Heritage et AL

The Dick Smith NRL Auckland Nines tournament takes place this weekend at that most hallowed of sports grounds, Eden Park. (Go the Warriors, just quietly!) Last year was the inaugural tournament and in the lead-up, I took a nostalgic look back, via our family history blog Kintalk, at the old league ground, Carlaw Park.  Now, we're skipping across town to the tournie venue itself - the stadium where that girl-and-boy-crush Richie McCaw held the Webb Ellis trophy aloft at the Rugby World Cup Final in 2011 - Eden Park.  The park began as a cricket ground in 1903, and was due to the vision of one Harry Ryan, a cricket enthusiast who approached landowner John Walters to lease part of his land as a sports field.  In the book   Eden Park: A History,  the authors write, "Certainly the rough paddock strewn with stones, studded with outcrops of rock and streaked with cowpats, falling away to a boggy trough that filled in a downpour and remained flooded throughout ...

We’re very pleased to announce that we've recently had a new collection of photographs from Sir George Grey Special Collections added to Heritage Images . The intriguingly named ‘Riverhead Dump’ collection has a very interesting story behind it.  Ref: Unidentified harbour, Sir George Grey Special Collections, Auckland Libraries, 1055-60.

My nine year old son Thomas has recently started playing for the Ponsonby-Kelston junior division of the Ponsonby Rugby Club , colloquially known as the ‘Ponies’. The Club celebrated its 140th anniversary at the end of May, so I thought that provided a good opportunity to explore the club’s history. Ref: Andre Elliot, Thomas in full flight for the try-line, by kind permission of the photographer, 2014 Founded in 1874, Ponsonby is one of the oldest rugby clubs in New Zealand, and is the last surviving founder member of the Auckland Rugby Union , which was formed in 1883. Ponsonby is well known as a ‘feeder’ club, with hundreds of its players having gone on to represent Auckland, an impressive 53 players are on its Honours Board for wearing the All Black jersey, and 21 for representing NZ Māori. Ref: Ephemera from Ponsonby Rugby Club, 140th Queen's Birthday weekend commemorative badge, 1874-2014 Early All Black legends from the Club include Dave Gallaher and George ...