[{"id":8241,"order":0,"imagePath":"https://admin.ezystream.com/static/images/article/46eb58c8-f700-4c4c-a6db-e316348eee8f.png","type":"image","content":"https://admin.ezystream.com/static/images/article/46eb58c8-f700-4c4c-a6db-e316348eee8f.png"},{"id":8242,"order":1,"contentText":"Early life and family
Vivienne Myra Lowe, an only child, was born in Lower Hutt on 11 April 1926 to Winifred and Hugh Lowe. Lowe made a living with his iron foundry. Vivienne attended Hutt Valley High School and studied at Victoria University College, graduating Master of Science in 1948 u2013 despite the difficulty of competing with boys who had received more teaching in the sciences at school.
In the week she graduated, she married Robert Boyd, and the couple went on to have four childrenu2014Vivienne, Alan, Dorothy, and Rosemary. Robert worked as an accountant for the railways and his work took them to Dunedin for some years. Vivienne quickly adjusted to the growing family and many aspects of traditional life for a married woman in the 1950s and early 1960su2014cooking, gardening, flower-arranging, camping trips. In addition, her son had autism, so there were extra responsibilities associated with that.
u2018I put a lot of energy into children,u2019 Vivienne says. u2018At one point I had a five-year-old who couldnu2019t talk, a two-year-old who couldnu2019t walk, and I was again pregnant. Frustrations are part of a womanu2019s life at home with small children. You can feel trapped. As it happened, the next child was perfectly normal, and both the others overcame their difficulties. Thatu2019s not to say that everybody overcomes. Some things canu2019t be put right.u2019
Vivienne was a brilliant organiser, and her Christmas shopping was done by November. From that organising bent and a keen mind, came her personal growth far beyond the domestic scene. Organising herself and other people was one of the foundations of her so-busy life of community service.
Community and public life
She began with Sunday School (every age level), and became president of the Dunedin Baptist Womenu2019s League. She started doing fund-raising in the Free Kindergarten Association, and became the Dunedin Kindergarten Association President in 1965.
The next year she became the national President of the Baptist Womenu2019s League (and also the family moved back to Wellington). Accepting that national position of leadership allowed her to take the opportunity of being the Baptist representative on the National Council of Women (NCW).
In the NCW she was later chosen as Vice-president (1974u201378) and then president (1978-82). She focussed on growing NCW by enabling new branches and getting NCW represented on many national bodies. u201cI used a slogan in 1975 in the International Womenu2019s Year when I was president of the National Council of Women,u201d she later reported. u201cu2018A womanu2019s place is everywhereu2019. Every person ought to be willing and have the opportunity to do as much as she can and as well as she can. Women really havenu2019t had that until recently.u201d
Her outlook became international when she became convener of the social welfare committee of the International Council of Women, 1984-88. Her letters came from faraway places like Lesoto, Indonesia, Israel and South Africa with reports on topics such as womenu2019s welfare and combatting prostitution.
Vivienne and her husband used to enjoy travel overseas, even though, as friends joked, neither had a good sense of direction and they frequently risked getting lost. Off they went and found many things to enjoy on the way. When she travelled to a conference, she talked long and late to accompanying friends, read light romances, and knitted energetically through the airports on the way.
When the government started a u201cCommittee on Women,u201d Vivienne and her friends laughed when they realised what the initials formed. She threatened an article, u2018The Committee on Womenu2014is it a fair cow?u2019 The committee was a precursor to the Ministry of Womenu2019s Affairs, and Vivienne said she and four others worked u2018furiouslyu2019 to coordinate the 1975 International Womenu2019s Year follow-up conference at the NZ parliament buildings in March 1976. She was the only non-employed member and felt it was important that she spoke for all unpaid caregivers.
Vivienne understood and considered her identity as an unpaid worker most seriously, and found many opportunities to promote recognition of all the kinds of work that women do, paid or unpaid. u2018Quite apart from children, women who care for disabled and elderly are often undervalued,u2019 she used to proclaim. u2018They arenu2019t even counted for census purposes. They work willingly, but they donu2019t describe their efforts as work. When ACC started, we fought for years to get womenu2019s unpaid work at home recognised in the scheme.u2019
Vivienne trudged the country drawing attention to womenu2019s unpaid work. She visited NCW branches from Whangarei to Invercargill, speaking at hundreds of meetings and parliamentary select committees, particularly drawing attention to the lack of recognition of so much that women do.
u2018To me to be a Christian is by definition to be a feminist, believing men and women are equal. Christianity sees the worth of every individual, male or female.u2019 Vivienne said this at a time when many Baptist men and women thought that if you called yourself a feminist you could not possibly be a Christian, and vice versa.
She also said, u2018Being a Christian is more important to me than being a woman or a wife or a mother and certainly more than being a Baptist.u2019
At the time there were not many women science graduates and Vivienne was invited on to the Royal Commission on Nuclear Power Generation. She had no objection to being a token woman on the committee. She said it was better a woman was there than none. It sat for two years and went on a seven-week world tour visiting nuclear power plants in USA, Canada, and Britain; Vivienne went on to Switzerland. The government decided against nuclear power even before the commission reported back.
Then came a string of honourable positions on national panels. Indeed, Vivienne had accepted nomination to the Baptist Union board and then withdrew when she was asked to chair the Abortion Advisory Committee, a task she saw high value in even when she was criticised by some Christians, including Baptists, for being involved at all. She was the first woman member appointed to the Union Council of the Baptist Church (in 1970) and was president in 1984. She somehow found time to deliver Meals on Wheels for the Hutt Hospital for 30 years.
Here are lists of Vivienneu2019s many committees and high awards (some with specific dates, and this is not a complete list!).
- lay leader in the Epuni Baptist Church, Petone
- President of the Baptist Womenu2019s League (1966u20131968),
- Vice-President of the National Council of Women (1974 to 1978),
- President of the National Council of Women (1978u20131982),
- Convener of the social welfare committee of the International Council of Women from 1984 to 1988,
- a member and later chair of the Consumer Council (1975u20131988),
- a member of the Royal Commission on Nuclear Power Generation,
- member of the Equal Opportunities Panel,
- member of the Advertising Standards Complaints Board,
- member of the New Zealand Media Alert Trust,
- chair of the Abortion Supervisory Committee (1979u20131980),
- member and later convener of the Baptist Public Questions Committee (1967u20131972, 1977u20131979),
- member of the Baptist Union Council (1970u20131985),
- president of the Baptist Union (1984u20131985).
- She was the first woman to hold the latter two positions.
Honours
- In 1977, Queen Elizabeth II Silver Jubilee Medal,
- Commander of the Order of the British Empire in the 1983 New Year Honours,
- Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire in 1986 Queenu2019s Birthday Honours, for public and community services.
Asked what drove all her committee work, Vivienne claimed two things. u2018Iu2019m interested and like doing it, and the friendships with the people I meet, but also it stems from my Christian worldview. Thereu2019s a bit in the Bible, u201cFrom whom much is given, much shall be expected.u201d I had a good education and a good start in life. I believe I should do something useful with it. I wouldnu2019t say I enjoy committee meetings for their own sake, but for what they achieve.u2019
Vivienne had two guiding rules on whether to accept a place on a new committee. u2018I donu2019t seek office, but wait to be asked. And then if I canu2019t find a good reason why not, I do it. I exhort women to accept responsibility rather than to ask for their rights.u2019 Perhaps in a sign that she was a woman of her age, she said, u2018Itu2019s neither appealing nor particularly Christian to demand rights.u2019
She commented on regrets once. u2018I donu2019t think one can get through life without regrets, but theyu2019re not major ones.u2019
Well, what was Vivienneu2019s personal practice of her Christian faith? u2018Just as marriage is one long conversation, so with God. I talk to him whenever I wish. When I know Iu2019ve done something I shouldnu2019t have, I have to start with an apology.u2019
Robert Boyd died seven years before Vivienne. She died in Lower Hutt in 2011 and was buried in the Taita Old Cemetery.
Sources
Tim Donahugh, Dominion Post, August 22, 2011, stuff.co.nz/dominion-post/news/obituaries/5478532/A-champion-of-women .
GT Bielby, Handful of Grain, vol. 3, 1914-1945, NZ Baptist Historical Society, 1984, p. 72.
Wood, Beulah, u201cWhat Makes her Tick?u201d Carey Baptist College, Auckland, 1989, pp 11-20.
Tallon, Mary E., u201cInterview with Vivienne Boydu201d, natlib.govt.nz/records/35831940.
u201cVivienne Boydu201d, Wikipedia, wikipedia.org/wiki/Vivienne_Boyd
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