Apr 25, 2008
Auntie Ruby, (actually Annabella Stuart Dale) died in Palmerston North in 1928, after a "tragically brief illness" according to her obituary, but the cause of her death remains a bit of a mystery. Family legend has it that she fell ill after a day's gardening, and it was believed that she had suffered some poisonous insect bite, or perhaps been in contact with some poisonous plant. Ruby and her mother and sister were living in Cook Street at the time. I can't think of any insect in Palmerston North which would have a lethal bite or sting. A section which Pam and I owned in Cook Street in the 1960's had an abundance of hemlock growing on it, and it is certainly poisonous, (ask Socrates), but you would have to eat it to get poisoned, and I can't think Ruby would be doing that.
Ruby was born in Greymouth in 1882 and educated in Westport. She attended Victoria University College and graduated BA in the early 1900's. She also played the violin very well, playing first violin for the Invercargill orchestra, and later for the Palmerston North orchestra. She achieved ATCL in 1914 and LTCL in 1917.
In 1918 she was head mistress of the Cape Foulwind school when Pam's brother Russell started there, and Pam's mother always claimed that Ruby Dale was responsible for Russell's fine handwriting. She also recalled that Ruby would walk out to the Cape from Westport along the beach, a distance of seven miles.
Mobility seems to have been a family characteristic, for Ruby also taught in Southland, at Mount Cook school in Wellington, at Tikorangi in Taranki, and was in charge of the secondary department of the District High School in Martinborough. At the time of her death she was teaching at the College Street school in Palmerston North. Pearl was teaching at the Girls' High at that time.
Ruby was a big strong lady with a big heart and loads of energy, so she had heaps of friends wherever she went. Dad recalls, at the age of five or six, complaining to her, (she would have been about 20), about all songs being about "love and that". Ruby's response was, "In troth, what else is there to sing about".
I wish we'd known Ruby. She must have been a bit like Anna and Henny, I think.