Conrad Harvey Sayce (1888-1994)
Conrad Harvey Sayce was born to William Jasper Sayce & Emma Maria Harvey on the 1st January 1888 in the parish St Nicholas, Hereford, Herefordshire, England. He had 4 siblings, a sister (Indiana Mabel) and 3 brothers (Marcus William, Douglas Edward and Leonard Alfred).
His ancestry has been traced back to his great grandfather, John Sayce of London, a tailor born in 1770. John’s father, also a John Sayce is of unknown origin, but was also a tailor and a Quaker.
The 1891 England census found Conrad with his younger siblings and mother still living in the parish of St Nicholas, Hereford. No record can be found of his father. The 1901 England Census found Conrad and his younger brother Marcus at a Quaker School (Sidcot School) in Winscombe, Somerset. Their siblings and both parents were at that time living at 152 Slow Hill, Newport, Monmouthshire in Wales.
The 1911 England census found Conrad as a school master at a secondary proprietary school in Kendal, Westmorland. He subsequently emigrated to Australia and in 1915 gave his address as 374 Auburn Rd, South Hawthorne, Victoria in his military Embarkment Roll form.
Conrad was married to a headmistress, Alice Mary Maxwell-Hyslop of Victoria on the 25th August 1922. Sadly Alice died the following year at the age of 43.
He married his second wife, Patricia Martha Farrington Letts in Melbourne, Victoria on the 29th January 1925. Patrica was the grand-daughter of Lord Farringdon.
In 1926 Rodney Alsop, a Melbourne architect, an international competition for the design of the Winthrop Hall at the University of Western Australia, in conjunction with his employee Conrad Sayce. The colonnade and barrel vaulted undercroft were constructed of finely detailed board marked in situ concrete. The commission led to a legal dispute between Sayce and Alsop, from which the former withdrew.
Conrad started his literary career with the publication circa 1920 of (Jim Bushman) A Valley of a Thousand Deaths. This was followed by Golden Buckles (Melbourne: Alexander McCubbin, 1920) which deals with fabulous finds in the Australian desert, In the Musgrave Ranges (London: Blackie & Son, 1922), (Jim Bushman). The Golden Valley (London: Blackie & Son Ltd, 1924), The Splendid Savage: a Tale of Central Australia (c.1925), The Splendid Savage: A Tale Of The North Coast Of Australia (Thomas Nelson, London, 1927), and lastly Comboman: a Tale of Central Australia (Hutchinson, London, 1934).
Conrad emigrated to South Africa in 1934 or 1935. He registered with the Institute of South African Architects in 1935, his address was given as c/o COOK & COWEN. In about 1937 he joined the office of HAWKE & McKINLAY, becoming a partner in the firm in 1939 after Hawke's death (cf HAWKE, McKINLAY & SAYCE). Some records how the partnership started in 1937 instead of in 1939. Projects undertaken by the firm were additions to the Johannesburg Town Hall in 1937, Building for the Department of Health in Benoni in 1937 and the new Middleburg Municipal offices in 1940.
Conrad was the author of a contribution (pp 60-101) to the book Homes of the Golden City (A. Macmillan Cape Town, 1948) where he is referred to as being Hon. FRIAWA, Medallist RIBA (Fellow of the Institute of Architects of Western Australia). He was the architect for the Standard Bank building constructed on the corner of Nind and Beit Streets in Doornfontein, Johannesburg. Plans were approved in 1951, and construction was completed March 1954 at a cost of ₤15,250. The architectural style was Neo Classical Modernist.
Conrad died on the south Coast of Kwazulu-Natal in November 1966. His surviving wife, Patricia Martha Farrington (nee Letts) married Clement Campbell Webb the following year and died in Port Shepstone, South Africa in 1994.
References
Miles Lewis, 200 Years of Concrete in Australia, p. 103
Institute of South African Architects
Who's Who in Australia (1933-1934 volume)
Who's Who in Australia (1935 volume)
