The Development of the Nelson provincial school system, 1842-1878

Abstract

The first settlers in Nelson arrived in the "Fife-shire" on the 1st of February 1842. They found little prepared for them and their first weeks were spent in building shelters for their families. The surveying of the town sites was not completed and the few tents and houses belonging to the Company's servants were the only buildings to be seen, while a few survey lines formed rough tracks along which the settlers moved through the manuka and rushes which covered the lower end of the town site. Heaphy, Charles. “Narrative of Residence in New Zealand” (in Fildes Collection) pub. Smith Elder, London. 1842. Pp. 101-103 Just six weeks later the first copy of the "Nelson Examiner" was published. N.E. March 12, 1842. This paper supported the cause of the education of the whole community throughout the thirty years of its existence under the editorship of J.C. Elliott, J.C. Richmond, E.W. Stafford, Alfred Domett and J.D. Greenwood. In the issue of April 2, 1842, "J. Wilson begs to inform his friends and the inhabitants of Nelson in general that he intends OPENING A SCHOOL for the instruction of children in Reading, Writing etc., on Monday next." This appears to have been the first private school established. Like other schools established at this time little is known about it. Continued advertising suggests it lasted for a short while at least.