Whanganui petition calls for street names in honour of key Sarjeant Gallery figures

A petition is calling for streets to be named after two key figures in the construction of the Sarjeant Gallery.

Former Whanganui District councillor James Barron said Charles Mackay, the mayor at the time of the Sarjeant’s construction, and the gallery’s architect Donald Hosie should be properly recognised before the Sarjeant’s official reopening next year.

The gallery opened in 1919 and a year later Mackay was imprisoned for shooting poet Walter D’Arcy Cresswell.

Cresswell survived and claimed Mackay shot him because he had threatened to expose his homosexuality.

Upon leaving prison in 1926, Mackay was sent into exile and died in Berlin three years later after being accidentally shot by a police officer during a riot.

Mackay St in Whanganui East was changed to Jellicoe St in the 1920s.

Meanwhile, Hosie was never properly recognised for his role in designing the Sarjeant building.

An open competition launched in 1915 to choose the design with the winning submission coming from the office of Edmund Anscombe in Dunedin.

“There were three entries from Anscombe’s office but the one chosen was from Hosie, who had done it off his own back and on his own time,” Barron said.

“When it was selected as the winner, Anscombe came in and said ‘Yep, that was all my work’ and actually signed a statutory declaration to that effect.”

A council staff member travelled south to conduct an investigation and Hosie presented his first draft drawings, Barron said.

The following report named Hosie as the winner.

“He [Hosie] was in the army and was going off to World War I but mayor Mackay got that delayed so he could finish the drawings.

“Council then received another report saying that because Hosie worked for Anscombe, anything he did was Anscombe’s property.

“Basically, council chickened out and put Anscombe’s name on the gallery foundation stone because it just seemed easier.”

Hosie was killed during the Battle of Passchendaele in World War I, three weeks after the stone bearing Anscombe’s name was laid.

Mackay’s name was scrubbed off the foundation stone following the Cresswell incident but eventually reinstated.

Whanganui Mayor Andrew Tripe said any member of the public could put a proposal together to change a street name and a petition was a great idea.

“I applaud anyone who has gone to that effort,” he said.

“Obviously, there is a process to go through and a group of people make the decision, including iwi and others.

“I’m happy to take any recommendation or suggestion by its own merits.”

A panel was formed last year to name new streets in Whanganui, featuring two representatives of Te Rūnanga O Tūpoho, the mayor or an appointee and two community representatives.

Barron said changing Jellicoe St back to Mackay St wasn’t necessarily the best option.

“The Sarjeant Gallery is very much the combination of Mackay and Hosie’s prodigious talents and currently unnamed roads or paths in or around it should be strong contenders, as should colonial relic names or 100 per cent unimaginative stuff – Maria Place Extension for example.

“That deserves a better name and it’s literally on the sight line axis to Pukenamu (Queen’s Park) and the Sarjeant.”

Barron said around 50 people had signed the petition in its first few days.

“This has always bothered me. I’m not thinking of a three-year process, just knuckle down and get it done before the Sarjeant reopens.

“Putting Mackay St back feels like the last piece in the puzzle in terms of undoing the wrong which happened.

“If we can get his name back on the Whanganui map, Hosie’s name deserves to be on there as well.”

The Sarjeant is scheduled to reopen in 2024.