Heritage et AL

For over 40 years I have passed the WW1 Memorial in the Nell Fisher Reserve (originally known as Civic Park) and been aware of its changing condition.  At times it has looked neglected, the drinking fountain broken, its bowl filled with cement and the lighting disconnected and the glass globe shattered or non-existent.  Former North Shore mayor Paul Titchener noted in his article in 1982 on the monument that “the passing years have not been kind to it" (Titchener, Paul. Beginnings, vol 6, p.44). When the new Birkenhead Library was built in 2010, the surrounding park was landscaped  and the memorial was expertly restored, creating a revitalised space . Some of this work is described in a Salmond Reed Architects Limited report . Although drinking from the fountain is no longer an option, the globe light has been replaced and it glows through the park trees, highlighted at night, that surround it. Ref: B0319, Nell Fisher Reserve Memorial, North Auckland Auckland R...

Recently a customer was searching through old letterbooks in the Chelsea Archives at Birkenhead Library. Tissue thin pages, eye-watering  italic script, crumbling pages, circa 1889 – that sort of thing. He was hoping to find reference to his grandfather. Instead he found curious little notes. Which would be fine, except they seem to be nonsense: Ref: 'Platypus', Chelsea Archives, Birkenhead Library

STOP PRESS! BIRKENHEAD LIBRARY 'UPGRADES'! Birkenhead Library's new 'photocopier' has been installed just in time for the Heritage Festival.    Ref: Albion press at Birkenhead Library Birkenhead Library has got ye olde Albion press (made in c1863) up & running and invites people to come and have a go. Typeset your name! Ref: Albion press demonstration, Birkenhead Library Indent paper!  Ref: Albion press demonstration, Birkenhead Library  Make a bookmark!  Ref: Bookmarks made using the Albion Press, Birkenhead Library All welcome. Sessions times at Birkenhead Library are as follows: Sunday 7th October from 2pm-3pm Wednesday 10th October from 3pm-4pm Sunday 14th October from 2pm-3pm. With many thanks to Graham Judd of GTO Printers , Birkenhead, who has lent the press to the library.  You can find out more about letterpress by visiting his blog . For those interested, Andy English's b...

 Ref: NZ 1965, Chelsea Archives, Birkenhead Library Once upon a time, sugar was good for you .... and Chelsea Archives at Birkenhead Library has the marketing-advertising-promo material to prove it!  Ref: NZ Sugar 1968, Chelsea Archives, Birkenhead Library It’s embedded in the many small publications contained in the archives - such as company newsletters, industry-related periodicals, series, centenary celebrations and that sort of thing. Today they might be considered corporate zines.  Ref: NZ Sugar 1969, Chelsea Archives, Birkenhead Library Examples include: 'Chelsea News', 'Sugar for New Zealand', 'New Zealand Sugar', 'CSR Newsletter', 'Australian Sugar', 'Sugar: Nature’s Bounty', 'Notes on Sugar in New Zealand' and the 'World'.  Ref: NZ Sugar 1970, Chelsea Archives, Birkenhead Library These publications contain splendours galore. Such as the many attempts to explain the triumph...

When James K. Baxter was dismissed from his job at the Chelsea Sugar Refinery, it's well known that he wrote a rather 'unrefined' poem to express his disgruntlement: "I had the job of hosing down The hoick and sludge and grit For the sweet grains of sugar dust That had been lost in it. For all the sugar in the land Goes through that dismal dump And all the drains run through the works Into a filthy sump". Despite this unsugared description, a copy of 'The Ballad of the Stonegut Sugarworks' is lodged in the Chelsea Sugar Archives (at Birkenhead Library), sandwiched between a 1962 plan of the 'Disposition of Buildings' and a 1976 letter from the Refinery Manger to the Managing Director about managing absenteeism. A positioning which is at once random, and oddly relevant - though I couldn’t locate that impressive sounding ‘sump’ on the plan (see below).  Ref: 1962 Plan CSR-B94127, Chelsea Sugar Archives As to the letter, it reads as...

Photo credit: Melvin Vaniman c1902, Chelsea Archives It's big, it's orange , it's preposterous. You see it out of the corner of your eye as you drive up the Harbour Bridge, unless you're concentrating on the road of course.. It's the Chelsea Sugar Refinery in Birkenhead.