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Growing up in Barrytown.
My Story
DescriptionI grew up in a West Coast Pub, the same pub my father grew up in, the same pub my grandparents built in about 1923. The All Nations Hotel, Barrytown. When I was growing up in the fifties Barrytown was an isolated community. The roads were prone to slips and at Rapahoe the road ran alongside the sea and I can still remember my father driving his trusty Vauxhall through the foam. It wasn't an easy trip to Greymouth and it took an hour to drive it. Westport was out of the question as it was two and a half hours away. So we had to make the best of what we had. The hotel had ten acres of land so we had a big veggie garden which my father was in charge of and we also had an orchard. We had hens and we fattened a pig and we also had a house cow. The cow provided milk and butter. From the time my older brother, sister and I were old enough we each had to take turns at hand milking the cow before we went to school. You either loved it or loathed it, I didn't mind. School was right next door so we came home for lunch which was usually girdle scones or pikelets which we wolfed down and ran right back to school. When I was six Mum went away(and she never went away)and my grandmother came to help look after us. When she came home she had a baby(my little brother). We were never told that she was having a baby so it was a big surprise and for years I thought she had gone to town and bought him.
As kids we spent a lot of time in the bush building tree huts, chopping down trees or investigating the old gold mining shafts. We also played for hours in the creek damming it and I remember building a raft out of claddie sticks and expecting it to float when we hopped on it. When the flax mill closed down we would go and play in it with one of us pulling on the belts while the other fed fern fronds into it. We built sledges and rode them down the slippery banks, pouring water on the bank to make the ride more exciting. In the Christmas holidays we took over the school swimming pool and spent hours there. Nobody worried about an adult having to be there to watch you. If we went home you were more than likely to be given a'job' so it was safer to stay away and only went home when we were hungry.
I was brought up that children were to be seen but not heard. So we had to behave ourselves being in a hotel, never to answer back, always speak when spoken to. When it got very busy we would have to help in the bar by washing glasses or in the kitchen with cooking and washing dishes and also wait on tables. I never liked doing any of it, I just did it because I had to. We had a lot of boarders, men who were working in the bush or men who were putting in the automatic telephone exchange or looking for uranium in behind Punakaiki. So we had to help with breakfasts for the men and they would pay us kids to do their washing and ironing.
We rode our bikes for miles, going for bike rides on the gravel roads to see the other kids in the district or we would call on the elderly residents who were always welcoming with a cuppa and we'd give them any news.
When we got to high school we had to board at the Greymouth High school hostel. The hostel life was some of the best days of my childhood and we made lifelong friendships. When I was eighteen my parents sold the hotel and we all moved to Christchurch and that is another story!ContributorMaye DunnDate of story events1948 to 1966Map[1]
As kids we spent a lot of time in the bush building tree huts, chopping down trees or investigating the old gold mining shafts. We also played for hours in the creek damming it and I remember building a raft out of claddie sticks and expecting it to float when we hopped on it. When the flax mill closed down we would go and play in it with one of us pulling on the belts while the other fed fern fronds into it. We built sledges and rode them down the slippery banks, pouring water on the bank to make the ride more exciting. In the Christmas holidays we took over the school swimming pool and spent hours there. Nobody worried about an adult having to be there to watch you. If we went home you were more than likely to be given a'job' so it was safer to stay away and only went home when we were hungry.
I was brought up that children were to be seen but not heard. So we had to behave ourselves being in a hotel, never to answer back, always speak when spoken to. When it got very busy we would have to help in the bar by washing glasses or in the kitchen with cooking and washing dishes and also wait on tables. I never liked doing any of it, I just did it because I had to. We had a lot of boarders, men who were working in the bush or men who were putting in the automatic telephone exchange or looking for uranium in behind Punakaiki. So we had to help with breakfasts for the men and they would pay us kids to do their washing and ironing.
We rode our bikes for miles, going for bike rides on the gravel roads to see the other kids in the district or we would call on the elderly residents who were always welcoming with a cuppa and we'd give them any news.
When we got to high school we had to board at the Greymouth High school hostel. The hostel life was some of the best days of my childhood and we made lifelong friendships. When I was eighteen my parents sold the hotel and we all moved to Christchurch and that is another story!ContributorMaye DunnDate of story events1948 to 1966Map[1]
West Coast New Zealand History (16th Sep 2015). Growing up in Barrytown.. In Website West Coast New Zealand History. Retrieved 1st Apr 2026 17:51, from https://westcoast.recollect.co.nz/nodes/view/947