. Malaysian students have been a feature of Otago life since the 1950s, when they were among the early Colombo Plan students. Though numbers have fluctuated over the years, they have always been one of the largest groups of international students at Otago, and their numbers peaked at over 700 in 1996 and 1997. The Chancellor, Vice-Chancellor, Public Orator and Registrar all attended the ceremony, held at the Shangri-La Hotel. Fourteen people received degrees in medicine and commerce, and Mazlan Binti Othman, a 1970s graduate and well-known astrophysicist, received an honorary doctorate. Over 150 other Otago alumni were ‘presented’ at the same ceremony. Several subsequent graduations were held in Malaysia, including at Kuching. If you know the name of the piper in the photograph, please let me know – unfortunately he is not named in the graduation booklet!

In 2012 Otago held fourteen graduation ceremonies – five in May, one in August and eight in December. Two of the December graduations were in Southland, and resulted from the university’s merger with the Dunedin College of Education. Some teaching graduates from the Southland campus received their degrees at an Invercargill ceremony, while there was a graduation for those with degrees endorsed in bilingual education at Te Rau Aroha Marae in Bluff.

This year marks the twentieth anniversary of the first July/August graduation. Hearty congratulations to all the newest graduates! I wonder how many of you were photographed in front of the iconic clocktower building?

The blogger and her mother in a clichéd graduation photograph, August 2003.