- The childhood home of Fred Dagg creator John Clarke is for sale after over 60 years.
- The Palmerston North bungalow retains many original features from Clarke’s time there.
- Clarke’s alter-ego, Fred Dagg, became iconic in the 1970s for his humour and satire.
The childhood home of Kiwi gumboot legend Fred Dagg has hit the market for sale for the first time in more than 60 years.
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The three-bedroom character bungalow at 18 Milverton Avenue, in Hokowhitu, Palmerston North, was where comedian John Clarke, spent his formative years.
Clarke, who died in 2017 during a hike in an Australian park, shot to fame in the 1970s with his laconic alter-ego.
Dagg was a gumboot-wearing, singlet-clad farmer with seven sons all named “Trev”. His acting embodied a dry Kiwi humour that resonated deeply with New Zealanders of the day.
The three-bedroom bungalow at 18 Milverton Avenue, in Hokowhitu, Palmerston North, was where Clarke spent his childhood. Photo / Supplied
Clarke’s sketches, songs and TV appearances poked fun at rural life, politics and bureaucracy. The deadpan delivery, whether acting or singing, became Clarke’s trademark. His 1976 album, Fred Dagg’s Greatest Hits, was a number one hit.
His family sold 18 Milverton Avenue in the 1960s to Sylvia and John Lloyd, whose actor daughter May Lloyd talked to OneRoof about her own childhood there and why parting with the house will be hard to do.
“It was a fertile place for imagination for me,” Lloyd told OneRoof. “There was a big back garden, and I used to spend hours out there as an explorer. I nearly poisoned my brother with Arum lilies one time because I ground them up and offered them to him as a dish.
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“It’s very good that I didn’t [progress to mushrooms]. My mother hated mushrooms, so we didn’t grow them, but they’d pop up when it got moist, but they were definitely of the death cap variety.”
Lloyd was not that many years younger than Clarke, and her memories are of the same schools, dairies and other local hangouts.
Some aspects of the home are still identical to when Clarke lived there as a child. “He would have lived in this tiny little room that my brother inherited. It didn’t have a door on it, just a little barn gate. There would have been just enough room for a single bed and a walkway to jump in and out of bed. I know he had a sister, so I’m assuming she had the room that was mine.”
The house, which Clarke’s parents sold in the 1960s, is on the market for sale for the first time in over 60 years. Photo / Supplied
The vendor’s mother lived at the house until she was 93 years. Photo / Supplied
The house is largely as Clarke would have experienced it. “The entranceway still has the original fake brick textured paper that he grew up with.” A cupboard above the fridge where Clarke played survives.
Lloyd’s mother lived in the house right up to the age of 93. Always perfectly presented, she made the fateful mistake of not looking her dazzling usual self when she answered the door one day to actor Sam Neil.
“My mother was very ill at the time. She heard a ring on the doorbell. She could see that someone in a suit was there. She pulled on a dressing gown, opened the door, and it was Sam Neill at the front doorstep.
Clarke died in 2017. He found fame in the 90s and 2000s in Australia as part of the double act Clarke and Dawe. Photo / Supplied
“John Clarke’s wife had said to Sam, ‘If you’re ever in Palmerston North, could you go to College Street School and take a photo, and then go to 18 Milverton Avenue and just get a snap’. There he was, very nicely asking permission to take a photo. They had a lovely chat on the front doorstep.”
Lloyd attended the New Zealand National Drama School and her first big acting role was as a nurse on Country GP, where she met her husband-to-be, Lani Tupu, the first Samoan actor to be cast in a title role.
The chemistry between Lloyd and Tupu was so good that the producers paired their characters on screen. But when the order to “cut” from a kiss was ignored by both actors, a lifelong off-screen relationship was born.
The couple now live in Sydney, where Tupu continues to act. Lloyd has completed two master’s degrees, worked designing fragrances with the city’s best-known florist, Grandiflora, and taught organisational theatre, a training and development approach, at Sydney University’s business school.
Like Lloyd, Clarke also ended up in Australia, moving there in 1977 and becoming a household name through his satirical work with Bryan Dawe, including mock interviews and the TV series The Games, which satirised preparations for the Sydney 2000 Olympics.
Harcourts agent Tim Cook said that the home was a classic do-up on the city’s best street. “Milverton Street is one of my favourite streets,” he told OneRoof. “It is one of the few established tree-lined avenues in Palmerston North.
“I raised my kids just around the corner, and we just walked everywhere.”
- 18 Milverton Avenue, Hokowhitu, Palmerston North, is for sale
