As a 14-year-old Wellington schoolgirl, my mother, Ngaire, was chosen for an international broadcast of the 1939 Empire Day greeting on May 24 to King George VI. As a presenter on 2YA’s daily children’s show, Ngaire was no stranger to the microphone, but the occasion earned her some fame. She was collected very early one morning in a government car from her parents’ home by James (later Sir James) Shelley, director of broadcasting, and driven to the 2YA studio to record the message. The one stumbling block was that overseas broadcasters couldn’t pronounce her Māori name – so they went with her middle name, Joyce, for the occasion.
She also got paid for it – 5 guineas ($10.50) – and the photograph taken of her later by Spencer Digby was used on the cover of the very first edition of the New Zealand Listener, which was distributed free to every household in the country.
If all goes well, Mum will celebrate her 100th birthday on Monday, October 7. Our family is grateful to the Listener for recognising this significant event in our lives. Her progress through life has been acknowledged with interviews to mark the magazine’s milestones – the 10th anniversary in 1949, the 25th in 1964, and in 1999 for the 60th.
Ngaire was one of four daughters born in Wellington to Scottish immigrants William and Jean McKenzie. All four girls attended Te Aro Primary School, and Mum’s secondary schooling was at Wellington Technical College, where she had her heart set on going to university and training as a teacher. Those hopes were dashed by her mother, who insisted she get a job and contribute to the family’s finances during the hard economic times of the 1930s. A great pity, because Mum would have been a fantastic teacher.
After leaving school, Mum worked as a clerk for AMP Insurance at its head office in Wellington. She met her future husband, Ian Darby, through their mutual enjoyment of tennis, at which both were competitive and successful players. World War II had broken out and Dad was keen to serve but too young to enlist. His ambition to fly was realised when he gained direct entry to the Royal Navy’s Fleet Air Arm. He travelled to the UK in 1942 and was deployed with the British Pacific Fleet. He and his pilot were shot down on August 10, 1945, and they spent the last month of the war as POWs. Dad arrived back in New Zealand in November 1945 as a lieutenant, aged 23.
Marriage followed in 1946 and Dad trained as a radiographer at Wellington Hospital, then moved to Christchurch for work and later Hawke’s Bay. Mum had wanted several children, but nature decided otherwise. My brother John was born in August 1949, and I in December 1952. John and I have been extremely fortunate in our choice of parents, with a stable and loving upbringing. We knew we had the best mother in the world.
In 2019, the Listener interviewed her again, aged 94, for a story about ageing well; she had only just given up volunteer work, helping out with morning teas at her church, because she was too busy looking after Dad.
Dad died in February 2020, just a few days after his 97th birthday. They had been married for 73 years. Mum later bought a villa in a retirement village in Taradale, Napier, where she remains independent and mentally sharp, if somewhat physically frail now. A weekly highlight is the delivery of her copy of the Listener, a constant in her life. Ngaire is deeply loved by her two sons, three grandsons and eight great-grandchildren. We marvel at the enormous change she has witnessed in her lifetime.
David Darby is a sheep and cattle farmer from Pōrangahau in Hawke’s Bay.
