Women's Institute meets one last time

The nine remaining members of Takahue WI did not find it easy to raise a smile at Tuesday's final meeting. From left, Dorothy Donaldson, Alma Powell, Jane Biddle, Christine O'Dea, Velda Berghan, Barbara Wyley, Fely Smith, Sandra Taylor and Louise Taylor.

It's gone in the Bay of Islands, the Hokianga and Northern Wairoa. Earlier this month Kaitaia's North Night gave up the fight, and on Tuesday Takahue followed suit.

Outside Whangarei, Country Women's Institute (or Women's Institute, as it became some years ago), is extinct in Northland.

Takahue and Waikuruki institutes, which could muster only nine members between them, merged last year, but that had only delayed the inevitable, Velda Berghan said on Tuesday.

The sad fact was the organisation was no longer attracting new, young members.

Mrs Berghan and institute colleague Sandra Taylor had both joined on August 16, 1967, so just made their half centuries. Ninety-one-year-old Dorothy Donaldson (Waikuruki) went back even further, to 1952.

The world had changed, Mrs Berghan added, since the institute's heyday, when membership was in the 30s, but WI's raison d'etre had not.

Years ago it had provided an opportunity for women, many living in relatively remote rural areas, to enjoy fellowship with others and to learn or share once highly-valued skills like gardening, preserving, cooking and sewing.

The 21st century did not place such value on those skills, Barbara Wyley said. Young women now bought what they wanted or needed, while the necessity of finding paid employment and other commitments deprived them of the time their parents and grandparents had had.

Not that the WI generations had time on their hands. Many of them milked cows twice a day, and between milkings they raised, clothed and fed their families.

But while Tuesday was not an occasion for celebration, the nine remaining members took some pleasure in looking back on what they and others had contributed to the community.

That contribution continued right to the end, the institute emptying its bank account and donating the contents to causes ranging from the rescue helicopter and the Kaitaia Fire Brigade to Hospice.

There was personal satisfaction too, particularly for Sandra Taylor, the only institute member in the Far North to have received the organisation's highest honour, the Gold Honours Badge, while Mrs Berghan, recipient of a Good Service Badge, said she had seen much of New Zealand thanks to her involvement.

Meanwhile the loose ends had all been tied up by Tuesday.

The trophies would remain at the Takahue Hall (where the institute had met 11 times a year since 1932), and the records and banner would go Te Ahu Heritage Museum.

The ladies plan to continue meeting once a month, just for a cup of tea and to put the world to rights, without having to worry about minutes or general business.