Full service history
Words Luke Williamson
Trevor Brljevich has achieved a lot in his many years, from a lifetime service for St John ambulance, to being the oldest competitor in the Kaiwaka Top of the Rock event; not to mention being the only New Zealander to have received the Dix Penning award.
After 71 years of living in Maungaturoto, Trevor Brljevich says he’s finally becoming one of the locals. “I came up from Birkenhead to work on my uncle’s farm when I was 21. I didn’t want to go but Dad told me I would only get that sort of opportunity once in my lifetime. They had no family and I was like a son to them, and eventually the farm was left to me, so it was a good decision.
“Do you want to hear a romantic story?” Trevor asks. “I was 27 years old and I said to my brother, ‘It’s time I got married’. I decided I would ask my sister’s friend who had spent a lot of time at our place in Birkenhead. I’d been away six years, but I went around to her place and knocked on the door, and said, ‘Yvonne, do you want to go to the pictures with me?’ She said no and shut the door. So I went back the second night and asked again, and she said yes. Six days later we were engaged and, a year later, married. We had two children and 47 years together.”
Trevor was a dairy farmer for about 30 years and then ran a successful Limousin beef stud, but eventually sold the farm because of concern over Yvonne’s health. Trevor still lives on three-quarters of an acre which he says was, at one time, “all calla lilies”. Growing flowers, and calla lilies in particular, is a passion of Trevor’s, one he inherited from his father. Trevor is the only New Zealander to have received a Dix Penning Award, given in Holland to acknowledge the world’s best plant breeders. “I just grow them now as a memorial to my dad and for my own pleasure,” he says. “I told the family I would retire once I’ve bred a blue one.”
Trevor is perhaps best known in his community for his lifetime of service to St John. “I joined St John in 1955 and drove the ambulance in Maungaturoto for 51 years. Yvonne would use a pot and a wooden spoon to let me know I had a call – I could hear it anywhere on the farm. I’m a Commander of the Order, but I had to let the active service go.”
Trevor has tended to many friends and family members over the years, including defibrillating his 92-year-old mother-in-law (who went on to live to 100!), and attending the famous Brynderwyn bus crash in 1963, which killed 15 people and injured 21. “It was hard to distinguish who was unconscious and who was dead. It was very disturbing, and what I imagine a war scene would be like.”
Kaiwaka’s Top of the Rock multisport event is another fond memory for Trevor. “It’s a pity it doesn’t run anymore because I always got a petrol voucher for being the oldest competitor,” he laughs. “I got my photo taken standing right on the very top when I was 80. It was quite scary because I’m not very good at heights.”
A fit and active man, Trevor has taken a hit to his health over the last year. “This cancer thing has made me feel old, but the best part about finishing the chemo is getting back into the garden – it makes me feel alive. I still grow enough to have flowers in the church at Christmas time and keep up some entries in the Paparoa A&P show.” And that’s enough for Trevor for the time being.