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By: John Rasmussen22nd Feb 2024 11:42AMMy father, Olaf Rasmussen (married to Jean Douglas) was the teacher at the Arapito School, possibly the last teacher before the school closed. I was born in Karamea in December 1944, and I can recall visiting the local Doctor sometime after I was 1 or 2 years old, about the time the school closed. Happy days!

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Promised Land (Arapito) School, ca 1931.

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DescriptionAs the settlers moved down from the Terrace on to the flats of the Promised Land it became evident that a school was required there.
Captain Robert Johnson supplied a section and assisted with setting up a school, probably a home with provision for a room to serve as a classroom.
A local committee was formed in 1882 and a teacher, Mr E. H. C. Plowden, was engaged, but the Education Board refused to recognise the venture.
By early 1884 the matter was resolved and an "aided" school was established, with Mr McFadgean as a teacher.
However, in June, fire destroyed the new school teacher's cottage which was situated where the Brethren hall stood near Roy Allen's home.
The Education Board acted quickly. By September approval was given the Promised Land (Arapito) school committee to erect a new school for the sum of £150 on a site about a quarter of a mile down the valley, near the home of Ken Lineham. The same year the Karamea School committee wrote to the Board complaining that pupils were being drawn from their school area to augment numbers at Promised Land (Arapito).
Pupils from the Land of Promise (Umere) side of the river came across to the new School in homemade canoes. As the crossing point was above the new School at Promised Land an argument arose as o whether the School should be re-sited further up the valley, or whether a School should be built on the Land of Promise (Umere) side.
Eventually this was resolved by the building of a School in the Land of Promise (Umere). The homemade canoes were replaced by a punt worked on wire ropes and the pulleys fixed between two huge rata trees on either side of the river. The tree on the land of Promise side survived for many years and was known as the Punt tree until it was destroyed by fire.
In 1894 a new School was erected at the cost of £150 on the same site as the previous one, which had proved inadequate.
Perhaps the most ingenious method of getting to school was used by George and Wally Johnson and other brothers and sisters when they harnessed a bull and a cow to pull their little homemade cart which was built on wheels cut from logs! They told of setting out one day with their sisters be-decked in their white starched pinafores, but the beasts of burden had apparently been too well fed on lush grass with the result that the inevitable happened and the girls had to be taken home to get their once lily white dresses laundered. Wally spent that day building a higher front on the cart!
Miss B. M. Robb began teaching in 1886, staying on next year when she became Mrs George Petit. She taught continuously till 1910, giving her the distinction of being the longest serving teacher in the district.
The roll rose from 18 to 25 by 1887 and remained static till the war years of 1914-18 when it fell to about 15 or 16.
1947 saw the school consolidated with the Karamea District High School and the empty school was later used, along with Kongahu School, to form part of the Manual Training Block.Date of Photo1931.Map^[1]ContributorClaire Ward

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Location (city or town)ArapitoKaramea

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Promised Land (Arapito) School, ca 1931.

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