The records of the Ross Shield indicate that the early Napier schools were the most successful in winning the shield when it was a challenge competition played for by individual schools. The only other school to offer strong challenges was Woodville District School. What a journey it must have been in those very early days of the 20th century. Travel would have taken nearly all day on the steam train.

The early Napier schools have changed their format, name or have been closed. Marist Brothers is now St Patrick’s and both Napier Main School and District School have both closed. Fortunately we have two photographs of these two schools with the winning teams. It also appears that Napier Main and Napier District Schools were one and the same as some of the same players are in both photos.

J R Ross indicated in 1899 that he would award a ball to the winning team in a challenge competition and later he indicated that he would replace this with a shield. However, it took some time to eventuate.

Frank Long, a HBRU historian summarises the minutes and the correspondence of that time and writes:

“The Ross Shield, promised to the HBRU in 1902, did not arrive in the province until September 1903. The shield was presented to Marist Brothers School in Napier as they were the area champions for that year and for 1902 and the school had those two dates 1902–03 engraved on the shield, despite the fact that the shield was not in Hawke’s Bay in 1902.

In 1904, the Hawke’s Bay Public Schools Sports Association, which governed sports activities for all schools in Napier at the time, decided that Marist Brothers were not eligible for primary schoolboy rugby. The HBRU decided that Marist Brothers were eligible and an impasse developed. Consequently, Marist Brothers handed back the shield to HBRU and there were no matches for the shield in 1904 and 1905.

That means the first time the shield was at stake in any competition was in 1906 when Marist Brothers were challenged for the shield by Dannevirke School, and Marist Brothers retained it.

Essentially then, this is the first date for a Ross Shield contest as before that time, the shield had been an object of presentation rather than competition.”