History

 

The land was evidently sold by the Maori owners to the Crown very soon after the settlement of 1840 of Auckland, because the Government offered section of land situated between Mt Albert and the Whau for sale at a public auction on 30^th and 31^st December, 1844. They were large blocks. Glenavon School for example stands on what was originally called lot 82, 91 acres, which was situated between the present day roads Blockhouse Bay Road, Tiverton Road, Whitney Street and Margate Street. Lot 82 was not sold at the auction and must have been sold privately later, but most others were. As an example of prices, Lot 81, which consisted of the 66 acres between Blockhouse Bay Road, Matata Street, Taylor Street and Wolverton Street was sold to S H ford for seventy five pounds, eighteen shillings i.e. $151.80. From our knowledge of the early settlers in Auckland it is clear that the men who bought these blocks had no intention of living on them, they merely bought the land as a speculation in the hope of selling it later at a profit. S H Ford for example was a doctor who lived at Russell. We have no reference to the purchase of the school block, but it was in private hands up to 1949 when it was again bought by the Crown as land for housing. In 1953 the purpose was changed and it was set aside for a reserve. The school is built on what was a swampy gully. The contractors after the blackberries and gorse, had to excavate 16,000 cubic yards of earth to fill the swamp and level the site.

 

Trams never ran down Blockhouse Bay Road. They reached only as far as Avondale – the Avondale extension was opened in January 1932 and closed in January 1956. About 1928 the Auckland City Council (who were then running the trams) began a feeder bus service from Blockhouse Bay to Mt Albert, later of course curtailed to Avondale. Before this you had to walk up to Avondale and catch a bus or train from there. Horse buses were running from Avondale ( or Whau as it was then called) as far back as 1875, but there were then only two buses a day during the week – at 8am and 3pm in to town and 12 noon and 5pm out from town. On Saturdays there were also two each way – in to town at 8am and 5.30pm and out at 2pm and 10.30pm. There were no buses on Sundays. The fare was one shilling i.e. 10 cents each way – very expensive. Trains began running to Waikumete via Avondale on 29^th March, 1880. There were also two trains daily, from Auckland at 7am and 5.30pm and from Avondale at 8.20am and 6.50pm.

 

Avondale was a separate borough with its own Borough Council until 1927 when Avondale Borough amalgamated with Auckland City. It began in 1868 as the Whau Highway District, which in turn changed in 1883 to the Avondale Road District. This lasted until 1922 when the area became a Borough. Highway and road districts were run by elected boards, much the same as borough council.

 

There are about a dozen photographs of early Avondale in the city library, the Racecourse and the Mental Home, which you could see in the New Zealand section of this Department. The Library at the Auckland Institute and Museum might also have photographs of the area.

 

Glenavon School was built and opened in 1955. The school was built on the site of a former swamp. So swampy was the ground that the first bulldozer sent in to start clearing the land became stuck for a lengthy period. The contractors excavated 16 thousand cubic yards of earth-work to fill in the swamp, and where the building was erected, the ground is part of that taken from the higher ground. Tests were carried out by City Council Engineers, who discovered that the soil gave an even compactness and could be safely built upon.

 

Glenavon School thus has the distinction of being the first school in Auckland to be built entirely on fill. The school, which cost approximately 35,500 pounds is a single-storied structure covering an area of 11,000 square feet. The original school was comprised of eight standard classrooms 124 square feet in area. Four were infants, and an additional 60 square feet was for storage space.

 

 

The Glenavon area houses a population of mixed socio economic classes and comprises largely of low income earners. There is a wide range in size and quality of houses. A fifth of the homes are state houses and other homes range from good quality three-bedroom houses on well maintained sections to some quite large high quality houses. Most gardens are neat and attractive. On the whole our families are reasonably well fed, adequately clothed and enjoy a reasonable standard of living. A good many of the children come from solo parent families. A large number of children have language difficulties. A stable staff and extra teaching time is needed for special needs teaching right across the school. Special needs also includes children with special abilities.

 

Integration at school of ethnic groups is extremely good and very rarely is there any “factional” problems. The children play together at school very well and there is a family atmosphere. Parents support school functions, and to a lesser degree working bees and the like. It has become very difficult to get parent helpers in the library or for making. The lunchroom endeavours to provide healthy lunches at a reasonable cost to the children. Volunteers are paid a retainer by the Board of Trustees for running the lunchroom.

 

The majority of our parents are interested in the school and when programmes involve children there is usually a good response. Functions such as kite days, disco’s, concerts, sports days, parent and fia fia days are very well attended.