We don’t know very much about Oscar when he was 6, or at any other time during his childhood. He was nine days old when a fire broke out soon after midnight at the Lloyd’s bakery on Lambton Quay. The fire spread quickly among the wooden buildings, and although it headed south and east, towards Te Aro pa, William took his young family up onto Wellington Terrace to be safe. Sarah makes mention of this story in a poem she wrote for her children – I suppose it was an unforgettable night for her, waiting on the hill in the small hours of the morning with a sleepy toddler and a new-born baby. She doesn’t say so, but William had probably gone to join the other settlers, local Maori, and the crew of several ships in harbour in fighting the fire. She would have been mightily relieved to go home in the morning, with William safe. Although many houses were destroyed, no-one was hurt in the fire.
The family moved to Blenheim in 1861, and Oscar seems to have taken up painting and wall-papering as his trade. By then, he was the eldest son, his older brother Ovid having died of tuberculosis three years earlier. In 1878 Oscar married Edith Brook, and their first child (my grandfather) was born later that year. Two girls and two more boys followed at tidy two year intervals.
Apparently Oscar was bright, very bright, scary-genius bright, and was given to tinkering around and coming up with new inventions. There was some concern in the family that he was insane, because some of his inventions seemed pretty wacky and way out for the time. The concern reached a whole new level in March 1888 when Oscar was committed to the Wellington Lunatic Asylum. The Marlborough Express reported :
LUNACY – Oscar Norgrove was committed to the Wellington Lunatic Asylum on Saturday by Mr Allen RM, Drs Cleghorn and Nairn having certified to his being insane. The poor fellow brought to our office a few days ago some models, very cleverly designed, with which he had been working out the theory of perpetual motion. Great sympathy is felt for his family.
I’m sure it was just wonderful for his family to have this announced to the whole town. His father had died two years previously, so was spared the sight of his son being carted off to the loony bin, but mother Sarah was still alive. Poor Edith was probably eyeing the kids and wondering if the insanity was hereditary (it doesn’t seem to have been – we’re all just fine, thanks!)
Although the modern view of nineteenth century definitions of insanity seems to be that the men in white coats carted off anyone who was a bit different, the reality of mental health care in New Zealand at this time wasn’t like that at all. Lunatic asylums didn’t differentiate between those who were mentally ill – treatable and with hope of recovery – and those who were mentally impaired from birth defect, accident or alcoholism. All were lumped in together. An ideal existed of providing a quiet haven with steady routines and therapeutic manual work, but by late in the century the asylums were becoming overcrowded. The country had a large population of early settlers who had never married. These men were aging, and many had mental health problems brought on by alcoholism, as well as age-related disorders. With nowhere else for them to go, the asylums had to take them in and care for them till they died. Wellington Lunatic Asylum (on the site now occupied by Government House) was probably less overcrowded than some in 1888, as the Porirua Asylum had opened the previous year.
Whatever Oscar’s problem was, it had to have been pretty serious if his large extended family couldn’t manage to look after him. It had to have been more than a matter of being misunderstood for his way-out ideas. Whether as a result of treatment or on his own, he seems to have recovered. I’m not sure when he was released (haven’t yet found the newspaper article trumpeting the return of his sanity), but by 1891 he was back in Blenheim, painting the parsonage.
In 1892, the Marlborough Express reprinted a letter titled “A New Zealand Inventor” from an Australian newspaper which makes it pretty clear that Oscar was indeed a clever chap. The writer of the letter (“FM” of Levin) had seen a newspaper article about someone in England who had patented a design for a boat with three keels, and that the admiralty intended to have some vessels constructed on the design. The inventor had apparently derived his idea from the albatross. “FM” went on to say :
Now here’s the only photograph I have of Oscar, posing in front of the house inI wish to call the attention of the public, through your paper, to the fact that the original inventor is Mr Oscar Norgrove, of Blenheim, Marlborough, New Zealand; that he constructed a model, which I saw, with plans, which he forwarded to the Admiralty, and that he stated at the time that he had derived the idea from the movements of the albatross. He has been a most enterprising man, and I think should have the credit of his invention, if not the profit. He forwarded the model, &c, about two years ago, while th[is] patent is quite
recent. Models and plans will be found in his possession on inquiry.
Manse Road with Edith, Edgar and Bertha. Judging by the size of the children, the photo would have been taken in the late 1880s. When Mum gave me the photo, she told me Oscar was holding one of his inventions. The photo has faded badly, and between the cricket cap and a beard of old testament proportions, it’s pretty hard to see what Oscar looks like. But it sure looks to me that what he’s holding is a pair of model-size trimaran hulls!
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