SANDWICHED between the waterfront and the once dusty, gravelled roads of Lautoka’s central business district, the school has offered a cocoon for students in the past 90-years of its existence.
Its presiding nuns enforced a rigid routine for children – some fresh from infancy and others already bulking with the form of youth, and just as their innocent voices would flow out from the parish into the bustling traffic in harmonious devotion, so too did their labour extend to mangrove planting along the seafront.
“It started on 28th January and named after St Thomas, the patron saint of the Indians,” school records confirmed.
With its history of European students and the city’s Colonial Sugar Refinery (CSR) population in the early 1900s, it may surprise some that it was initially established as an Archdiocese school for the educational needs of Fijians of Indian descent children, and not European students, who actually joined later.
Similarly in Suva, St Thomas Indian School was established earlier in 1897 for Fijians of Indian descent students, and was to be later known as St Columbus, and what is now Marist Brothers Primary School.
In the West, the thriving port town had sprung up around the Lautoka mill, and had a growing Catholic presence, with the construction of the church earlier funded by the family of Reverend Fr Arsene Laplante, a Marist Father from Washington, US, who had volunteered for missionary work in the South Seas.
Mother Bernard
Accredited as the founder of the school, Mother Bernard probably didn’t realise the extent of her humble labour at the time.
She came to Fiji in 1925 with Sr Dorothy and then Sr Austin, with records noting that they resided in tiny rooms towards the back of the Catholic church that had just been completed before their arrival. All their cooking was carried out under a nearby lemon tree.
A letter sent to Mother Bernard from the bishop on January 18, 1925 stated that the school’s installation would be catered by the mission.
Some of the challenges of these formative 20s were shared in a letter addressed to her peer Mother Eamon in 1961.
“During 1926, the Europeans wanted a school for their children, but as these children were all non-Catholics, we refused that project, though substantial fees were guaranteed,” she wrote.
One of the foundation pupils included Luke Vuidrekei, who would later make recollections in a message to mark its 50th anniversary in 1975.
“Before the school was opened in 1925, several Lautoka children were attending school at St Joan of Arc at Qereqere, Nasigatoka,” he noted. Like others, he boarded in Sigatoka for school and when St Thomas opened, he and a host of other students returned home to continue education in Lautoka.
Among the earliest teachers at the school was George Geborees.
“His task was difficult, dealing with great, big, husky boys from Namoli koro among us eight-year-olds,” Mr Vuidreketi related.
“Once it was touch and go when one of the big boys shaped up, tried to give George a boxing lesson or two, just for being ashamed to be corrected openly in class.”
Racial segregation
It wasn’t long before student roll flourished and a Fr Boudier oversaw the construction of its part-European section from an old church building that sat on the edge of the sprawling property.
In 1928, the European section of the school began operations from a convent building.
“Sr Maur taught all the senior boys in the church,” the school records noted.
A swell in numbers meant that a parish hall had to be used as a classroom in 1939, when Fr Walter was then made the parish priest.
The school would continually grow as a key centre of education for Lautoka students, who were housed in classes according to their ethnicities.
During classes, Fijians of Indian descent students used a building called St Thomas Primary School, while European students were put in the Convent School (which presently houses the school office). By 1951, I Taukei children were housed with the part-Europeans and Chinese students in the St John Bosco building, which is now the school’s canteen area.
By 1951, native Fijian children were transferred from the Indian to part-European section of the school. Four years later, the European and “Euronesian” sections of the school were combined,” records noted.
Despite the racial segregation of school lessons, former students from these times have attested that colour didn’t matter outside classes as they would all mingle freely.
The racial divisions of these classes ceased by the late 50s and, the three “schools” of St Thomas, St John Bosco and the Convent School merged into a single institution. It retained its founding name of St Thomas.
Developments
“In 1931, Lautoka’s first parish priest, Fr Roe, arrived. Until then, Fr J.M Helliet and Fr Claudius travelled from Ba.”
That same year, the school, which faced the sea, would bow to the force of a hurricane that left behind extensive damage.
In 1932, Mother Benedict returned to NZ. The convent was re-constructed and the European section of the school was built, with two classrooms on ground floor, below the hall.
“Fr Roe gave about 100 towards this building with the understanding that the hall could be used by the parishioners when necessary. The bishop also lent 150 for the building. When Mother Bernard repaid this money, the bishop gave it to Varoka (Ba) for their building,” the records noted.
Mother Bernard took her place at the school again in 1933, which by then work had started on the presbytery that now sits next to the church, in front of the school.
In her letter to Mother Eamon, she also noted that the nuns, who were promised a priest by the bishop if a presbytery was built, worked hard to get this done.
A new parish hall was blessed by Bishop Foley in 1956 and some of the nuns who served at the school included Sisters Alexius, Bernadine, Amadeus, Zita, Paula, Antonia, Nolasco, Ann Marie, Wilfred, Jerome, Rosina, Regina and Mary Malachy.
In 1966, a new Catholic church was blessed and opened by then the Archbishop-elect Foley.
Hurricane Bebe hit in 1972 and a year later, the front garden of the school was cleared to lay the foundation of a new presbytery, where the Columban fathers moved to in 1974.
The convent that housed European students included boarders such as the Watson siblings from Sigatoka, who were enrolled therein the 1950s.
“We would stay at the convent during the week and get picked up by our father on Friday afternoons and return home for the weekend,” remembers Valda Watson, who attended the school with her sisters, Judy and Beverley and their brother Graham.
Other boarders included children from Ba and Nakauvadra.
“It was the 40s and we were all very small, primas. And because we stayed in the convent with the nuns, we led their lives and attended mass every day, and dined when they did. They were strict but good fun and I would say that their teachings shaped my character.”
Her father worked for the CSR Company in Lomawai, outside Sigatoka and she and her siblings were kept well occupied during the week.
“Mother Claudia, Sr Claire and Sr John taught us and we had very intensive schooling, with piano and sewing lessons that kept us busy all the time.”
St Thomas High School
Primary school classes went up to sixth grade, and towards the end of the 70s, a block was built to house seventh and eighth graders at St Thomas Primary School.
By 1976, a decision had been reached to relocate the high school and a piece of land was purchased at Natabua for this purpose.
“The parishioners of Lautoka worked tirelessly, raising funds for the high school,” school records noted.
“It took 10 solid years of fundraising by the parents and parishioners to get the high school to Form 6 level. The high school was self-sufficient but the 10 years in which we had concentrated on the high school took its toll on the infrastructure of the parish, and the primary school.”
The high school was opened in early 1977, and also marked its anniversary in Lautoka this past week.
Life lessons
Those who graduated from St Thomas Primary School included a host of distinguished personnel and many who would find careers in law, education, sports and civil service, to name a few.
One former pupil, a Lautoka lawyer who enrolled in the school in 1941, recalled that the kindness of the Sisters was balanced with the strict discipline of teachers such as Andrew Moti and Hari Charan.
“The most unusual extracurricular activity was the planting of mangroves to prevent erosion of the seafront,” noted Surendra Prasad in a piece written for the school’s golden jubilee souvenir booklet in 1975.
“Periodically each class would go under the supervision of senior students and plant mangroves a few chains away from the high water mark between the mainland and Bekana Is.”
Although this was the most disliked activity for many students, he noted that it played an important part in soil preservation and the prevention of erosion for a portion of the town.
In the 40s, extracurricular activities would also include welcome ceremonies for the batches of NZ and US servicemen who periodically arrived by ship and landed at the old CSR wharf. St Thomas’ students would be taken there to cheer the troops on as they arrived.
“Prayers formed the integral part of the school life. Apart from the usual daily prayers several times a day, special prayers were said on special occasions. Stress on prayer and religious teaching contributed greatly to the high standards of the pupils and it gave them complete confidence in their work and studies.”
In gratitude
This past week witnessed swells of former scholars and alumni converge to mark the school’s 90th anniversary, an occasion that provided lively reminisces of lessons and activities over several generations.
“One of the goals of the reunion has been to honour the memory of all those nuns who taught at the school,” said Dr Louise William, a former pupil and member of the event’s organizing committee.
“And to remember the legacy they passed on, not only academically but in terms of the values they taught, which has helped and carried many of us through in life.”
As Dr William aptly noted, many of these Sisters had left the comfort of their developed countries to teach in what was then a more primitive Fiji in the early 1920s and beyond, and their sacrifices also lifted the standard of education, to the benefit of countless local children.
