FRYER, William Thomas Stanley (Stan)
Born 1884; died 29 November 1918; buried 30 November 1918; age 35
The FRYER family lived in Happy Valley Road, one end then forming part of the wider Brooklyn district, and like his father, Stan worked in different labouring jobs to support his five children born between 1903 and 1918.
Stan was a Wellingtonian born and bred. His parents were John Fryer (1837 to 1902), Surrey-born [i], but a Vogeltown resident from at least the time of his marriage to Stan’s mother, a New Zealander, Sarah Ann CLIFTON (born in Lower Hutt in 1856, died 1919). John and Sarah married in early 1877, in the Ohiro Valley house of her stepfather, one G W SHORT. The Short family were very early pakeha residents of Brooklyn and many reminders of their presence, such as Short Street in Vogeltown and Reuben Avenue in Brooklyn, remain to this day [ii]. Harry Short was an old family friend of the founding Fitchett family who farmed in the Ohiro part of Brooklyn and had been permitted by John Fitchett [iii] to prospect for gold on his land in the wider area. (Other Short family connections included JA Short, the Brooklyn plumber, gasfitter, and drainlayer whose business premises were based in Cleveland Street for many years and the Short auction rooms on Willis Street).
Stan, born in 1884, was the first son for John and Sarah, who had already had four daughters between 1877 and 1883 – Charlotte Annie (1877), May Florence (1880), Eva Matilda (1881) and Myrtle Alice (1883). Six years later a younger brother, James Henry, known as Jim, was born. In 1896 Stan acquired a new ‘sibling’, Dorothy who was born to his oldest sister, Annie, but taken on by her grandparents as if she were one of their own.
The Fryer children were pupils at Vogeltown School from the time it opened in September 1883 with provision for 34 learners. At that time, the school was sited on the knoll on Mornington Road opposite the current site of the Vogelmorn Bowling Club. Stan’s oldest sister Annie was among its foundation pupils, being the 7th child to be enrolled [iv].
Stan’s schooldays began in 1890 at Vogeltown School when he was 5 years and 2 months old [v]. In common with his siblings, Stan completed his education at primary level in 1896; he did not stay long enough to achieve proficiency in the senior standard [vi]. None of the Fryer children have achievement levels recorded at different standards, perhaps showing erratic attendance.
Stan’s sister May Florence died in 1900 aged 20 and was buried in Karori Cemetery in the Public 2 section in the same plot as James Henry Fryer who had died in 1898 aged 70. James was Stan’s paternal uncle, and the namesake of his brother ‘Jim’.
Two years after this tragedy, John Fryer died, in August 1902, by which time he was 70 years old. A lifetime of labouring had no doubt taken its physical toll, but since 1893 his occupation had been that of candle maker, which was probably less physically demanding work. He was buried with his daughter and brother in the Public 2 section of Karori Cemetery. Members of the Excelsior Lodge of Druids, number 97, to which John had belonged, were ‘requested to attend the funeral of their late Brother’ [vii].
By the time Stan married Isabella Maud LUSTY [viii] in 1905 (she was known as Maud) they had already had their first child, Cyril William, known as Bill, born in 1903 [ix] in Ohinemuri, in the Waikato. It is not known why they were resident in the Waikato at the time.
By 1905 they had moved back to Wellington and were living in what was then called Happy Valley Road, and is now Ohiro Road. This road is the continuation of Ohiro Road which today runs south through Brooklyn village straight down to Owhiro Bay on the south coast of the North Island, but unlike today, where the change from one road to another occurs a fair way down Happy Valley, in 1918 (according to Stone’s street directory) the last house in Ohiro Rd was at number 154. After this, in 1918, the road was then named Happy Valley Road all the way to Owhiro Bay on the south coast [x].
Maud and Stan went on to have further children: John Stanley was born in 1905, Maude Olive followed in 1907, and Eva Thelma in 1909. In early 1911 Gilbert Thomas was born but he failed to thrive and died when only 5 weeks old. He too was buried in Karori Cemetery, in an infant’s plot in the first Public section [xi]. The birth of Walter James in March 1918 completed the Fryer brood.
Stan appeared before the magistrate on more than one occasion for allowing stock to wander for which a 5-shilling fine and court costs of 7 shillings must have been an unwelcome expense on a tight income [xii]. January 1915 was an especially unfortunate month for Stan as the day before his court appearance for the stock wandering episode, he was also fined for breaching the city bylaws by driving a motor car without a showing a tail light [xiii].
In 1917, Stan was called up for military service in World War I and placed on the reserve roll, in the second division, in category ‘E’ meaning he had five dependents, a wife, and at the time, four children.
When he got sick with influenza, Stan was taken to the 32-bed temporary hospital that had been set up in Brooklyn School and it was there he died on 29 November 1918. The baby of the family, Walter, was just 8 months old.
Stan’s funeral took place the next day, and he was buried in his own plot in the Public 2 section of Karori Cemetery. Maud paid for his plot on 31 October 1919, and had inscribed on one of two plaques on his headstone:
In Loving Memory of
William Thomas Stanley
(Stan)
Beloved husband of
Isabella Maud FRYER
Died 29 Nov 1918
Aged 35 years
Dearly loved, sadly missed
Maud inserted an In Memoriam notice in 1919 and followed this with many more in subsequent years. Further memorial notices were published from Stan’s sisters, his nieces, and his brother Jim in 1919, 1920, 1921, 1922, and 1924.
In 1922 Maud’s notice said:
‘Sweet is the word, “remembrance”,
And this a wish to show
We still hold you in remembrance
As the years come and go.’
Maud never remarried. Her last years were spent at 25 Waripori Street in Berhampore. When she died in 1948, aged 65, she was buried with Stan. Her presence in the grave is not marked by any inscription on the second (left side) plaque on the headstone but cemetery/burial records confirm that she was buried there on 13 August 1948.
Her father, William John Walter Lusty had also been buried in Karori when he died in 1893. A few months after he was buried, his wife Elizabeth applied on 4 September 1893 for a permit to move her husband’s body to a different plot she had purchased elsewhere in Karori Cemetery. According to the application held by Archives New Zealand, Wellington [xiv], the Office of the Colonial Secretary gave instructions to prepare a permit the same day Elizabeth applied and one was granted the very next day and sent to Elizabeth on 6 September. Such administrative speed!
Researched and written by Jenny Robertson
Grave Information:
Section: PUBLIC2
Plot: 284 J
Sources:
[i] At least two other Fryer brothers migrated to New Zealand, William Thomas (1831 to 1888) and James Henry (1828 to 1898).
[ii] Reuben Avenue was named after Reuben Short, a Fitchett farm employee according to Fanny Irvine-Smith The streets of my city, published AH and AW Reed, Wellington, 2nd ed, 1949, page 237.
[iii] Early Brooklyn Revisited Joy Vickers and Ashton J Fitchett, Northland Print, Wellington, 1998, page 24.
[iv] Vogeltown School records are held by the Turnbull Library in Wellington, deposited there by Brooklyn School.
[v] New Zealand Society of Genealogists, Kiwi Collection version 2, 2015 on disk
[vi] The Vogeltown School building was moved from what is now Mornington Road to the present Brooklyn School site in Washington Avenue in 1898 where it was later renamed and expanded further as the suburb’s population grew and the suburb expanded.
[vii] Stan’s mother Sarah married again in 1906 to Archibald Alfred McNeil RICE (1869 to 1935). She continued for some years to live in Happy Valley Road, but later moved to the Main Road, Lower Hutt where she died in March 1919.
[viii] School records are also informative on the schooling of Isabella Maud LUSTY who married Stan in 1905. She was born in 1882 to William John Walter Lusty, a carpenter born in 1858 in Wellington, Somerset, England and Elizabeth SLARKS or STARKES, born in Wellington, New Zealand in 1860, who married on Lambton Quay, in September 1876. Both were underage and already had their first son, Walter who had been born earlier the same year.
William Lusty worked on various building contracts around the city including the construction of the spire on St Peter’s Church in Willis Street. The Evening Post of 25 July 1879 tells something of the health and safety struggles contractors had in working at height even on churches.
A man named W. Lusty, residing in Thompson-street, while working in the tower of St. Peter's new church, in Willis-street, yesterday afternoon, inadvertently stepped on a loose beam, which canted over and precipitated him a distance of 43 feet. He alighted upon his back on the joist below, and was picked up in an insensible condition and conveyed to Dr. Kesteven's. It is feared that he has sustained severe internal injuries, besides a slight fracture of the left arm and some contusions, as he is spitting blood and unable to move.
Fortunately, Maud’s father survived and recovered; the Lusty family grew to seven children (five girls of whom Maud was the fourth child and second daughter, and two sons) born between 1876 and 1893. Living in Thompson Street on the city fringe of Brooklyn, Maud attended Te Aro Infants’ School, Te Aro School, Mt Cook Girls’ School, and finally Thorndon School. Maud’s father was also a well-known bandsman in the city and although he survived the serious fall from St Peter’s Church in Willis Street, he died suddenly in 1893, at only 37 while Maud was still at school.
A report in the Evening Post of 15 May 1893 records:
Mr William Lusty, a well-known bandsman — having been successively a member of Cimino's old Artillery and Naval Brigade Bands, Gray's, and of late years Jupp's— died in the Hospital last evening from abscess on the brain. Deceased leaves a widow and six children [seven are listed in BDM with the last born in 1893] quite unprovided for. He will be remembered as the carpenter who fell off St. Peters Church building when it was in course of erection, and was very seriously injured. Jupp's Band will play at the funeral tomorrow, and also invites the aid of members of other bands in the city.
The aid mentioned resulted in a Wellington benefit concert by various bands from which the proceeds were given to Elizabeth to help her financially. Maud’s mother Elizabeth did not remarry for 10 further years, bringing up her family in Wellington and doubtless providing a good role model for Maud when she was confronted by the same sudden loss of her husband and children’s breadwinner.
[ix] Birth first registered in 1928. Bill became a bootmaker.
[x] The 1918 Stone’s directory shows Mrs Isaac Short as living at 162 Happy Valley Road which would have been close to the Brooklyn village intersection in 1918.
[xi] Another child called Gilbert Leslie Fryer was also born in 1911, to Dorothy Fryer, John’s sister/niece. No father’s details were registered.
[xii] Evening Post 6 August 1909, Dominion 30 January 1915, and Evening Post 1 September 1916.
[xiii] Evening Post 29 January 1915.
[xiv] Archives New Zealand, Wellington, ACGO 8333/645 Rec 1893/2779 Lusty, Elizabeth
Born 1884; died 29 November 1918; buried 30 November 1918; age 35
The FRYER family lived in Happy Valley Road, one end then forming part of the wider Brooklyn district, and like his father, Stan worked in different labouring jobs to support his five children born between 1903 and 1918.
Stan was a Wellingtonian born and bred. His parents were John Fryer (1837 to 1902), Surrey-born [i], but a Vogeltown resident from at least the time of his marriage to Stan’s mother, a New Zealander, Sarah Ann CLIFTON (born in Lower Hutt in 1856, died 1919). John and Sarah married in early 1877, in the Ohiro Valley house of her stepfather, one G W SHORT. The Short family were very early pakeha residents of Brooklyn and many reminders of their presence, such as Short Street in Vogeltown and Reuben Avenue in Brooklyn, remain to this day [ii]. Harry Short was an old family friend of the founding Fitchett family who farmed in the Ohiro part of Brooklyn and had been permitted by John Fitchett [iii] to prospect for gold on his land in the wider area. (Other Short family connections included JA Short, the Brooklyn plumber, gasfitter, and drainlayer whose business premises were based in Cleveland Street for many years and the Short auction rooms on Willis Street).
Stan, born in 1884, was the first son for John and Sarah, who had already had four daughters between 1877 and 1883 – Charlotte Annie (1877), May Florence (1880), Eva Matilda (1881) and Myrtle Alice (1883). Six years later a younger brother, James Henry, known as Jim, was born. In 1896 Stan acquired a new ‘sibling’, Dorothy who was born to his oldest sister, Annie, but taken on by her grandparents as if she were one of their own.
The Fryer children were pupils at Vogeltown School from the time it opened in September 1883 with provision for 34 learners. At that time, the school was sited on the knoll on Mornington Road opposite the current site of the Vogelmorn Bowling Club. Stan’s oldest sister Annie was among its foundation pupils, being the 7th child to be enrolled [iv].
Stan’s schooldays began in 1890 at Vogeltown School when he was 5 years and 2 months old [v]. In common with his siblings, Stan completed his education at primary level in 1896; he did not stay long enough to achieve proficiency in the senior standard [vi]. None of the Fryer children have achievement levels recorded at different standards, perhaps showing erratic attendance.
Stan’s sister May Florence died in 1900 aged 20 and was buried in Karori Cemetery in the Public 2 section in the same plot as James Henry Fryer who had died in 1898 aged 70. James was Stan’s paternal uncle, and the namesake of his brother ‘Jim’.
Two years after this tragedy, John Fryer died, in August 1902, by which time he was 70 years old. A lifetime of labouring had no doubt taken its physical toll, but since 1893 his occupation had been that of candle maker, which was probably less physically demanding work. He was buried with his daughter and brother in the Public 2 section of Karori Cemetery. Members of the Excelsior Lodge of Druids, number 97, to which John had belonged, were ‘requested to attend the funeral of their late Brother’ [vii].
By the time Stan married Isabella Maud LUSTY [viii] in 1905 (she was known as Maud) they had already had their first child, Cyril William, known as Bill, born in 1903 [ix] in Ohinemuri, in the Waikato. It is not known why they were resident in the Waikato at the time.
By 1905 they had moved back to Wellington and were living in what was then called Happy Valley Road, and is now Ohiro Road. This road is the continuation of Ohiro Road which today runs south through Brooklyn village straight down to Owhiro Bay on the south coast of the North Island, but unlike today, where the change from one road to another occurs a fair way down Happy Valley, in 1918 (according to Stone’s street directory) the last house in Ohiro Rd was at number 154. After this, in 1918, the road was then named Happy Valley Road all the way to Owhiro Bay on the south coast [x].
Maud and Stan went on to have further children: John Stanley was born in 1905, Maude Olive followed in 1907, and Eva Thelma in 1909. In early 1911 Gilbert Thomas was born but he failed to thrive and died when only 5 weeks old. He too was buried in Karori Cemetery, in an infant’s plot in the first Public section [xi]. The birth of Walter James in March 1918 completed the Fryer brood.
Stan appeared before the magistrate on more than one occasion for allowing stock to wander for which a 5-shilling fine and court costs of 7 shillings must have been an unwelcome expense on a tight income [xii]. January 1915 was an especially unfortunate month for Stan as the day before his court appearance for the stock wandering episode, he was also fined for breaching the city bylaws by driving a motor car without a showing a tail light [xiii].
In 1917, Stan was called up for military service in World War I and placed on the reserve roll, in the second division, in category ‘E’ meaning he had five dependents, a wife, and at the time, four children.
When he got sick with influenza, Stan was taken to the 32-bed temporary hospital that had been set up in Brooklyn School and it was there he died on 29 November 1918. The baby of the family, Walter, was just 8 months old.
Stan’s funeral took place the next day, and he was buried in his own plot in the Public 2 section of Karori Cemetery. Maud paid for his plot on 31 October 1919, and had inscribed on one of two plaques on his headstone:
In Loving Memory of
William Thomas Stanley
(Stan)
Beloved husband of
Isabella Maud FRYER
Died 29 Nov 1918
Aged 35 years
Dearly loved, sadly missed
Maud inserted an In Memoriam notice in 1919 and followed this with many more in subsequent years. Further memorial notices were published from Stan’s sisters, his nieces, and his brother Jim in 1919, 1920, 1921, 1922, and 1924.
In 1922 Maud’s notice said:
‘Sweet is the word, “remembrance”,
And this a wish to show
We still hold you in remembrance
As the years come and go.’
Maud never remarried. Her last years were spent at 25 Waripori Street in Berhampore. When she died in 1948, aged 65, she was buried with Stan. Her presence in the grave is not marked by any inscription on the second (left side) plaque on the headstone but cemetery/burial records confirm that she was buried there on 13 August 1948.
Her father, William John Walter Lusty had also been buried in Karori when he died in 1893. A few months after he was buried, his wife Elizabeth applied on 4 September 1893 for a permit to move her husband’s body to a different plot she had purchased elsewhere in Karori Cemetery. According to the application held by Archives New Zealand, Wellington [xiv], the Office of the Colonial Secretary gave instructions to prepare a permit the same day Elizabeth applied and one was granted the very next day and sent to Elizabeth on 6 September. Such administrative speed!
Researched and written by Jenny Robertson
Grave Information:
Section: PUBLIC2
Plot: 284 J
Sources:
[i] At least two other Fryer brothers migrated to New Zealand, William Thomas (1831 to 1888) and James Henry (1828 to 1898).
[ii] Reuben Avenue was named after Reuben Short, a Fitchett farm employee according to Fanny Irvine-Smith The streets of my city, published AH and AW Reed, Wellington, 2nd ed, 1949, page 237.
[iii] Early Brooklyn Revisited Joy Vickers and Ashton J Fitchett, Northland Print, Wellington, 1998, page 24.
[iv] Vogeltown School records are held by the Turnbull Library in Wellington, deposited there by Brooklyn School.
[v] New Zealand Society of Genealogists, Kiwi Collection version 2, 2015 on disk
[vi] The Vogeltown School building was moved from what is now Mornington Road to the present Brooklyn School site in Washington Avenue in 1898 where it was later renamed and expanded further as the suburb’s population grew and the suburb expanded.
[vii] Stan’s mother Sarah married again in 1906 to Archibald Alfred McNeil RICE (1869 to 1935). She continued for some years to live in Happy Valley Road, but later moved to the Main Road, Lower Hutt where she died in March 1919.
[viii] School records are also informative on the schooling of Isabella Maud LUSTY who married Stan in 1905. She was born in 1882 to William John Walter Lusty, a carpenter born in 1858 in Wellington, Somerset, England and Elizabeth SLARKS or STARKES, born in Wellington, New Zealand in 1860, who married on Lambton Quay, in September 1876. Both were underage and already had their first son, Walter who had been born earlier the same year.
William Lusty worked on various building contracts around the city including the construction of the spire on St Peter’s Church in Willis Street. The Evening Post of 25 July 1879 tells something of the health and safety struggles contractors had in working at height even on churches.
A man named W. Lusty, residing in Thompson-street, while working in the tower of St. Peter's new church, in Willis-street, yesterday afternoon, inadvertently stepped on a loose beam, which canted over and precipitated him a distance of 43 feet. He alighted upon his back on the joist below, and was picked up in an insensible condition and conveyed to Dr. Kesteven's. It is feared that he has sustained severe internal injuries, besides a slight fracture of the left arm and some contusions, as he is spitting blood and unable to move.
Fortunately, Maud’s father survived and recovered; the Lusty family grew to seven children (five girls of whom Maud was the fourth child and second daughter, and two sons) born between 1876 and 1893. Living in Thompson Street on the city fringe of Brooklyn, Maud attended Te Aro Infants’ School, Te Aro School, Mt Cook Girls’ School, and finally Thorndon School. Maud’s father was also a well-known bandsman in the city and although he survived the serious fall from St Peter’s Church in Willis Street, he died suddenly in 1893, at only 37 while Maud was still at school.
A report in the Evening Post of 15 May 1893 records:
Mr William Lusty, a well-known bandsman — having been successively a member of Cimino's old Artillery and Naval Brigade Bands, Gray's, and of late years Jupp's— died in the Hospital last evening from abscess on the brain. Deceased leaves a widow and six children [seven are listed in BDM with the last born in 1893] quite unprovided for. He will be remembered as the carpenter who fell off St. Peters Church building when it was in course of erection, and was very seriously injured. Jupp's Band will play at the funeral tomorrow, and also invites the aid of members of other bands in the city.
The aid mentioned resulted in a Wellington benefit concert by various bands from which the proceeds were given to Elizabeth to help her financially. Maud’s mother Elizabeth did not remarry for 10 further years, bringing up her family in Wellington and doubtless providing a good role model for Maud when she was confronted by the same sudden loss of her husband and children’s breadwinner.
[ix] Birth first registered in 1928. Bill became a bootmaker.
[x] The 1918 Stone’s directory shows Mrs Isaac Short as living at 162 Happy Valley Road which would have been close to the Brooklyn village intersection in 1918.
[xi] Another child called Gilbert Leslie Fryer was also born in 1911, to Dorothy Fryer, John’s sister/niece. No father’s details were registered.
[xii] Evening Post 6 August 1909, Dominion 30 January 1915, and Evening Post 1 September 1916.
[xiii] Evening Post 29 January 1915.
[xiv] Archives New Zealand, Wellington, ACGO 8333/645 Rec 1893/2779 Lusty, Elizabeth