Notes |
- SOMERSET BUDGET AND PEARSTON ADVOCATE SATURDAY, OCTOBER 28, 1944
The Late Mr. Arthur Driver
Gill's Grand Old Man
The passing of Mr. Arthur Driver at his Somerset home, "West Haddon" robbed our town of its oldest inhabitant and Gill College of its Grand Old Man. Although in his ninety-seventh year he retained to a remarkable degree his outstanding intellectual activity, and it was only in recent years that a gradual failing in physical vigour caused him to retire from participation in public work. His last brief illness was softened by the loving care of his only daughter, Dorothy. The end came peacefully on the afternoon of Friday, 20th October.
The late Mr. Driver was a native of the East Midlands, that rural corner of England that gave us Doctor Gill. He was the son of Mr and Mrs. John Driver and was born on 17th August 1848, at West Haddon, Northamptonshire. He loved the place of his early boyhood. His Somerset home was named after it and he gave the name Haddon to his oldest surviving son. But of complete change of scene came with the appointment of his father to the headmastership of the Church School in the industrial town of Stockport, some seven miles from Manchester. When in his later years he spoke of the distressing conditions that prevailed in South Lancashire in the days of his youth it was always with a feeling of profound satisfaction that he had so delightful a haven as sylvan Somerset.
He received his early education in his father's school before proceeding to the Rose High School in Bowden near Manchester. The Headmaster was the famous J.M.D Meiklejohn whose works on History and the English language won wide renown. His teaching on Literature exerted an abiding influence on the cultural development of his pupil.
Arthur Driver began his teaching career as a student-teacher under his own father. During this period he attended evening lectures at Owen's College which afterwards became the University of Manchester. Here he matriculated. A teaching post in Manchester enabled him to continue his studies at Owen's College until, at the age of twenty-two; he passed the Intermediate B.A. examination of the London University.
Those early experiences amid the squalor and poverty then rife in industrial Lancashire persuaded him to emigrate, and at the end of 1870 he sailed for the United States of America. He occupied teaching posts in the Academies of Deerfield and Taunton, Massachusetts, and finally at Boston where, in 1874, he was awarded the Teachers' Diploma of the Boston Supervisory Board. Teaching conditions in America he found attractive, while his yearly salary of fifteen hundred dollars was princely compared with the pittance paid in England. But even these inducements failed to persuade him to sacrifice his British Nationality at the price of further advancement.
Returning to England, he secured an interview with the Secretary to the Superintendent General of Education for the Cape Colony. The latter was Dr Langham Dale, one of the original trustees of the Doctor Gill Bequest. There was a great demand for qualified teachers and Mr. Driver decided to proceed to the Cape where, eventually he accepted a post at Uitenhague in the school which later became Muir College. Her he served for several years under Mr. F. Bryce, B.A.
At the end of 1886 he was attracted by an advertisement in the Grahamstown Journal and his application led to his appointment at Gill College which had been opened seventeen years before. His early contemporaries on the Gill College Staff were Professor Robert Mac William and Professor David Craib, and soon afterwards Professor James Craib and Mr. S. Masson. At this time the Gill Corporation included the Rev. J.H. Hofmeyer, Sir Jacobus de Wet and the Rev. W. Leith, the first minister to the congregation of the Presbyterian Church in Somerset East. For forty years the Rev. Leith was a member of the Somerset East Library Committee, mainly as Chairman. The literary tastes they enjoyed in common led to a long friendship between him and Mr. Driver, and the latter became a loyal and liberal adherent of the Presbyterian Church. For many years he was Secretary and Treasurer and never was an adverse balance shown. He became also a member of the choir and the Church music was enriched by his tenor voice which, while never strong, was beautifully sweet and true.
A Gill College prospectus of those early years described him as Assistant Master in charge of Art and Singing. He was placed in control of the Gill Boarding Establishment which was then housed in the former residence of Doctor Gill in Paulet Street. This post he filled with such industry and integrity that in 1892 he was appointed by the Governing Body of Gill College to the post of Housemaster in charge of the newly erected College House with Mrs. Thomas Tilbrook as Matron.
The College Speech Day of 1897 was noteworthy for presentations and Congratulatory speeches by Mr. L. Abrahamson, M.L.A., on the forthcoming marriages of two members of the Staff, Mr. S. Mason to Miss Longden, and Mr. Driver to Miss Minnie Florence Weeks. Married at the age of 49, Mr Driver was privileged to enjoy forty-four years of most happy wedded life. His wife passed away on 10th June 1941. There were seven children, six sons and one daughter. One son died in infancy. The eldest son, Hubert Weeks Driver, was killed in air-combat over Flanders in 1918, a few weeks before the end of the Great War.
The surviving children are: Dorothy (Mrs. Armstrong), whose husband, back from Active Service, is farming near Cathcart. Edgar Haddon Driver, Bank Manager at Fort Victoria, Southern Rhodesia. Walter Driver, B.Sc. (Engineering), Manager of the Sheet Mills Division, Iscor. Colonel William Gall Driver, O.B.E., S.A.A.F., somewhere in Italy. Captain Kenneth Weeks Driver, D.F.C., S.A.A.F. prisoner-of-war in Germany since 14th June, 1941.
Few schoolmasters can match the wonderful record of the late Mr. Arthur Driver of 60 years of teaching followed by eight years in which temporary teaching was frequent and often for periods of many months. He often used to remark that his application for furlough in 1922 was a great mistake for it revealed to the Education Department (which demands retirement of its men-teachers at sixty) that Gill College had a veteran master, in active service still in his 74th year.
His length of service and his remarkable vitality were equaled only by his versatility as a teacher. Commencing as master in charge of art and singing he afterwards became the first Woodwork-master at Gill College. Subsequently he did most successful work in Commercial Subjects up to Matriculation. During a lengthy absence of his Principal, the late William Joiner Gall, M.A., he gave most able assistance with the language teaching at Gill. Withal, mathematics - and Higher Mathematics too - was his recreation, even to the closing years of his long life. Well informed in a great diversity of subjects, he was a learner to the last.
The farewell functions which marked his official retirement in June, 1922, were eloquent of the high esteem in which he was held by the Education Department and the general public alike, the place he had won in the hearts of his very many colleagues and pupils, past and present. At a complimentary dinner messages of appreciation and goodwill were received from all over Southern Africa. At the Town Hall, Mr Clifford Palmer - one of his earliest pupils - presented a magnificent gold watch and chain, a tribute from former pupils and parents. There were presentations from the Staff and Pupils at a farewell assembly in the College Quadrangle, and finally Old Gillians gave a gold medal recording their appreciation of his long and devoted service.
His final labour of love for Gillians was performed as Secretary to the Gill War Memorial Committee. At the unveiling ceremony there was handed to the Principal for safe custody a beautifully carved box made of teak (salvaged from the Cookhouse Bridge wrecked by floods some 50 years before) containing parchment scrolls on which the names and services of 147 Old Gillians in the Great War were faithfully recorded by their veteran teacher. The compiling of these records of men scattered over the world was performed with that diligence and thoroughness which were characteristic of all he did.
In spite of hard work and advancing years he was ever ready to devote himself during school vacations to the interests of his profession, and in October, 1934, these services were recognised by his election as Honorary Life Member by the South African Teachers' Association of which he had been a member since 1887.
Few institutions in Somerset East have inspired more service than its Public Library. Mr Arthur Driver was first elected to the Committee at the beginning of 1898 and in February, 1904, he was appointed Secretary and Treasurer in succession to Prof. James Craib. His term in office exceeded forty years, and he remained until his 91st year devoted to a service which afforded wide scope for his intellectual gifts and sound business acumen.
The years 1904-05 were the most ambitious in the annals of the Library. On 14th September 1904, the Committee accepted the contract of R. G. McLelland of Port Elizabeth for the erection of the present building at the cost of £987. The work was completed by March, 1905, the total cost of erection and additional furnishing amounting to £1034. At the annual general meeting held in August that year a special minute was recorded expressing "high appreciation of the good services rendered by the Secretary, Mr Arthur Driver, during the last eighteen months, especially in connection with the new Library Building".
A parliamentary grant of £500, together with an accumulated credit balance of £137 reduced the indebtedness of the Library to the Standard Bank to some £400. It was the firm resolve of Mr Driver to wipe out this overdraft while providing for the adequate stocking and further expansion of the Library. With such success did he pursue this project that before retirement he was able to provide an additional reference room and hand over to his successor a Library not only free from debt but splendidly equipped and supplied, together with a substantial credit balance. The Library stands today a fitting monument to his industry, acumen and sound literary taste.
Such is the record of devoted service and achievement of our late veteran citizen and schoolmaster. Ever a staunch and patriotic Englishman he rendered a most loyal service to the Town and Country of his adoption. Energetic, upright and never self-seeking he won through his fidelity to his life's work honour and esteem throughout the community to which he devoted the greater part of his long life. Well of him it may be quoted:
"O good old man; how well in thee appears
The constant service of the antique world
Wen service sweat for duty, not for meed"
|