A long-forgotten fund aims to support the professional development of nurses in the region.
The fund consists of a sum of money Kit McGuire — a local nurse who died in 1973 — left as a legacy to support nurses after her death.
Miss McGuire was born in Timaru in 1896.
She attended Timaru South School before embarking on a career in psychiatric nursing, graduating from Sunnyside Hospital in 1927 and returning to Timaru after her parents died.
Settling in the family home she had dedicated herself to healthcare, working part-time as a public nurse and, for a time, as a private nurse to Doctors S. Fraser and W. H. Unwin.
She was a member of the New Zealand Registered Nurses Association and played an integral role in supervising state nursing examinations at Timaru Public Hospital for 22 years.
However, it was her leadership as the Matron of the South Canterbury Health Camp for 28 years that made a lasting impact, helping countless children achieve better health.
Miss McGuire was appointed MBE in the 1960 New Year Honours for services to community and the Children’s Health Camp.
When the Nursing Association South Canterbury Branch was dissolved in 1988, among it was a scholarship in her name.
The trustees of the Kit McGuire Trust resettled the funds with the Aoraki Foundation last year, to establish the Kit McGuire Nursing Fund.
The new fund would carry on the purpose of the trust, to advance nursing and specifically the education and professional development of nurses in their third year of training who resided in the Aoraki region.
Once the fund reaches $50,000 it will be used to award an annual scholarship to a South Canterbury nurse in their third year of training.
The fund was at $41,250 and a group of South Canterbury nurses were considering ways to top the fund up to the level needed for distribution.
Fundraising spokeswoman Anna Wheeler said the independent account had been discovered last year.
She said she hoped the fund would create some energy around nursing.
‘‘And celebrate the role nursing contributed to health in South Canterbury.
‘‘The primary purpose of the funding was to advance nursing and specifically education and professional development of nurses who reside in the Aoraki region.
‘‘The priority within this purpose would support a nurse in training in their third year of a bachelor of nursing,’’ she said.
It would not be linked to any type of nursing — such as hospital care, aged care or primary care — but rather the wider profession.
She said a high proportion of nurses start and stay in South Canterbury for their entire nursing career, which fitted with what she imagined about Miss McGuire.
‘‘What I imagine is that Kit was a real community nurse. The story around it is forever.’’
