End of the line for city hospital
But the biggest challenge with the art deco-style Grey St building, parts of which date back to the 1930s, was that it needed to be earthquake strengthened.
Still, it was a day of nostalgia for the surgeon who has been operating at Grey St since 1989 and who carried out the last operations in its theatres on Friday.
‘‘This place has given great service to the community.
‘‘For someone like me – I’ve lived here all my life – it is sad to see it end.
‘‘I can see all the reasons why it has to happen, but it’s a point in history.’’
The building was originally known as Mater, then became Mercy Hospital.
When the Catholic sisters wanted to sell in 2000, a group of 20 surgeons and specialists joined forces to buy and operate the hospital business. They invested about $4m in upgrading the facility with two new operating theatres in 2003, bringing the total number of theatres to four, and added extra patient rooms.
Crest opened its new specialist centre in Carroll St in July.
Its development included two new operating theatres and patient rooms, a patient lounge, extended day stay facilities, a refurbished recovery unit and service areas.
There will be no surgeries at Crest next week while staff pack up the last of the portable equipment and supplies and fit them in at the Carroll St hospital and specialist centre.
Operations will start again on October 5, with a formal opening of the consolidated centre on October 10. The ‘‘sold’’ sign has gone up on the front fence on Grey St, with Broadway Radiology expected to take over the premises. When Shirley Hampson woke on Friday morning, she discovered her bed was on fire.
A ‘‘popping’’ sound alerted her to the fire that started in her bedroom of her Tokomaru home about 12.50am, with her three-year-old son asleep next to her.
‘‘The heat was really intense then a popping and cracking.’’
Walking down the blackened hallway, Hampson said the whole thing ‘‘happened so fast’’.
‘‘If [Jason Waho] hadn’t been home I don’t know if I could have Christmas preparation has begun for Rongotea School with students packing presents into shoe boxes for a project that sees children in Vanuatu given gifts.
Rongotea School deputy principal Cheryl Tornquist said the school has collected presents for the project Operation Christmas Child since 2009.
They collect the gifts every two years. Gifts are divided up for the children by age and gender. Felttip pens, hair-ties, race car and colouring books are items that can be donated. Items that may leak or melt, food and lollies and breakable items are not allowed to be included in the packages.
The school’s events team worked away like little elves, filling the boxes with the special items on Thursday. The gifts will be sent away to Vanuatu in October.
Tornquist said the community had been incredibly generous, donating clothing, toys and stationary for the children.
‘‘We aimed to get just do 10 boxes but I think we probably will do about 12 this year.
‘‘It’s just getting everybody involved. As a school we give to each other, we give to our com- munity and then we give further a field as well.’’
‘‘I actually stumbled on it. We gathered things up, got it going and decided we’d commit every second year.’’
Abby Rees, 11, and Brianna Marshall said they wanted to get involved because they wanted to help others. The school donated 19 boxes filled with goodies in 2013.
It costs $9 a box for postage. Hailing from Australia, the Newcastle People’s Chorus is a twentyeight member strong union choir with a repertoire which places emphasis on social justice and worker’s rights.
As such their programme featured a wide variety of songs largely written over the last century reflecting various social concerns as they arise through time.
Generally singing acappella, the chorus is deeply committed to their message, this conviction successfully masking the technical problems that arise when such a group claims all-comer status.
However, the message behind their programme is powerfully presented and sung with great confidence and enthusiasm, much appreciated by their audience.
Conducted by Gabrielle Thacker, the programme featured a variety of works, many Australian, some written by chorus members, others arranged by members to suit the make up of this informal choir.
Songs such as Weevils in the Flour marking Newcastle during the depression, and the pathos of Joe Hill or Working Man, the latter backed by a powerpoint about the Chilean Coal Mine collapse, all left a lasting impression. Of course, no such programme would be complete without Waltzing Matilda with an introduction explaining why it could never become the national anthem. Completing the programme was a short bracket by the Brazen Hussies featuring a similar theme using popular songs to make their point, from the work of women to contemporary discussion on the TPPA.
Again, enthusiasm and conviction was the order of the day, succinct messages demonstrating ‘The Power of Song’ throughout the evening.