Dorothea Mundella Jean Wilson

Dorothea (Dorrie) Wilson was born in Herbert on the 17th of April,1906, the second child of Robert and Annie ( Thomson) Wilson. The Wilsons ran the general store in Hampden for some years before shifting to nearby Herbert to run the store in that town. Dorrie attended the Otepopo Primary School then went to Waitaki Girls High School in Oamaru for three years. She worked as a seamstress for 6 months on leaving school. In the early 1920's the family moved to the town of Outram on the Taieri Plain to run a store and barber shop there. Dorrie helped her dad in the shop. Her father died prematurely in 1929 and she and her mother maintained the shop until her marriage to Graham Wyllie in 1934. They lived in the property known as Balmoral and this is where their two sons Ian(1935) and Grant(1938) were born. In 1941 they moved to a farmlet at 110 Gladstone Road Mosgiel where their daughter Marianne(1945) was born.

TAIERI PLUNKET SOCIETY OTAGO DAILY TIMES, ISSUE 21360, 13 JUNE 1931.

The annual meeting of the Taieri Subbranch of the Plunket Society was held in the Coronation Hall on Wednesday. After the routine business had been attended to, the following were elected office-bearers for the ensuing year:-President, Mrs A. Arundel; vice-presidents, Mesdames Allan and Gordon; treasurer, Mrs Wilson; secretary, Mrs Livingston; committee Mesdames White. Smith, Smeaton, Lambert, Graham, Wyllie, Gillan, Weddell, Sproule, Reid, Connor, Ferry, Millan, and Miss Drummond. The district nurse reported on the number of cases engaging attention, and what had been accomplished during the past year. As the work of this branch was growing, the committee expressed a wish to have the nurse stationed on the Taieri.

At the close of the business the committee provided afternoon tea.