Katikati war memorial hall

Katikati war memorial hall

Honour Board Dedication

Katikati war memorial hall and roll of honour board.

Sue Baker-Wilson has kindly provided the following information about this hall:

‘At a 1943 public meeting the Katikati community decided to build the hall as a memorial of WW1, and the then current war. A Queen's Carnival in the early 1950's set the hall project wheels in motion, raising over 7000 pounds to build Katikati's War Memorial Hall. It was opened Oct 4, 1954 by the then Governor General, Sir Willoughby Norrie. It was built by H D R (Hilton ) Rayment, known as Chook – a fighter pilot gunned down during the war – on a section the committee bought beside the then Post Office. When the BNZ bank found out what the land was being used for, it gifted the section alongside to provide a larger one. For extra space the loges on either side of the hall were filled in later, and an adjoining hall lounge was built in the early 1980's.’

The plaza in front of the hall was redeveloped and formally reopened as Memorial Square on 14 April 2014. The flagpole was moved from the hall roof to the centre of the square. The names of wars and military actions in which New Zealanders had served were inscribed on granite blocks set into the pavement: South Africa, World War I, World War II, Korea, Malaya, Borneo, Vietnam, Afghanistan and United Nations deployments.

Sources: ‘“Record of Service of Which All of Us Are Proud”: Governor General Opens Katikati War Memorial Hall’, Bay of Plenty Times, 5/10/1954, p. 3; Ernest E. Bush, The Katikati Story, Tauranga, 1975, pp. 53-4; ‘Memorial Square Open for Anzac Day, Bay of Plenty Times, 24/4/2014. 

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