Heritage et AL

Now on in our exhibition space on the second floor of the Central Library is House and home: domestic life in New Zealand . This nostalgic exhibition, which will run until 30 October, explores the domestic side of New Zealand life before the 1980s. It looks at what made a house a home in New Zealand. Today we’re looking at entertainment in the home. Piano Ref: James D Richardson,  Jean Richardson sitting on cushion on chair, playing the piano, 1915?, Sir George Grey Special Collections, Auckland Libraries, 4-8902.

Coffee lounges opened in Auckland in the 1950s and filled a social gap for people who weren’t attracted to other entertainments available at that time such as commercial cabaret and big bands in ballrooms. They sported glamorous European-inspired names like C’est si Bon, El Paso, La Ronde, Picasso and Piccolo and their décor was Bohemian chic. Walls were covered in murals, or posters of bull fights, and ceilings were painted black and draped in fishing nets. Tables were lit by candles stuck in Chianti bottles, and the air was usually thick with cigarette smoke. Ref: John Rykenberg, Auckland restaurant, 1959, Sir George Grey Special Collections, Auckland Libraries, 1269-A997-3.

Back in the day, Auckland had its only version of New York’s Coney Island - a fully functioning amusement park on the waterfront complete with dodgems, a roller coaster, stalls and sideshows. The equipment had come from the New Zealand and South Seas Exhibition, a world fair that ran in Dunedin from 1925-1926. Held at Logan Park, it was most spectacular in the evening when lights highlighted the growing use of electricity. According to Te Ara , it was the most popular exhibition in New Zealand’s histor y.   Note the "scenic railway" to the right in the image below. Image: Comprehensive view of the exhibition at Logan Park Dunedin, 1926. Auckland Libraries Heritage Collections AWNS-19251126-43-1. At its closure moves were afoot to take advantage of the sideshows and thus was born the idea of an Auckland Luna Park. Luna Park was in fact the name of the very first amusement park on Coney Island, New York.  Reclaimed Harbour Board land was chosen  although not ...

You all are living under a cloud if you didn't hear that most amazing sporting news of the past month. Forget the Breakers, Team New Zealand and the Cricket World Cup… the real news was that The Bushwhackers , that great wrestling tag team of the 70s and 80s, were inducted into the WWE Hall of Fame . This is huge. Mike Hosking even mentioned it on the telly during Seven Sharp. Here at the Central Library as part of our 1920s entertainment display, we've naturally included pro-wrestling because back in the day, like its boxing cousin , wrestling just exploded in popularity. By the thirties it had become a huge deal. Bouts filled halls all over the country – such as in the image below, taken in Masterton. Both promoters and wrestlers were out to make big money and the Dominion Wrestling Union was formed to promote the sport. Wrestlers – known as ‘matmen’ – came from all over the world looking for a match, and Monday nights at the Auckland Town Hall saw fans queuing early ...

Chris Bourke has written a great  profile on the  AudioCulture  website about Auckland entertainment industry entrepreneur and local government politician Phil Warren. Many of the images included in the article are from the Phil Warren manuscript (Click here and type "NZMS 1214" into the search field), donated to  Sir George Grey Special Collections  after Warren's death in 2002. Ref: NZMS 1214, Phil and an unknown friend dining in the early 1960s, Sir George Grey Special Collections. Born in 1938, Warren came from a family in which music and politics were important - his parents were performers and his grandfather's wife's family were political figures in Auckland. As a teenager, Warren worked for the music retailer Beggs and through a contact at this job he was hired as a travelling salesman. When he was 18 years old, Warren met with an Australian agent of Clef Records in an attempt to establish a New Zealand branch of the company. The agent was surp...