After the First World War, a Hikurangi resident, perhaps a teacher or the headmaster at the school, compiled a handwritten list of Hikurangi School Old Boys who had served with the New Zealand Expeditionary Force. This listed 90 names, including eight men who had given their lives. It is now held at the Hikurangi Museum. In August 1945, not long before the end of the Second World War, the Hikurangi School committee decided to erect a more permanent Second World War War memorial.
This initially incorporated a marble tablet provided by the Hikurangi Women’s Institute with the names of nine dead. At an unknown date, this was replaced by a granite tablet with identical wording. In 2014, however, the Hikurangi RSA decided to erect a new memorial at the school which listed the names of all the district’s fallen during both world wars. The new obelisk was unveiled on 26 February 2015. It lists 20 First World War names and 16 Second World War names. The old memorial tablet was donated to the Hikurangi Museum.
Sources: Jim O’Reilly, Under the Mountain: Hikurangi School Centennial, Hikurangi, 1963, pp. 41-2; ‘All names on new Hikurangi memorial’, Northern Advocate, 28/2/2015.
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