Geoffrey Thomas Alley

Position(s)	Lock
All Black No.	327
Provincial / State sides
National team(s)

Geoff Alley
OBE
Birth name	Geoffrey Thomas Alley
Date of birth	4 February 1903
Place of birth	Amberley, New Zealand
Date of death	25 September 1986 (aged 83)
Place of death	Upper Hutt, New Zealand
Height	1.90 m (6 ft 3 in)
Weight	100 kg (220 lb)
School	Christchurch Boys' High School
University	Canterbury University College
Notable relative(s)	Rewi Alley (brother); Gwen Somerset (sister)
Occupation(s)	Librarian
Rugby union career
Position(s)	Lock
All Black No.	327
Provincial / State sides
National team(s)

Last updated April 03, 2019

Geoffrey Thomas "Geoff" Alley OBE (4 February 1903 – 25 September 1986) was a New Zealand rugby union player and librarian. He played three test matches for the All Blacks and was New Zealand's first national librarian.

Rugby union, commonly known in most of the world simply as rugby, is a contact team sport which originated in England in the first half of the 19th century. One of the two codes of rugby football, it is based on running with the ball in hand. In its most common form, a game is between two teams of 15 players using an oval-shaped ball on a rectangular field with H-shaped goalposts at each end.

Early life and family

Born in Amberley, North Canterbury, in 1903, Alley was the fifth child of Clara Maria Alley (née Buckingham) and her husband Frederick James Alley. His siblings included Rewi Alley, the activist and educator who went to China, and Gwen Somerset, a noted educator. He was educated at Christchurch Boys' High School, and left in 1921 to manage a farm near Lumsden owned by his father. In 1926, Alley began studying at Canterbury University College, from where he graduated with a Master of Arts with first-class honours in 1932.^[1] His thesis was entitled Experiment in rural adult education. He was also awarded a Diploma of Social Sciences in 1930.^[2]

Amberley is a town located in the Hurunui District in north Canterbury, on the east coast of the South Island of New Zealand. It is located on State Highway 1 approximately 50 km north of Christchurch. It is the seat of the Hurunui District Council.

Rewi Alley was a New Zealand-born writer and political activist. A member of the Communist Party of China, he dedicated 60 years of his life to the cause, and was a key figure in the establishment of Chinese Industrial Cooperatives and technical training schools, including the Peili Vocational Institute. Alley was a prolific writer about 20th century China, and especially about the Communist revolution. He also translated numerous Chinese poems.

Gwendolen Lucy "Gwen" Somerset was a New Zealand teacher, adult education director, educationalist and writer.

In 1930 Alley married Euphan Margaret Jamieson in 1930; they had two sons and two daughters.^[1]

Rugby union

A lock, Alley represented Southland and Canterbury at a provincial level, and was a member of the New Zealand national side, the All Blacks, in 1926 and 1928. He played 19 matches for the All Blacks including three tests.^[3]

Rugby Southland is the provincial rugby union who govern the Southland Region of New Zealand. Their headquarters are at Rugby Park Stadium in Invercargill, which is also the home ground of the union's professional team, the Southland Stags who compete in the Mitre 10 Cup Championship Division and challenge for the Ranfurly Shield.

The Canterbury Rugby Football Union is the governing body for rugby union in a portion of the Canterbury Region of New Zealand. Its colours are red and black in a hooped design. The CRFU govern the running of the Canterbury representative team which have won New Zealand's first-tier domestic competition National Provincial Championship 14 times including a "six-peat" from 2008 to 2013 – with five in the National Provincial Championship, two in the Air New Zealand Cup, five in the ITM Cup and one in the Mitre 10 Cup. Their most recent victory was the 2017 Mitre 10 Cup. Canterbury also acts as a primary feeder to the Crusaders, who play in the Super Rugby competition.

Alley wrote a book on the 1930 tour of New Zealand by the British Lions,^[3] entitled With the British rugby team in New Zealand, 1930.

The 1930 British Lions tour to New Zealand and Australia was the twelfth tour by a British Isles team and the fifth to New Zealand and Australia. This tour is recognised as the first to represent a bona fide British team and the first to be widely dubbed the 'Lions', after the nickname was used by journalists during the 1924 tour of South Africa.

In the lead-up to the 1960 All Blacks tour of South Africa, Alley was a member of a pressure group, the New Zealand Citizens' All Black Tour Association, that opposed the exclusion of Māori players from the team imposed by the South African authorities.^[1]

The 1960 New Zealand rugby union tour of South Africa, was a series of rugby union match played by New Zealand national rugby union team in South Africa and Rhodesia.

The Māori are the indigenous Polynesian people of New Zealand. Māori originated with settlers from eastern Polynesia, who arrived in New Zealand in several waves of canoe voyages some time between 1250 and 1300. Over several centuries in isolation, the Polynesian settlers developed a unique culture, with their own language, a rich mythology, and distinctive crafts and performing arts. Early Māori formed tribal groups based on eastern Polynesian social customs and organisation. Horticulture flourished using plants they introduced; later, a prominent warrior culture emerged.

Library career

Alley worked as a travelling WEA (Workers' Educational Association) tutor sponsored by the Carnegie Foundation, before becoming head of the new Country Library Service in 1937, director of the National Library Service in 1945, and New Zealand's first national librarian at the National Library of New Zealand in 1964. He retired at the end of 1967, and was described by Tom Shand as "one of New Zealand's greatest public servants".^[1]

Alley was elected a Fellow of the New Zealand Library Association in 1955,^[1] and in the 1958 Queen's Birthday Honours, he was appointed an Officer of the Order of the British Empire, in recognition of his service as director of the National Library Service.^[4]

Later life and death

Following his retirement, Alley lived on a two-acre farm in Upper Hutt that he purchased in 1946. From 1968 to 1971, he was visiting professor at the University of Western Ontario School of Library and Information Science. He died at his farm in 1986.^[1]

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References

1 2 3 4 5 6 McEldowney, W.J. "Alley, Geoffrey Thomas". Dictionary of New Zealand Biography . Ministry for Culture and Heritage . Retrieved 13 December 2015.
↑ "NZ university graduates 1870–1961: A" . Retrieved 13 December 2015.
1 2 Knight, Lindsay. "Geoff Alley". New Zealand Rugby Union. Retrieved 13 December 2015.
↑ "No. 41406". The London Gazette (Supplement). 12 June 1958. p. 3554.

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[DNZB_Alley-1] 1 2 3 4 5 6 McEldowney, W.J. "Alley, Geoffrey Thomas". Dictionary of New Zealand Biography . Ministry for Culture and Heritage . Retrieved 13 December 2015.

[2] "NZ university graduates 1870–1961: A" . Retrieved 13 December 2015.

[AB_profile-3] 1 2 Knight, Lindsay. "Geoff Alley". New Zealand Rugby Union. Retrieved 13 December 2015.

[4] "No. 41406". The London Gazette (Supplement). 12 June 1958. p. 3554.