George William Hutchison (3 April 1882 – 14 February 1947) was a

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politician and accountant. He was

Mayor of Auckland City The Mayor of Auckland City was the directly elected head of the Auckland City Council, the municipal government of Auckland City, New Zealand. The office existed from 1871 to 2010, when the Auckland City Council and mayoralty was abolished and ...

from 1931 to 1935.

Biography

Hutchison was born in Mangonui in 1882 and educated at

Auckland Grammar School Auckland (pronounced ) ( mi, Tāmaki Makaurau) is a large metropolitan city in the North Island of New Zealand. The most populous urban area in the country and the fifth largest city in Oceania, Auckland has an urban population of about I ...

. He was a public accountant in Auckland from 1907, rising to become a Fellow of the New Zealand Society of Accountants and Auditors, and local President of the Chartered Institute of Secretaries. From 1911, he was secretary of the Auckland branch of the

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. He was the president of the Auckland Rotary Club in 1928/29 and a vice-president of the Auckland Town Planning Association. He served on the

University of Auckland , mottoeng = By natural ability and hard work , established = 1883; years ago , endowment = NZD $293 million (31 December 2021) , budget = NZD $1.281 billion (31 December 2021) , chancellor = Cecilia Tarrant , vice_chancellor = Dawn F ...

Council from 1929. Hutchison entered local-body politics as a member of the

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Road Board. He was elected onto

Auckland City Council Auckland City Council was the local government authority for Auckland City, New Zealand, from 1871 to 1 November 2010, when it and Auckland's six other city and district councils were amalgamated to form the Auckland Council. It was an elected b ...

in 1929 and was elected mayor in 1931. In the 1934 King's Birthday Honours, he was appointed a Companion of the Order of St Michael and St George. He was appointed a Chevalier of the Légion d’honneur by the Republic of

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on 3 December 1934, in recognition of his service to visiting French warships as the Mayor of Auckland. This award was announced by the French Foreign Minister along with awards to Reverend Hadden Kingston Vickery and The Honourable John Alexander, which were "made as tokens of appreciation of the very cordial welcome which the city of Auckland... adnever failed to extend to various French warships." In 1935, he was awarded the King George V Silver Jubilee Medal. Hutchinson was succeeded as mayor by Sir Ernest Davis in 1935, but served as French Consular Agent in Auckland from 1939 to 1942, and died in Auckland on 14 February 1947.

Awards and decorations

Companion of the Order of St Michael and St George (1934) * Legion Honneur Chevalier ribbon

Chevalier of the Legion of Honour (1934) * King George V Silver Jubilee Medal (1935)

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Hutchison, George 1882 births 1947 deaths People from the Northland Region People educated at Auckland Grammar School Mayors of Auckland New Zealand accountants New Zealand Companions of the Order of St Michael and St George Knights of the Legion of Honour New Zealand recipients of the Legion of Honour