Unveiling of the Restored Graves of Lake Falconer and Alice Ayson - 7th June 2015

Coinciding with Lake's 160th birthday in 1855 and on a sunny afternoon on Sunday June 7th 2015 at Taita Cemetery, thirty family and extended family came together to pay their respects to Lake and Alice Ayson on the occasion of the unveiling of their newly restored graves.

Those attendees included the last surviving grandchild, seven great grandchildren, eight great great grandchildren and three great great great grandchildren.

Alan Ayson, being the last surviving grandchild, acted as Master of Ceremonies extending a warm welcome to everyone and gave an overview of how the project had been progressed with Glover Memorials completing the work in such an expert manner. The donations from family to enable the restoration to occur so quickly was recognised and the care and attention from the contracted company to bring together such a wonderful transformation was acknowledged and thanked.

Clan Chief Hugh Francis (Great Grandson) was asked to join him for the unveiling ceremony and, after Hugh had plied the children with lollies, one of the youngest great great great grandchildren assisted with removing the tartan drapes off each headstone and plaque.

Claire Hills (Great Grand Daughter) was invited to do the blessing.

We are descended from a family with a strong Christian faith, a family who helped build and sustain churches, a family with a secure understanding of the importance of Christian community.

So, as we gather at this place today as Clan Ayson, we ask Lord for your blessing on what we are about to do.

Many of us here today are descended from the six sons of Lake Falconer Ayson and Alice Dabinett Ayson.

William Douglas Ayson

Charles Lake Ayson

Hugh Fraser Ayson

George Dabinett Ayson

Leslie Duncan Ayson

Francis (Frank) Catlins Ayson

Lord, we ask you to bless all those whose financial generosity, hard work and the gift of their time have made this day possible.

As a result of their efforts we are about to complete a job left unfinished 88 years ago.

Lord, we ask you to heal any family hurt that has damaged relationships down the generations so that as a clan, we can move on together in peace and go from strength to strength in your loving care.

We ask for your blessing Lord on us, the memorial plaque and the restoration of the graves of Lake Falconer and Alice Ayson.

The restoration and the plaque which we unveil today is a sign of remembrance, a sign of respect and a sign of our celebration of their lives as husband and wife, as parents and grandparents and the important contribution they made to the community in which they lived.

May Lake and Alice Ayson, through the loving mercy of God, rest in peace.

Alan Ayson speaks about his Grandfather Lake Falconer Ayson.

Alan Ayson Alan elaborated further on the life of Lake Falconer Ayson, his young years and career path, his long travels overseas, his trials and errors in establishing the fishing industry in New Zealand and his goals.

Lake had very clear talents and that was hard work. All the children of the early settlers would have grown up where hard work was the norm and Lake was no exception.

To bring money into the household of 14 children Lake worked on a neighbour's farm before taking up a job as a Rabbit Officer. After meeting an expert fish culturist called Mr F.S. Pillans he moved to Masterton where the hatchery became the largest in the southern hemisphere and supplied fingerlings to all the North Island and northern South Island lakes and rivers.

Having produced six boys the lives of Lake and Alice would undoubtedly have had many memorable moments when pranks were played. Alan recounted one story when a visitor arrived on a horse with a night cart trailer. While his back was turned the boys undid the girth strap from the horse with obvious consequences.

Alan described the disrepair of the graves, with broken and missing black and white tiles, the subsiding of the ground beneath and the discolouration of the unreadable headstones. It was sad that this had occurred but the result now was unbelievable. With the old tiles being European and very expensive it had been decided not to replace them at this stage but to ensure the site was filled and with drainage built in. The new surface would enable tiling to occur at any stage in the future should that be affordable and suitable.

He spoke highly of Glover Memorials who had completed the restoration and the installation of the plaque acknowledging the project.

Photo: Alan Ayson and Chief Hugh Francis with young Jove Christie assisting with the unveiling.

Lindy Daniell speaks about her Great Grandmother Alice Ayson.

We are lucky to have so many written records of Lake’s life story but when we look for information on his mother Douglas Lamond, or his wife Alice there is so much we don’t know.

So I would like to tell you what little I know about Alice with the hope that others in the family can do further research.

Alice’s father Job Dabinett (who was born in Somerset) and her mother, Alice Sophia Hector, arrived at Port Chalmers Dunedin on 1st Feb 1856 aboard the “Isabella Hercus”, a voyage taking six months. They had four children at that stage. (Mary, James, George and Charles). They were housed in the Government Barracks in Dunedin till they set out on foot to the home of relatives in Warepa. Their journey to Warepa mirrors that made by Peter and Douglas Ayson except they had the added burden of their luggage not arriving till three months later on the schooner “Pack” which came around the coast down to Port Molyneaux.

Four more children were born at Warepa, Albert, William, Alice and Katherine. So Alice was the 7th of 8 children.

The Dabinetts lived next door to the Ayson farm at Corydon and then later moved to Owaka.

Like the Aysons they would have been bringing land into production and Alice’s childhood and teenage years would have been contributing to the regular chores within the home and on the farm and also experiencing the seasonal highs and lows that farming in the far south would bring.

So living next door it is hardly surprising that romance blossomed and when Alice was 23 she married Lake on 11th June 1880 in a double wedding ceremony at Knox Church Dunedin together with Lake’s sister Douglas and James Davidson. Three years prior to their marriage, Alice’s sister Kate married Lake’s brother - Hugh Fraser Ayson

Lake and Alice produced six boys, William, Charles, Hugh, George, Leslie and Francis. My grandfather was George Dabinett Ayson.

After the birth of their 3rd child Hugh, they moved to Masterton in 1886 as Curator of the trout hatchery.

Claire and I grew up in Masterton and we remember Lake and Alice’s house. It was a typical New Zealand cottage with the front door between two windows and a curved veranda along the front. It was located on top of a small hill with a macrocarpa hedge at the back. The 13.5 acre site was leased from Mr A.W Renall and became quite a tourist attraction with its park like grounds, ponds fed by clear spring water, fish feeding and swans. Occupying the site now is the St Patricks Primary School and the MetLife Retirement Village.

One can only imagine how busy Alice would have been raising their boys and as we have heard she would have been on her own for long periods while Lake travelled overseas.

When Alice died in 1910 she had been married to Lake for 30 years. By passing away at 52 she would have been grandmother to nine grandchildren and missed out on seeing another eleven born after her death. My father, Graeme Dabinett Ayson was born in 1913 so he missed out on having Grandmother Alice.

Alice and Lake could boast to having 41 great grandchildren. And it is wonderful to have some of their great great great grandchildren here today.

In concluding - I wish I could tell you she belonged to various organisations, what her hobbies were, what her personality traits were, but I can’t.

This highlights for me the absolute urgency and importance of recording our own life story, our achievements, and the things we are proud of. No one knows more about me than I do for example.

The next stage in our web site development, after the family tree is sorted, is to have a page dedicated to the current generation so I look forward to receiving documents from you titled “This is My Story” “This is My Mother’s/Father’s Story.”

I am sure Lake and Alice would be amazed at how we communicate these days, and the huge difference between their lives and ours, but I am sure they would both be very proud that they instilled in us the importance of maintaining family traditions and standards as we are showing today with such a large contingent paying our respects.

Clan Chief Hugh Francis concludes the ceremony with his address.

Let me also give you all a very warm and hearty welcome. We are lucky with the weather as the forecast before was not good. Thank you all very much for coming, and especially those from afar. In addition I am very glad some of you brought along your family including the younger ones who I hope will not forget today.

I can vividly recall when I was about 3 or 4, Ivy my grandmother, wife of Judge Hugh Fraser Ayson brought mum and I out this way to a cemetery some 70 yrs ago - but I cannot recall exactly where it was. It must have been here. Probably more of interest to me then was the train going by, and a picnic we had by the Hutt River.

To select today was both significant and symbolic as Lake was born at Warepa Otago exactly on this day 160 years ago then lived for 72 years. Alice died about 16 years earlier aged 52.

Now how did the restoration come about?

On 18 February 2012 Dean Christie organised a Wellington gathering at Bellevue – and from this gathering it was learnt that the graves of Lake and Alice were in a terrible state. Dean took Claire and Lindy to the Taita Cemetery and they were so moved by the condition of the graves that they decided something had to be done.

Alan Ayson, and Daphne too, became involved and being the last living grandchild Alan volunteered to ensure his forebears rested in peace. He obtained quotes and found Neville McCann of Glover Memorials who did an excellent job.

Prior to this though from meetings, also at the grave site, Lindy, Alan and others formed a strategy. From a notice in the Clan Newsletter and the Clan Ayson gathering in Palmerston North in February this year, sufficient money was quickly raised by Lindy and Alan with support of partners to get the project moving. This was very rewarding and we must thank Ted Ayson of Levin for his very generous donation along with you people too that gave it the kick start.

I visited Ted while enroute today. He is poorly and sends his best wishes – he is 89 next Monday week. Ace Neame immediate past chief residing in Tauranga also sends his regards to all for a great day.

If you had of seen the poor state of the headstones before, you would note the outcome here to be simply unbelievable. Behind the grime before it was difficult to make out the names - and the broken tiles on Lake’s grave that had fallen into disrepair. I am sure Lake and Alice can now Rest In Peace.

You have heard from Alan and Lindy of the lives of these two forebears and I think we should be all proud to be linked with them and the magnificent achievements of Lake becoming Chief Inspector of Fisheries for New Zealand. In his job he travelled the world to identify the best species of trout and salmon to be introduced to New Zealand waters. At the trout hatchery at Turangi there is a notice acknowledging Lake and that he identified that place suitable to be a hatchery - and you know what a success that is today.

One of my objectives as Chief is to ensure the graves of our ancestors of that generation are kept in good order and their locations known - and also to be detailed on the Ayson website.

Lastly, a very special thank you to Lindy for organising the tartan veils, the name tags, the notices, the administration, Claire for the excellent blessing and lastly to Alan and Daphne for their time and effort to get the restoration completed and for organising the afternoon tea.

Thank you one and all for coming.

Before restoration (Photo by Alan Ayson) After restoration (Photo by Lindy Daniell)

Thank you to Dan Cooper for all the wonderful photos recording this special occasion

Alan and Daphne Ayson with Claire Hills.

Dean Christie, centre, can be very proud of the result after he organised a family gathering in 2012 where the idea for restoration emerged.

The great great great grandchildren enjoying the occasion and learning about the family