School dedicates hall to local dad Lange

Waterlea pupil Edith Lange, daughter of the late Prime Minister, and Helen Clark share their memories. Picture / Paul Estcourt

One of the last things former Prime Minister David Lange did was to struggle from his sick bed to attend a parent-teacher evening at his daughter's school.

Yesterday the school, just down the road from Mr Lange's Mangere homestead "Waterlea", named its new school hall in his honour.

At the opening ceremony of the David Lange Memorial Hall, attended by Prime Minister Helen Clark, Mr Lange's widow, Margaret Pope, said her husband had many connections with Waterlea School.

It was named after the nearby Waterlea home, built in 1885, which had been the Lange home since 1991.

The couple's daughter Edith, who unveiled the plaque and is a pupil at the school, said of her father: "One of the last things he did when he was very sick and had trouble leaving his bed was to come down here for a parent-teacher evening."

Mr Lange was Prime Minister from 1984 to 1989, and died aged 63 on August 13 last year after a long battle with kidney failure and a rare plasma disorder, amyloidosis.

Ms Pope said he would have been surprised to have a hall named after him.

She remembered a hall Mr Lange visited in Clyde which was dedicated "by this district in gratitude for the good times between 1915 and 1917".

"David couldn't help but think about the absence of tributes to the 1980s [the period of his leadership and of wide economic reform]. But perhaps this is the first one.

"He would be very proud to have a hall named after him and honoured by the Prime Minister's presence," she said.

"Edith and I will always remember the great times we've had here."

Ms Pope had suggested that Mr Lange run for the board of trustees soon after Edith started, since he had introduced the boards to schools. He said he didn't think he would fit in - an impression that soon ended.

"He understood this is the kind of school which does its best for everyone and makes sure everyone fits in, no matter where they come from or who they are."

Helen Clark recalled Mr Lange's passion for education, which led to his serving as Minister of Education when he was Prime Minister.

"I always remember him as a big man with a big heart and the common touch."

The ceremony also took Helen Clark back to her own childhood.

Congratulating Waterlea on a show of dancing and singing , she said: "I don't even remember the tape recorder being in my school in 1960, when I was in standard four. The only programme we listened to was National Radio, just after lunch when we were all half-asleep."