Class of '68 recall mischief of past

Former Dunedin Teachers College classmates (from left) Jocelyn "Joss'' Murray (nee Thompson),...
Former Dunedin Teachers College classmates (from left) Jocelyn "Joss'' Murray (nee Thompson), Lynda Gemmill (nee Tsukigawa), Denise Pearson (nee Whittington) and Marian "Voss'' Gibson (nee Vosseler) demonstrate the "duckwalk''. PHOTO: PETER MCINTOSH
School was definitely out for four teachers college friends yesterday, as they relived their glory days as students in Dunedin 50 years ago.

Marian "Voss'' Gibson, nee Vosseler, Denise Pearson, nee Whittington, Lynda Gemmill, nee Tsukigawa, and Jocelyn "Joss'' Murray, nee Thompson got to know each other while at the Young Women's Christian Association in Moray Pl - now 97 Motel Moray.

All attended the Dunedin Teachers College and they estimate they now have 150 years' teaching experience between them.

The once tight-knit group took the opportunity to get together again for the first time since the 1970s, at the college's class of 1968 dinner on Saturday night.

"We caught up like we've never been apart,'' Mrs Pearson said.

Since 1978, Mrs Murray has been living in Australia, and the other friends have spent their careers working around Otago, Southland and Canterbury.

Mrs Pearson, who now lives in Newhaven, South Otago, said when they were at teachers college the group used to get up to "quite a lot of mischief''.

She and Mrs Thompson, now in Christchurch, once hitchhiked to the Berwick forestry camp so Mrs Pearson could see her boyfriend.

The pair then had to climb the fences to get into the YWCA as the gates had been locked.

Each morning they used to walk the same route from Moray Pl to their lectures and they planned to do it again yesterday, Mrs Pearson said.

Sometimes they would break into a "duckwalk'' linking their arms around each other's waists.

"We were quite eccentric,'' she said.

Besides marking the beginning of their friendship, 1968 was also the year the college burned down.

Along with books and learning materials, some of the students' personal items were lost, and they had to work in a nearby lecture theatre which is still part of Otago Polytechnic.

After they left the YWCA, the group stayed together, living in Dundas St with another flatmate, who has since died.

Mrs Gemmill, who recently retired from her role as a counsellor at East Otago High School and has taught at schools including Logan Park High School in Dunedin, said it was ``amazing'' to see all her old classmates again.

"We had so much fun. It wasn't something that you would ever want to lose.''

elena.mcphee@odt.co.nz

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