Annie makes 90

Ruapehu Bulletin, Volume 14, Issue 681, 8 April 1997, Page 7

Annie makes 90

Family and friends of Anne Crighton gathered with her to celebrate her 90th birthday at the Ohakune Club at Easter. About 40 people chatted of old times with Mrs Crighton, who has lived in her Miro Street home for some 55 years. Born Annie Hayward Ewer Gardiner, she came to Ohakune with her parents 1 (the late Helena and Hayward Gardiner) when she | was about two. Her parents lived on 21 | acres in Old Station Road where they milked cows, grew vegetables and supplied her grandmother's boarding house (then west of the Mangawhero Stream, opposite the end of Clyde

Street) with milk, cream and butter. Mrs Crighton went to a school that is where the bowling green is now located. Later she went to a school in a mill hall and then to the school at the present site. She had three brothers, George, William and Robert, and two sisters, Marton and Violet. She married Charlie Crighton who came to the districtfrom Waiuku, South

Auckland. He set up a mill onTohangaRoad. They had six children, Silvia, Jimmy, George, Jennie, Janice and Peter, who was killed at 18 months when he wandered onto the road just down from their Miro Street home. Mrs Crighton is still fairly active, cooking her own meals, and enjoying crocheting and pottering in her garden when warm weather allows. She has 50 grandchildren and great grandchildren.