Biographical information provided by Flora Feltham for the He Tohu exhibition:
Charlotte Elizabeth Joynt was born in Auckland in 1862 to Irish immigrants Amelia and Charles Joynt. She attended Kauaeranga Girls’ School in Thames, and was appointed a pupil teacher there in 1880. In 1881 she transferred to Newton East School in Auckland. Charlotte was clever: she was awarded a prize in a district essay competition (1877), she passed all her teaching examinations, and she came 4th in a scripture-memorizing competition (1883). She also won an award for sewing a boy’s shirt at the Auckland Sunday School Union Industrial Exhibition. Charlotte never married and lived in the family home on the corner of Picton and Paget streets in Ponsonby until she died in 1951, aged 89. Both Charlotte’s mother, Amelia Elizabeth Joynt and sister, Annie Tregaskis, signed the petition (sheet 26).