Times-Age photographs

As newspapers downsize their operations there has been a trend for their photographic collections to be sold to international collectors.

In Masterton the trend has been bucked with the recent transfer of nearly 1,000,000 photographs and negatives from the Wairarapa Times-Age to the Wairarapa Archive.

The newspaper, which was form in 1938 following the amalgamation of the towns two dailies, is housed in a wonderful Art Deco building, styled on the now-demolished Miami Herald building.  The newspaper printing has been outsourced and the building sold to a local property developer, the newspaper leasing back part of the space.  As part of that process the newspaper’s photographs needed to find a new home and the Wairarapa Archive was the logical place for the, given the close association between the newspaper and the archive.

Masterton District Archivist  Gareth Winter is excited to have such an extensive collection of photographs added to the Archive’s collection.

“These photographs represent a unique look at a slice of Wairarapa history for the past fifty years.  Through these images we have a window into the way our region has developed.”

It will take a long time to process these photographs but they are currently stored in chronological order and can easily be scanned and reproduced for clients.

Descent from Disaster

 

Several years ago the Wairarapa Archive was approached by Auckland film-maker Screentime for some background information for a documentary series about New Zealand disasters. It was to be titled ‘Descent from Disaster’ and was to be focussed on six significant New Zealand disasters, including plane and train crashes, ship wrecks, mine explosions, the 1931 Hawke’s Bay earthquake and the 1918 influenza epidemic.  It was Wairarapa’s experience in the latter that they were interested.

Of the six disasters, the 1918 epidemic killed by far the greatest number. The epidemic, which seems to have originated in the United States in early 1918, spread around the globe.  Estimates of the death vary wildly, but it seems that at least 25 million people lost their lives, far more World War One.

Director Bryn Evans was making the episode based on the influenza epidemic.  He found that events in Wairarapa were representative of the epidemic, and discovered that Wairarapa Archive held records which would help his research.  He talked to archivist Gareth Winter about events in Masterton and to Neil Frances about the effects of influenza at Featherston Military Camp. Eventually, having thoroughly searched the holdings of memories and photographs at Wairarapa Archive, Bryn came up with a filming schedule, concentrating on F.P. Welch’s work as a volunteer nurse, and the effects of the epidemic at Featherston Camp.

The film crew, with interviewer and narrator Judy Bailey, spent time at the Wairarapa Archive, perusing old records and newspapers, and then spent further time in the Masterton Club, looking at the plush surroundings that briefly served as an influenza hospital.

The first recorded cases of influenza in New Zealand were in Auckland in early October, although after the pandemic has passed, many people blaming the returning troopship Niagara which also carried the Prime Minister Massey.  However, the ship docked in Auckland three days after three days after the first New Zealand deaths.

The first recorded outbreak in Wairarapa was at the Featherston Military Camp, where large groups of young men, statistically the most prone group, were assembled.  In early November the local newspapers were stating that the flu had struck the camp and 299 men had been hospitalised.   The camp housed thousands of soldiers in training and the disease spread very quickly.   By the middle of the month over 2000 men were being treated in the hospital and 22 had already died.  The first Masterton deaths were reported on the newspapers of 13 November.   Mastertonians had gathered in the streets to celebrate the end of World War One, little realising that some of them were already infected with the disease.   Some of the crowd collapsed at the ceremonies held in Masterton Park and were rushed to Masterton Hospital.

At the height of the Wairarapa pandemic the Masterton and Greytown hospitals were swamped with patients and nurses and doctors had contracted the disease meaning  volunteer nurses and helpers were called for.   Temporary hospitals were set up in many buildings through Wairarapa – in schools, clubs, and in the Masterton Borough Council Chambers.   All schools were closed down until the following year and most businesses were instructed to remain shut.

Among those who were pressed into service as volunteer nurses was the local businessman F.P. Welch, who left a good record of Masterton during the epidemic in his dairy, now stored in the Wairarapa Archive.  He writes of his many nights of service at the Masterton Club and the nearby Services Club, where he tried valiantly to help save the lives of those stricken with the flu.  Ironically, Welch’s diaries, which span over forty years, usually record his own struggles with chest infections, but he somehow missed out on a dose of the 1918 influenza.

The film crew gained a valuable insight into the way the influenza epidemic affected a small but representative rural community and the country’s biggest military camp, while archive staff had a look at film-making – which seemed to require much sitting around and waiting but, for a day at least, was a novelty.

Men with fibre

 

 

Archivist Gareth Winter has a long-term interest in the Ruamahanga River.  A couple of summers ago he walked the length of the river, from the headwaters high in the Tararua Range, down to the outlet at Lake Onoke.

One of the interesting sites on the hike was ‘Mahaki’ farm, just south of Martinborough, where an extensive flax growing industry flourished in the first half of the 20th century.  The Wairarapa Archive had little documentation of the growing and processing exploits on ‘Mahaki’  until recently, when the granddaughter of farm hand Fred Small presented us with a set of over 30 photographs.  It shows the entire process, from raising the young flax plants, right through to loading the finished product onto a ship in Wellington.   A remarkable addition to our collection.

CENTENARY TO SPAN MAJOR EVENTS

EMBARKATION: The scene at Masterton Railway Station on August 13, 1914, as the first Wairarapa volunteers left for training prior to going to war.

As the 100th anniversary of the start of World War I looms, a group of Wairarapa people have banded together to plan for its centenary and events that unfolded over the duration of the war.
Led by war historian Neil Frances and Masterton RSA president Bob Hill, the group called WW100 Wairarapa involves the RSA, Wairarapa Archive, Masterton, Carterton and South Wairarapa district councils, Anzac Hall Society, Featherston Heritage Museum and Red Cross.
It will span the major events of the entire war that lasted from August 1914 until early November 1918 and is not designed to shut out others who may want to commemorate events.A search for locally collected war souvenirs and records is planned for early next year and several groups are looking at musical and dramatic depictions of the war.  Mr Frances said World War I inspired lots of music, drama and literature “much of which is virtually unknown now”.The planned recognition of the war dubbed “the war to end all wars” will extend to the centenary of the Soldiers’ Club in Masterton, now Wairarapa Services and Citizens Club, in August 2018 and beyond to the Armistice and the influenza epidemic that followed.
Mr Frances said there were almost 600 names on Wairarapa memorials with some names appearing more than once.  Wairarapa Archive and Carterton District Council are working on identifying and obtaining service records for those commemorated on the memorials.

ex http://www.times-age.co.nz/news/centenary-to-span-major-events/1904037/

Gunner Dobson

Among the recent arrivals at the Wairarapa Archive have been papers from the family of early pakeha settler George Smith.

Smith, who farmed to the east of Masterton before settling in the town in the 1870s, had four children – two sons, two daughters.  The unmarried daughters Margaret and Gladys, befriended a Wellington-based  World War One soldier, William Dobson, who sent them a variety of cartoons from Featherston Military Training Camp, and from his service overseas.  Dobson survived the war and became a successful tiler and, in the words of his son, a “frustrated cartoonist”.