Heritage et AL

Blame it on the rain by Hana Pera Aoake Carin Smeaton : Kia ora Hana, You’ve been a busy mama! I’ve just finished reading your gorgeous little pocket-sized pukapuka 'Blame It On the Rain' and now I’m reading your third (and latest) 'Some Helpful Models of Grief.' I love the philosophies that you weave through your writings with the humour and socio historical threads that we writers from this part of the world tend to shy away from. I love that you don’t sanitise things and I love reading books that embrace that edge. Could you please let us Aucklanders know where you’re from and your connections to Tāmaki Makaurau?  Some helpful models of grief by Hana Pera Aoake Hana Pera Aoake : He uri tenei nō Ngāti Mahuta, Ngāti Hinerangi, Waikato/Tainui, Te Arawa, me Poutini Ngāi Tahu. Kei te noho au ki Kawerau. I tipu ake au Ōtepoti me Te whenua Moemoea. Ko Aoake tōku whanau. Ko Miriama Jean taku Tamāhine. Ko Hana Pera Aoake toku ingoa.  Kia ora, my name is Hana. I'm from a...

The South Auckland Research Centre has recently processed two collections, which provide an insight into the history of two local schools: Manurewa Central School and Finlayson Park School . Manurewa Central School opened as Manurewa School in 1906, after the Woodside School Building was shifted to its new site on the corner of Hill Road and Great South Road. The building was later demolished in 1972. You can read more about the move and opening in the 31 August 1906 entry on Manukau’s Journey – a Manukau timeline . Ref: Opening day, Manurewa School, 3 September 1906, photograph reproduced courtesy of Manurewa Historical Society, South Auckland Research Centre, Auckland Libraries, Footprints 01209.

A collection of 1970s newspaper articles regarding Māori is available to view in the Sir George Grey Special Collections reading room or to search online at Index Auckland . The scrapbooks contain many useful items for whakapapa or historical research, from obituaries to articles promoting the introduction of Māori language teaching in schools. Copies are also available in the Central Research Centre . Even though the clippings are not precisely dated, nor source newspapers always identified, reading through the Scrapbooks reveals areas of concern and celebration for Māori at that time . Ref:  Photograph of three year old Raewyn Tiari,  [Scrapbooks of newspaper clippings about Maori] volume 2, page 17,  1972-1975, Sir George Grey Special Collections, Auckland Libraries, 995.3 S43.

To mark  Te Wiki o Te Reo Māori , Māori Language Week, for 2015 here at Heritage et AL we are featuring some of the oldest items in our collections relating to te reo Māori. These taonga are all held in Sir George Grey Special Collections and currently on show in our exhibition space on the second floor of the Central Library as part of our exhibition   Pūtahitanga: a meeting of two worlds in the North, 1769-1842 . The arrival of Captain James Cook in New Zealand in 1769 is usually seen as the beginning of the meeting of two worlds – the Māori and the European – leading to increasing interaction, misunderstanding and understanding, cross-cultural movement and exchange. This exhibition reveals some of those interactions with explorers, sealers and whalers, missionaries, traders and settlers in the documents and books produced at the time and held in Sir George Grey Special Collections. The word Pūtahitanga means a confluence of streams and expresses the fluidity ...