List of former staff of St Peter's College, Auckland: Difference between revisions

Notable former staff of St Peter's College, Auckland include the following:

• The Honourable Jim Anderton (born 1938): politician; taught in the intermediate at St Peters in 1959 and 1960 ; President of the New Zealand Labour Party (1979-1984); Member of Parliament for Sydenham (1984 – 1996); Member of Parliament for Wigram (1996-present): former Leader of the New Labour Party (1989-1991), former leader of the Alliance Party (1991 – 1994), and current leader of the Progressive Party (2002 - present); Deputy Prime Minister (1999-2006), Minister for Economic Development (1999-2005), Minister of Agriculture (2005-2008), Minister for Biosecurity (2005-2008), Minister of Fisheries (2005-2008), Minister of Forestry (2005-2008), Minister Responsible for the Public Trust (2005-2008), Associate Minister of Health (2005-2008), and Associate Minister for Tertiary Education (2005-2008)

• Br Vincent Nicholas Cusack (1912-2004): educated at Christian Brothers School, Dunedin; played rugby for the Dunedin Rugby Football Club (First Five Eighths) 1929-1932; in 1932 he played in the Otago representative team; he went to St Patrick's College, Strathfield to became a Christian Brother in 1933; he started off as a lay brother (which meant that he did not wish to teach but rather do manual work) made his final profession in 1944; in 1938-1939 and 1943-1944 he was at Tardun Farm School in Western Australia and in 1940-1941, 1945-1948 and 1957-1960 he was at Clontarf Orphanage, also in Western Australia; joined the staff at St Peter's College, Auckland to teach in the intermediate; taught at, and was otherwise associated with, St Peter's College for 37 years (1961–1997); one of his ex-pupils at St Peter's said "Mentors are few and far between. Br Cusack loved and understood his boys and was tough but fair"; in the mid to late 1990s was involved with the St Peter's tuckshop where he arrived at 7.30am every school day to heat the pies for the day; died aged 91 in 2004 (buried South Hill Public Cemetery, Oamaru)

• Miss Judith Edwards: influential and effective choir and singing teacher at St Peter's College late 1950s until 1962; trained as a singer by Sister Mary Leo at St Mary's College; in 1955 she won the John Court Memorial Aria Contest and she was a finalist in the first Mobil Song Quest in 1956.

• Mr Kenneth Coulton Gorbey (born 1945) CNZM (2007, for service to museums): Museum Consultant and Academic; taught at St Peter's College in 1967; director of the Waikato Museum (opened in 1987); involved in the development of Te Papa, New Zealand's National Museum (opened in 1998); project director of the Jewish Museum Berlin (opened in 2001); teaches Museum and Heritage Studies at Victoria University of Wellington.

• Mr Patrick Richard Lam (born 1968), All Black, loose forward (1992), Teacher at St Peter's College (1991 - 1992) see Notable Alumni of St Peter's College, Auckland.

Tom Weal

Mr Thomas K Weal was born in 1929, and taught at St Peter's College from 1953 to 1989. In the 1960s he particularly taught History to the Form Three classes (Year 9). He was greatly loved for his willingness to depart from the curriculum to talk about any aspects of Philosophy, History, Religion or current affairs raised by students only too eager to encourage these instructive diversions. He was Deputy Leader of the Social Credit Party (then called the Social Credit Political League) from 1970-1972. In 2008, he was the Honorary Consul in Auckland for El Salvador.

During the many years Mr Weal taught at the college, he undertook some interesting trips. During the St Peter's College summer vacation of 1970/1971, as Deputy Leader of the Social Credit Party, he mounted a one-man campaign in London to protect New Zealand's interests in relation to the entry of the UK into the European Community (then known as the EEC). Mr Weal felt that the British public was not aware of the damage which New Zealand would suffer if Britain joined the Common Market without safeguards for her primary produce. He spent three weeks talking to anti-market groups in England. He felt that British people knew that New Zealand would have to have a special arrangement if Britain entered the EEC, but that they did not know why. Mr Weal said he had found that very few people knew exactly what joining the EEC meant for Britain. He thought that that was why there was a great fear of going into Europe. He said: "The public just doesn't know what's going on in Brussels. For this reason they're interested in hearing the Commonwealth view on the negotiations and that's what I've tried to express." Mr Weal was invited to return to Britain and was urged to bring a member of the New Zealand Labour Party with him. "We wouldn't be here to play politics, but just to let people know what's in it for us if Britain joins the EEC," he said. He rejected the idea that he was "meddling" in British politics. "In fact one of the most successful things I did was to deliver a letter outlining New Zealand's objections to British membership to every MP before the Common Market debate," he said. Mr Weal thought that letter had an influence in the fact that more than 100 Labour members signed a petition opposing the entry negotiations. On his way back to New Zealand, Mr Weal broke his journey in Rome, where he had an audience with Pope Paul VI. The UK joined the EEC in 1973, but there were special arrangements put in place for New Zealand primary product exports.

Mr Weal was also in Zambia in 1970 where he met, and was impressed by, Archbishop Emmanuel Milingo of Lusaka.

In 1980 Mr Weal and his wife, Margaret, were in the UK and in Rome where they met Pope John Paul II. Mr Weal said to the Pope, "'Back at St Peter's College where I teach Christian Living, three of my boys each want to be Pope'". "[The Pope] ... paused a moment, shook with mirth and stepping back to me with an appreciative grin, he said, 'Maybe'". In 1982 Mr Weal went to El Salvador where as part of a "a trip of a lifetime", he met President José Napoleón Duarte of that country.

Main References/Sources

• Zealandia, 1939-1990.
• St Peter's College Magazines, St Peter's College, Auckland, 1948-2008.
• St Peter's College Silver Jubilee 1939-1964, Christian Brothers Old Boys Association, Auckland, 1964.
• J.C. O'Neill, The History of the Work of the Christian Brothers in New Zealand, unpublished Dip. Ed. thesis, University of Auckland, 1968.
• Felix Donnelly, One Priest's Life, Australia and New Zealand Book Company, Auckland, 1982.
• Malcolm Robertson, Nga Parata Karaitiana The Christian Brothers, A Public Culture in Transition, A Comparative Study of the Indian and New Zealand Provinces, an unpublished thesis for MA in Anthropology, University of Auckland, 1996.
• NZ Catholic : the national Catholic newspaper, 1996- present.
• Graeme Donaldson, To All Parts of the Kingdom: Christian Brothers In New Zealand 1876-2001, Christian Brothers New Zealand Province, Christchurch, 2001.
• John Tamihere and Helen Bain, John Tamihere Black and White, Reed, Auckland 2004.
• Nicholas Reid, James Michael Liston: A Life, Victoria University Press, Wellington, 2006.
• Rick Maxwell, St Peter's College, Auckland, Simerlocy Press, Auckland, 2008.