lit a candle 4h agoI only know him through a Hutt Valley badminton Facebook group a friend added me to years ago, full of people swapping old club photos. Was out in the garden when someone posted the notice from The Post. Ninety years counting volunteering at the very hospice that looked after him at the end, that's the part that stayed with me all afternoon.
Their story
Bruce James King was born on 20 March 1937 and spent most of his life in the Hutt Valley, part of the greater Wellington region of New Zealand. He was not a figure of national fame or the subject of a Wikipedia biography, and no detailed public record exists of…
Bruce James King was born on 20 March 1937 and spent most of his life in the Hutt Valley, part of the greater Wellington region of New Zealand. He was not a figure of national fame or the subject of a Wikipedia biography, and no detailed public record exists of his working life or early career. What is documented, through the obituary published in his memory, is that he was widely known and well liked within two particular communities: the Hutt Valley and Auckland tennis and badminton scenes, where he was associated for many years, and the volunteer network supporting Te Omanga Hospice in Lower Hutt.
According to the notice placed by his family, Bruce achieved a great deal in his life, and he was especially remembered for his long volunteer service to Te Omanga Hospice and his sustained involvement with local tennis and badminton clubs. For readers who know him only through these community ties, that record of quiet, sustained service appears to be the core of how he will be remembered: not through headlines, but through the clubs he helped run, the matches he organised or played, and the hospice he gave his time to for years before, in a turn that his family described as fitting, he died there himself.
Bruce was married to Karen King. Together they raised six children, Murray, Adam, Jarrod, Troy, Sandra and Leanne, and the couple had nine grandchildren, living across Auckland, Wellington and the United States at the time of his death. He is also survived by his brother, Rex.
Bruce James King died on 25 October 2026 at Te Omanga Hospice in Lower Hutt, at the age of 89. His family's notice described him as deeply loved, but it did not state a specific cause of death, and no cause has otherwise been made public. His passing was announced through an obituary published by The Post, the Wellington newspaper, on 28 October 2026.
It is worth noting for anyone arriving at this page expecting information about the medieval Scottish king, Robert the Bruce, or a historical figure called James Bruce, King of Scotland, that this is a different, unrelated person: a private New Zealand man, well regarded in his local community, who died in October 2026. There is no documented family or historical connection between Bruce James King of Lower Hutt and the royal House of Bruce.
Biography adapted from News reports and the sources cited on this page; death reported by Legacy | Obituary.
That group is how a lot of us heard too. He ran the Tuesday night draw for years.