Modern School

Thanks To Postage Stamps

By E. Schubert, recently Schoolmaster at Pitcairn.

Not on isolated Pitcairn Island do the children move like , “unwillingly to school”. They love it.

t’s probably not surprising, idering the fine modern ol building and excellent nal equipment that Pitcairn e days. brary especially has grown years and today equals the at can be seen anywhere . a small school enrolment, i also a 16 mm movie pro id a 35 mm still projector. 8, a piano was bought, and a new sewing machine, a layer and a duplicator were long being a “sole charge”

Pitcairn now has an assist her to help with the lower She is an island girl, one Irst islanders to complete a ndence course up to Form I. She was appointed last m’s present fine new school was opened in 1949, with iment of between 15 and 18 By 1958, the number had o 27 and at the beginning it was over 30.

They Enjoy It

11 school children on Pit ear shoes, but all of them (form and enjoy it. The girls ?reen pinafore with a white and the boys wear khaki nd shirts. range from five to 15 years re is now a growing tend • some to remain at school secondary correspondence (from New Zealand) under her’s supervision. iis modern school develop irted with a postage stamp. ppened this way: Pitcairn, 30ut of nine of the world- Bounty mutineers had its iool just before the begin the 19th century. This first Pad walls of rough hand mber and a thatched roof, or was smoothed with an id desks and chairs were ade. Pencils and books as v them today were absent. )le and prayer book taken

from the Bounty before burning served as the only reading books. (Though taken away from Pitcairn in 1839, this famous Bible is today back on the island, having been re paired and returned in 1950.)

Bible Only Reader

The school was opened by John Adams and Edward Young, after the deaths of seven of the nine mutineers and the six Tahitians. By this time 23 children had been born to the mutineers and most of them were of school age.

Attendance at school was made compulsory, thus Pitcairn became one of the first places (possibly the first) in the world to introduce compulsory, primary education.

Young died shortly after and left Adams, a near uneducated man, to

Stamp Error. In 1951

Pitcairn brought out an 8d stamp showing its new school (above, lower stamp). When it brought out a new Queen Elizabeth stamp in 1957, instead of showing the school, as intended, the stamp showed the school master's house (centre).

The error was corrected in 1958, but the caption, not the building, was

changed (top).

Pitcairn school, with its rugged backdrop. The children all wear uni forms and love going to school. The school master, E. Schubert, is standing on the right.

:he education and govern this growing community, cere and consistent applica s untrained and unpaid settled into what turned rly 30 years of selfless ser e best part of the next 100 tcairn had untrained but :ious teachers. A few years he beginning of the 20th the Seventh-Day Adventist of North America began mission teachers there for iars at a time. They would ;ime train island teachers, their departure, would take school. Eventually, teachers e same church were sent stralia. not until 1948 that the first lent-t rained and paid ;et foot on Pitcairn Island.

realm's First Stamps

1940, Pitcairn Islanders sed British or New Zealand for outgoing mail. In that Nairn’s first stamps went on le series illustrated the on the Bounty ” and the ;ttlement. They proved an te success as collectors all world sought stamps from smallest and most remote i possession. than 10 years, besides pay administration costs, suf inds had been accumulated for the building of a new ad schoolmaster’s residence. buildings were pre-cut in hipped to Pitcairn on a chartered vessel, and there by the islanders under the on of three Indian car sent from Fiji for the job. in 1949, the first properly and equipped school on was opened.

Mr. Moverly, Pitcairn’s first Gov ernment schoolmaster moved into a new school and residence costing

in all £Stg.7,ooo thanks to Pitcairn’s first stamp issue.

In 1951, a new Bd. stamp, showing the school, was issued. This was fine, but when in 1957 a complete new Queen Elizabeth II issue went on sale the first thing noticed by the islanders was an error in the new 4d stamp.

The building pictured on the stamp bearing the caption “Pitcairn School” was actually the school master’s house!

The error was quickly brought ta the notice of the Administration in Fiji but it was not until November, 1958, that this erroneous stamp was withdrawn and a new one, of exactly the same design but with the caption, “Schoolteacher’s house” on it, put on sale.

It may be safely claimed that the schoolmaster on Pitcairn is the only teacher in the world to have both his school and his house pictured on postage stamps!

[?]lated Pitcairn, photographed from a high point on the island, with the sea in the distance. Photograph is by the author.