John Hardcastle.
'At 3 a.m. on Saturday Mr John Hardcastle ceased to be an active member of the ‘'Herald’s” literary staff. For more than 40 years he has given to South Canterbury a mind big enough for the whole of New Zealand, and a character which those only can estimate who have worked with or for him. Journalism is not Sunday School teaching, and the men who remain even ten years in a newspaper office without becoming cynics or sophists are commonly coarse or dull. But Mr Hardcastie is neither; and if he goes into retirement still loving and believing in his fellow-men that is an achievement of which one in a hundred is capable. For cynicism is, unquestionably, a proof and a confession of failure, and Mr Hardcastle has triumphed.
We know, of course, that this is neither the time nor the place to appraise him. A more formal farewell will be accorded to him in a few days, and on that occasion others less intimately associated with him than ourselves will compel him to listen to what his contemporaries think of him. But our readers would not forgive us if we did not also say now and at once that his retirement is a thing altogether different from any other newspaper retirement that South Canterbury has ever known, and that when he went home in the small hours of Saturday morning he carried with him, though he was too modest to be conscious of it, a distinction that no one else similarly placed has ever yet achieved in this district. For journalism is one-third politics and one-third business, and only casually and accidentally education or ethics or art. It is a new machine, but, though necessary and even priceless, a far from perfect machine; and Mr Hardcastle must be the first man in Canterbury who has lived among its wheels for two generations without soiling his hands or leaving marks on anyone else. Had he been ambitious he could long since have left this district for more lucrative and influential positions. But he was not ambitious in the matter of cash or personal vain-glory, and so he ends to-day where he began — honoured and honourable instead of rich.
So much’ we must say even while feeling all the time that it is not we who should say it. And we must add one word more. There are journalists who are only journalists, and because the “demnition grind” is so constant, there are few who are anything else. But Mr Hardcastle is a scholar and a thinker. His researches have impressed the highest authorities, as many in South Canterbury know; but what most do not know is that in other fields altogather he is the aulhor of several arresting and stimulating speculations. Though his place in journalism will never quite be filled there is pleasure in the knowledge that he will have freedom now to fill a much more important place in science and abstract thought. -Timaru Herald, 4/9/1922.
OBITUARY.
MR. JOHN HARDCASTLE.
The death occurred in Timaru on Sunday evening of Mr. John Hardcastle, at the age of 80 years, one of the oldest and most highly respected residents in South Canterbury. Born in Yorkshire, he was the eldest of the family of the late Mr. Thomas Hardcastle, who was one of the earliest settlers in the Geraldine district. Leaving England with his family at the age of eleven years, he remained for some years on his father's farm, and afterwards engaged in various occupations, including gold-seeking in Otago and Westland, until he qualified, by training in Christchurch and Melbourne, to become a schoolteacher. It was while acting as headmaster of the Temuka school that he became associated with journalism through assisting a friend in the production of the Temuka Leader, eventually taking charge of both the literary and the business side of that journal until, in 1879, he joined the Timaru Herald, which had been started 15 years earlier by Mr. A. G. Horton, one of the founders of the New Zealand Herald. Five years later, Mr. Hardcastle joined the staff of a new evening paper in Napier, but that journal lasted only a few years, and in 1888 Mr. Hardcastle returned to the Timaru Herald to take editorial charge of the evening edition, the South Canterbury Times. The latter ceased publication in 1895, and from that time until he retired in 1922, Mr. Hardcastle was continuously engaged on the staff of the Herald, acting on several occasions for varying periods as editor. During this career of over 40 years in active and arduous journalism, Mr. Hardcastle devoted much time and labour to various philosophical and scientific studies, and particularly to the geology of South Canterbury. These interests fully engaged him since his retirement five years ago, and he retained until his death, which occurred suddenly, the physical and mental vigour which always characterised him. Mr. Hardcastle leaves a widow, three sons, all of whom have followed him in journalism, and two daughters. -NZ Herald, 14/6/1927.
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