HIBS Old Boy 2008-2012 (Yrs 7-11)
An Old Boy going places but still with his feet firmly planted on the ground. Insanely busy with what he calls a mad job with lots of pressure, but he wouldn’t have it any other way.
From humble beginnings in Wellington, and five years at HIBS, to Logan’s family moving to Palmerston North on his first day of school in Year 12. His transition to PNBHS was seamless as he walked straight into a production of Whistle Down the Wind which he loved doing, before performing in Hairspray, Guys and Dolls, and Phantom of the Opera. He speaks fondly of both schools with lots of good memories.
Logan loved architecture, music, history, politics and the arts during his high school years. Growing up he wanted to be an architect, but by the end of college he landed in Broadcasting.
So Logan was off on his next chapter of his life to New Zealand Broadcasting School at Ara, then known as Christchurch Polytech. He must have done alright as he went straight into an internship for his first job with Radio New Zealand, which he feels lucky to have landed. His first four years was with the Christchurch News team and he worked with some of the greats like John Campbell.
It was a very busy time in the South Island, it was post-earthquake and Logan unexpectedly became an expert on earthquake insurance. He’s proud to have helped some of those worst affected progress their claims, after years of being ignored by big insurers.
Logan was one of the first reporters on the scene at the 2019 mosque attacks, a defining moment in his career, both in witnessing the horror first hand, but also telling the stories of brave survivors who never lost faith in their community or their country.
Logan moved back to his home region of Wellington with RNZ just as COVID hit. He has often bumped into HIBS Old Boys over his career journey, in Wellington he had Cameraman Don Thomas in his work bubble, small world huh.
The New Zealand Herald was his next move back to Christchurch, before an opportunity came up with 1 News. Logan worked in the Auckland newsroom reporting on a variety of stories from high profile crime, disasters such as Cyclone Gabriel, as well creating stories on award winning TV shows Fair Go and Sunday before he was named as US Correspondent and moved to New York last October. This job was as high profile as it gets in New Zealand journalism. Life is busy but he loves it over there, and is now at the front of some of the biggest issues and news stories in the world right now.
Logan remembers HIBS for his passionate teachers and tutors. In particular, Joe Hamilton helped him forge a passion for world events and history and he just connected really well with him.
Gil Evans was our first Brass Tutor at HIBS and Logan learnt Trumpet and Trombone with him. He also introduced Logan to the orchestra, a passion he has to this day. Gil even took Logan - with his own family - to his first performance of the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra. He describes this as one of his best memories from HIBS and he went on to conduct the concert orchestra in his last year for Palmerston North Boys High School. Gil has since passed on but his passion still lives on in Logan.
Lastly Logan feels he needs to say a belated thank you to his PE teachers (he probably never thanked them at the time). He describes how he was terrible at everything, especially hating running at school and came last in his class every time. Well here we are 12 years later and he is about to run his first ever Half Marathon.
Great to have a chat with Logan Church, a young man at the top of his game.