28 WESTON

John and Mary Weston and their family arriced in 1850 aboard the S.S. Mariner, and farmed at Omata.  John died in 1857 "after a painful and lingering illness" and never saw the considerable achievements of his children. The family became deeply involved in the history of St Mary's. Son Henry purchased The taranaki Herald newspaper in 1867 and remained sole proprietor until his death in 1920. From the 1880s, Henry Weston and his brothers and nephews took a lively interest in the condition of the churchyard, raising funds for paved paths, and eventually paying for the stone wall and lychgate on the eastern side of the churchyard. They also gifted a pair of stained glass windows in the west wall of the South Aisle as a memorial to John and Mary. Unusually, the wording on the modern granite stone at the foot of the original Welsh slate memorial differs from the original.

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