photo: Lisa Truttman
photo: Sir George Grey Special Collection, Auckland Libraries, NZ map 3500
photo: Lisa Truttman
Clockwise from top left: A map of the Carrington Road area from the 1950's. Recent photos of Penman House.
Hyde referred to it as ‘The Grey Lodge’ in her writing, a nickname also used by the District Engineer in a letter to Buchanan prior to her instalment at The Lodge. It appears to be a name used by those familiar with the building. It also seems to have been known as Oakley Lodge at some point during this period. Hyde lived alone in a double room in what was then the newest ward in the hospital. Her room on the first floor had two sets of windows facing north and west. It was better furnished than any of the other wards, and she retained sole use of her room until she left in 1937. She lived and worked at The Lodge, and wrote her novel, The Godwits Fly, as well as five other books and two collections of poetry while she was living there. The final stanza of her “Three Poems” gives a description of her room:
I should like to die in this room – It looks towards the West. Outside, the great bronze sickle of the dusk Mows the red poppies of the sunset clouds. Robin Hyde Young Knowledge.
In the 1970s the building was leased from the Auckland Hospital Board by the Baptist City Mission and used as a ‘family-type’ supervised boarding house for psychiatric patients on leave. They named it after the Penmans, a prominent family in the Mt Albert area, and it has been known as Penman House ever since.
Penman House was run by Mr and Mrs Ron Auty, who, in close association with the Baptist City Mission board and social workers, were attempting to help residents adapt back into the local community. According to an Auckland Star article in 1974 they had 22 residents aged from 17 to 72, at different stages of recovery, and some with part time work. These residents paid board from their wages or their benefit, and were given help with budgeting.
history
Buchanan as an “attractively yet economically furnished villa” for “twenty-four patients of either the advanced convalescent type, or for the admission of early border-line cases”.
Mr Auty was quoted saying the atmosphere of the house was that of a family rather than an institution. “We feel that within the total context of the family there can be healing. We see a lot of problems, but in the midst of this we can see something happening as well,” he said. Penman House has been part of Unitec since 1992, when all the adjacent hospital land and buildings were purchased by what was then known as Carrington Polytechnic. Until recently, the building housed the Unitec Facilities Management department, and since July 2013 Penman House has been the home to the Research Office and Postgraduate Centre at Unitec. The purpose of the Research Office and Postgraduate Centre is to support staff and student research by providing research management services such as strategic research funding, ethical review, grants and funding, and student thesis examination. The centre also provides facilities for postgraduate students including study spaces and a computer lab. Dean of Research Simon Peel says it’s a great new home for his department. “It’s a beautiful old building with an interesting history. We’re very happy to be here, and we look forward to working and meeting with others in this new environment.”
» spring 2013 » advance
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