Margaret McQueen: Bus driver and promoter of social dance events

June 30th, 2011
By David Armstrong

Her strong Scottish ancestry (her father was a proud Stuart) gave Margaret McQueen a natural introduction to one of the greatest loves of her life - Scottish Country dancing and now all forms of social dancing.

From her early days in Marton, where she spent her childhood and teenaged years, Margaret loved the evenings out with the family dancing to the country bands and Scottish pipe bands.

"It was fun - I loved the music, the family outings. My cousins were in the Marton pipe band. It was all part of dad, in the blood. That's where we learned the old-style type of dancing."

But Margaret also has a tough and determined side, having worked her way through a string of demanding physical jobs and running some time-consuming businesses along the way. Now her big challenge is to enjoy new experiences and keep making a wide circle of friends following the death of her husband 10 years ago.

Many Motuekans will know Margaret from her bus driving, the community health shuttle, and the work she does to help others learn and enjoy older-style dancing at socials and special school events.

Although never an academic success at school, Margaret did develop there a special aptitude for cooking and sewing, which held her in good stead throughout her working years. When she left home at 19 and struck out on her own to Wellington and soon after to Auckland, she earned her keep in sandwich bars, bakeries and restaurants while also doing some sewing contracts.

In Wellington she met and married Laurie, who was an adept mechanical engineer. His work took him to Auckland, Whakatane and Whangarei over the span of about four years. Through this time, Margaret and Laurie had four children (David, Kathy, Jennifer and Mandy), meaning that she became essentially a "stay home mother".

Whangarei meant living in their own home for the first time, and purchasing their own business, Whangarei Wrecking & Salvage Co. They stayed there for about 12 years, then sold the business and moved to Great Barrier Island where they bought the lease to operate the Fitzroy Guest House.

Both worked very hard there, running both the guest house and the associated farm. "We had cows to milk, we killed our own beef for the guest house, supplies came on by ferry," she says. Plus looking after the guests and providing all their meals - all for $12 each a day.

"It was a 26 hours a day, nine days a week job," she laughs. "But the kids did help us a lot."

They worked hard in this tough environment for three years, then returned to the mainland and spent several years in and around Kaitaia in the far north. They ran a seven-day-a week shop, then bought a farm, then a three-acre block. With the children now growing up, Margaret began further cafe and similar work.

About 25 years ago they went on a holiday in the South Island, where they discovered Motueka. Straight away they decided this was the place for them to live. They bought a property in Brooklyn.

While Laurie worked at Motueka Lumber, Margaret continued taking on various jobs, including orchard and cafe work. Then she leased and ran the Galley Takeaways business in Riwaka, another seven-days-a-week job. But a disastrous fire put an end to that and, with help from her daughters, she took on a Chinese takeaway business in Motueka for a few years.

Around this time there was plenty of travel, too, with destinations including Australia, the Phillipines, England and Scotland, Japan, Hawaii, the USA and Canada.

For Margaret, everything changed 10 years ago when Laurie became very ill and died with lymphoma cancer. She faced a new challenge - loneliness. First up was a move into her new home in Motueka, built for her by her son-in-law. She lived in her campervan while the house was being built.

She had only recently taken courses to obtain her HT (heavy truck) driving licence and then a bus-driving licence, which she was shortly to use, but initially she did some voluntary work for the Sallies, mainly for company. Then she was asked to drive school buses for the Motueka Bus Company, which she did for six years mainly on the Riwaka run. Then she was offered the job driving the Community Health Shuttle, which she has been doing for the past few years.

"I enjoy taking people to their appointments. I enjoy the work, I enjoy the people, I'm helping somebody, and it's also company for me," she says. "You learn a lot about lonely people. I've experienced terrible loneliness myself, since Laurie died. I'm involved in a lot of things, but you're still lonely."

And that was when the serious involvement in dancing started again. Margaret placed an advert in the paper and began the Scottish Country Dancing group, based in the Uniting Church. Then with some friends from Elysium (widows and widowers) she started the Old Time Dancing group in 2004. This led to running classes using some experienced teachers.

Margaret purchased equipment to play dance records and tapes and spent considerable time making taped collections, and was the local driving force behind running roughly two-monthly dances in the Memorial Hall and Lower Moutere Hall.

By now she was helping at many community events involving dancing. She taught social dancing in Brooklyn and Parklands schools. She taught children to dance for displays at the Festival of Lights, the High School's 'Dancing with the Staff' event or the Parklands ball. She also took some children into rest homes to perform for residents.

Margaret has also been involved for 12 years with the pipe band as bass drummer and currently as custodian and public relations officer. SHe organised the band's 50-year reunion in 2004. She has done vomuntary work with Meals on Wheels and Age Concern.

Recently she joined the Combined Probus group, again to enjoy the company, and she has quickly become involved: she drove the bus for their 10-day South Island trip, and has some great photos to prove it. Other recent new activities include kayaking, cycling, and movanning (motor vans). She's just tried her hand at golf for the first time.

Her networking and determination also resulted in the successful running in March of the big three-hour charity concert for the Christchurch earthquake. Starting with the brass band, she called and cajoled a great variety of musical people and groups like the Celtic Band and cultural groups to contribute acts to an appreciative audience. "After word got around, people were ringing me to ask to be included," she says. They raised $2000.

Many of her family are living in and around Christchurch and all were affected in some way by the February quake. "That gave me the inspiration. But I would have done it anyway - I love helping people. And organising this was a highlight of my recent life."

As to the future, Margaret is determined to spend more time with her 20 grandchildren, meaning she will probably drop some of her current commitments. This year she went on a sea cruise and loved it so much that she wants to do it again (perhaps even working on board as a cook). And more fishing would be a bonus.

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