Heritage et AL

Tāmaki Pātaka Kōrero | Central City Library is pleased to announce that our popular Heritage Talks programme will now be available as part of Auckland Libraries’ content on SoundCloud and YouTube . Heritage Talks are a regular event run by Research Central  and focus on topics of interest in the areas of local, family and world history. Talks are presented by a range of researchers and historians whose enthusiasm for their subjects is contagious. And now you don’t even need to leave the comfort of your home to share in the stories. Grab a cup of tea, sit back, and relax! Each SoundCloud podcast will give a brief introduction to the speaker and topic including a talk teaser before proceeding to the talk itself. If the talk contains a significant amount of visual material then we will endeavour to make these available through YouTube. Available now is Keith Giles’ Crazy Cameramen and Profligate Photographers . As the title implies, this popular talk captures some of the colour o...

After my father came to New Zealand in 1955 he worked in New Zealand Shipping Co Ltd’s Auckland office. Part of his job was overseeing the provisioning of the company’s ships after they had docked in Auckland. New Zealand Shipping’s fruit and vegetables were supplied by C. W. Wah Jang and Co. Ltd of 31 Queen Street. Strategically located near the wharves and just across from the Chief Post Office, Wah Jang’s did a prosperous trade in fruit and vegetables with most ships floating around the South Pacific. During the Second World War, Wah Jang’s apparently provisioned every United States Navy vessel passing through Auckland! Ref: Henry Winkelmann. Looking north west from the Waverley Hotel along Queen Street, 11 November 1919. Heritage Collections, Auckland Libraries, 1-W1675. Helene Wong’s Heritage Talk at Tāmaki Pātaka Kōrero Central City Library earlier this year on the history of Chinese families in Auckland helped clear up some of the mysteries about Wah Jang’s. Her talk al...

The Chinese have a rich history in New Zealand and are amongst our earliest settlers - with large numbers arriving in the 1850s for the gold rush. There have been some awesome books written about early Chinese. In our Family History research guide on our website , we highlight the famous books Windows on a Chinese Past written by James Ng and Unfolding history, evolving identity, the Chinese in New Zealand by Manying Ip. However, we also have several books in our collection written by other authors and researchers such as Helen Wong's In the mountain's shadow : a century of Chinese in Taranaki 1870 to 1970 = Zai shan de yin ying : yi ge shi ji han ren Taranaki 1870 dao 1970 and To be Jungseng in New Zealand : descendants of Jungseng villagers who migrated to New Zealand from 1890 . Search in our catalogue using keywords "Chinese" and "New Zealand" for many other titles. At the Auckland Family History Expo in August 2016, the Chinese communit...

I became curious about the poll tax when a customer requested a book by Nigel Murphy called ' The Poll Tax in New Zealand ' (1994). The research and writing of this book was commissioned by the New Zealand Chinese Association . The book highlights the NZ government's involvement in discrimination against Chinese settlers and the hardships they suffered as a result of the steep poll tax they had to pay when moving to NZ (see post on 19 March 2013).. The NZ government introduced the poll tax in 1881. Under the Chinese Immigrants Act only Chinese immigrants had to pay the poll tax. The tax was a response to anti-Chinese attitudes in European settler society after an economic slump and increasing competition for jobs. Ref: 31-60218, Mr Going, 1910, Sir George Grey Special Collections

To celebrate Chinese New Year (also see the earlier post on 21 January 2013), we have been busy pinning up great heritage photos on Historypin. The images show locations and activities in Auckland associated with Chinese communities. The collection of images on Historypin  has two parts. The first is Old Chinatown in the centre of Auckland, around Greys Avenue, Hobson and Cook Streets. The first shop and business in this area was recorded in 1895. Other shops and businesses as well as a mission hall, masonic lodge and housing were quickly established. The images chosen show key locations in Old Chinatown, a landscape which will be both familiar and unfamiliar to present day Aucklanders. In an attempt to 'clean up the area', by 1964 Old Chinatown had been demolished to make way for new developments such as Myers Park, council flats and Auckland Town Hall. Ref: 4-2212, Chinese Mission Hall, Sir George Grey Special Collections