Mr Oliver Mays, Treasurer of the Waitemata County Council, was born at Leicester, England, in 1835, and received

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Mr. O. Mays.

his training as a teacher at the Diocesan schools in his native town. He came to New Zealand in the year 1858, and was at once appointed by the Auckland Board of Education to the charge of a school at Woodside, on the Great South Road, and was there for two years and a half. Mr Mays soon obtained a first class certificate from the Board, and was promoted to the larger school at Devonport, which he conducted with marked success for five years.

Several of the prominent public men in Devonport to-day were his pupils during this period. In 1863, Sir George Grey, during his second governorship, proposed to establish a school for the sons of Maori chiefs, on the island of Kawau, where, being removed from the influence of tribe and custom, they might be educated on purely English lines. On the recommendation of the Board of Education Mr and Mrs Mays were appointed to conduct the institution. The exigencies of the Waikato war, however, prevented his Excellency from carrying out his benevolent scheme. Shortly afterwards the Bishop of New Zealand (Dr Selwyn) offered Mr Mays the charge of the large Native School at Waimate, Bay of Islands, which he accepted; but before he could enter upon his duties, the school buildings were unfortunately destroyed by fire. Mr Mays then commenced business as a general storekeeper at Devonport. He was appointed the first postmaster for that district, and held the office for twenty years. On retiring from business in 1883, Mr Mays was appointed Immigration Officer and Superintendent of Quarantine for the port of Auckland, and carried out his duties to the entire satisfaction of the General Government until the system of assisted immigration ceased in 1889. When the Counties Act came into operation in 1877, Mr Mays was one of the two members then elected to represent the Takapuna Riding in the county of Waitemata. During his thirty-nine years' residence in Devonport Mr Mays has been conspicuously and closely identified with nearly every movement for the advancement of that important suburb. He collected funds for the erection of the first public wharf and the first church, and for the acquisition of the present splendid site of the public school. In 1867 the first road board was established in Devonport, mainly by his exertions, and he was chairman of the board for some years. He represented the local body on the Harbour Board for ten years, and in 1881 he was a member of the special committee, and moved the adoption of its report, which recommended the construction of the large dock at Calliope Point. Mr Mays has been a member of the Devonport Borough Council since 1892. Immediately after his election he moved that a deputation consisting of Messrs J. C. Macky, R. H. Duder, A. Buchanan and himself, should wait upon the Auckland Harbour Board to obtain the transfer of the public reserve at Devonport, known as the “Triangle,” to the Devonport Borough Council. Mr Mays' action in this matter was ultimately successful in recovering for the people of Devonport a valuable block of land, which was originally reserved by Sir George Grey for public purposes, and was specially exempted from sale at the first disposal of Crown lands in the district. The Harbour Board acknowledged the justice of the claim, and assisted in the promotion and passing of an Act of Parliament, authorising the transfer of the land to the local body. Mr Mays has rendered very special service to Devonport in connection with education. Having secured the best possible site for a public school, he urged the committee to obtain a new building, adapted to the needs of the district, and the result was that a vote of £1200 was made by the Board of Education and expended in the erection of the original block of buildings on the present site. As chairman of the school committee for very many years he has, with the cordial cooperation of his colleagues, done a great deal in other ways to place the Devonport school in the front rank of the public schools of the province. The Devonport school committee is one of the very few in the colony which have established a technical work-shop and kindergarten classes; and one of Mr Mays' colleagues on the committee, Mr Edward Bartley, voluntarily undertook the first year's management of the workshop, and brought it to such a state of efficiency that the Education Department gave a yearly grant in aid of the cost. The Devonport school has now a roll of 600 scholars, with a staff of sixteen teachers, and Mr Mays and his colleagues are justly proud of its success. In 1885 Mr Mays was appointed treasurer of the Auckland Grammar School Trust, and his management of the school's endowments has been equal to the progress made by the school itself, which now stands at the head of the secondary schools of the colony. In 1888 Mr Mays was gazetted an official visitor of the industrial schools in Auckland, and devoted a good deal of his time to the promotion of the boarding-out system, which, in the Auckland district at least, has proved a great success. When the Hospital and Charitable Institutions Act came into operation in 1886, Mr Mays was elected to represent the counties of Rodney and Waitemata, and the Borough of Devonport, on the Auckland Hospital and Charitable Aid Board. He held the position for six years, and was chairman in his last year of office. During his membership the late Mr Edward Costley bequeathed £100,000 to the charitable and other institutions of Auckland. Of this bequest, £12,150 was for the Old Men's Home, and Mr Mays was one of the first to advocate the erection of a suitable building outside the city for the aged people, who were then lodged in two very old buildings on the Hospital grounds. There was much opposition to this project from those who wished the money to remain on fixed deposit, in order that the interest might be applied in reduction of the rates levied for charitable aid purposes; but the agitation thus commenced was eventually successful, and in 1889 his Excellency, the Earl of Onslow, laid the foundation stone of the new home at Epsom. On that occasion Mr Mays made an impressive speech, in which he gave the history of the benefactors of Auckland, and dwelt especially on the characteristics of the noblest of them all—Edward Costley. Mr Mays is recognised as a high authority on the law relating to local government, in connection with which he has had such exceptional experience. Apart from his knowledge of practical affairs, Mr Mays is a man of much natural ability, and always speaks with persuasive eloquence on subjects in which he is interested. This is so well recognised that, in 1884, a deputation from Sir George Grey's Central Election Committee twice waited upon him, and earnestly requested him to contest the Waitemata seat for the House of Representatives. The committee offered to support him with the whole strength of its powerful organization, and had he allowed himself to be nominated, his election would have followed almost as a certainty. He, however, declined to enter the parliamentary arena. Mr Mays, who has been a Justice of the Peace for a number of years, is further referred to in an article on the Waitemata County Council.