Saint Marys Bay, New Zealand

Story

Saint Marys Bay is an inner suburb of Auckland City, New Zealand.Historical timeline1800smid-1840s George Scott farms the land where Three Lamps is now.1853 For £1100 Catholic Bishop Pompallier purchases 19hectare in the area between Three Lamps and the shoreline from James O’Neill, christening it Mount St. Mary.1854 O’Neill’s house becomes St. Anne’s School for Maori Girls run by the Sisters of Mercy. Responding to a Maori request for holy women to teach the children, the sisters of Mercy arrived in Auckland from Ireland in 1850 already fluent in the Maori language. Their first school and orphanage was situated near St Patrick’s Cathedral in Federal Street in the CBD.1854 St Mary’s College for Catechists on the North Shore is transferred to Ponsonby. St. Marys School for Boys and a Seminary are built on 5acre of Crown Grant land at the end of Waitemata St.1858 The wooden Church of the Immaculate Conception is built..1859 New Street is put through the middle of the St Mary Mount estate and Bishop Pompallier presents land on the eastern side of the street for the creation of St. Mary’s College. Almost unaided the sisters erect a three-storey convent building and open it in 1861. The only surviving building from this period is the Kauri St Mary’s Chapel constructed in 1865 by Edward Mahoney for £1100.1860s Many Roman Catholics buy land in the new subdivisions in order to be near the Catholic centre with its church, convent and schools. Names such as "Dublin" and "Green" reflect this development.