Heritage et AL

Image: Penny Vernon with her twin lens camera, 17 July 2025, photographer Jane Wild Robin Hyde’s distributed archive continues to grow. Sometimes the photograph, the book or the letter takes its own time. In this case a photograph which features Robin’s son Derek Challis took over forty years to be developed. The story behind the photograph demonstrates the way documentary heritage can surface beyond the formed collections. This is particularly apparent when an archive is collected after the subject’s death. Iris Guiver Wilkinson (1906 – 1939), known to her family as Iris, and now better known as Robin Hyde has left a trail of letters and photographs across the country and beyond reflecting her vivid and tumultuous life. More letters continue to be found and through digitisation and transcription they add to the distributed archive in collections, both public and private.  Image: Derek and Ellynne (Lyn) Challis with Jean Sweetman, Grey Lynn, 1980s, photographer: Penny Vernon The p...

34 sketches in New Zealand for Mr Charles Abraham. Ref: Caroline Abraham, Sketchbook, Sir George Grey Special Collections, Auckland Libraries, 3-111. Mrs Caroline Harriet Abraham is chiefly remembered as a recorder of the early colonial New Zealand landscape. Her cousin was the wife of Bishop Selwyn and she herself married Selwyn’s good friend Mr Charles Abraham. During the first half of their New Zealand residence, the Abrahams lived mainly at St John’s College where Charles was Principal. They moved south in 1859 when he was made inaugural bishop of Wellington. Ref:  Carolin e Abraham, Sketchbook, Sir George Grey Special Collections, Auckland Libraries, 3-111.

In today’s property market most young couples can only dream of such a wedding gift, but when Julia Thorne George married up-and-coming lawyer Wilfred Colbeck in June 1895 her parents presented her with a house in St Stephens Avenue, Parnell. What’s more, Sir George Grey sent her a generous cheque that enabled her to furnish the dining room in style. She was nevertheless miffed at Sir George for failing to attend the wedding. Technically, he was her great-uncle, but she regarded him more as a grandfather. She had lived in the same house as him most of her life. Her mother, Annie, was the daughter of Grey’s half-brother Godfrey Thomas, who died young. Grey not only took Annie in but continued to provide a home for her and her growing family after she married Seymour Thorne George in 1872. Ref: Daniel Mundy, I nterior of Mansion House, Kawau Island, c1870, Sir George Grey Special Collections, Auckland Libraries, 7-A3034.

Did you know that June the 9 th is International Archives Day ? To celebrate, archive services from around the world were invited to submit an image from their collections and send a message to archival colleagues around the world. See if you can find all the contributions from New Zealand in the photo page , according to the NZ Records email list there are nine. Information about the gestation of International Archives Day and the reasoning behind it can be found at the International Council on Archives website . The hashtag #IAD15 was also really enjoyable to follow on Twitter throughout the day; happily Britain’s National Archives have collated them in Storify form . All of Auckland Libraries’ Research Centres hold archival collections, as does the Birkenhead Library which is home to the Chelsea Sugar Refinery’s archive . Through sheer coincidence the subject of both of Auckland Libraries’ contributions were the personal papers of decorated war heroes. Ref: Don ...

In recent years Auckland bibliophile and historian John Webster has been a generous donor to Sir George Grey Special Collections . Among the items he has gifted to the library is an 1845 edition of 'The poems of William Wordsworth '. The book is in superb condition for its age, but what makes it of particular interest is the hand-written inscription on the second leaf, which reads: “Anna Hosykns from William Wordsworth, Westminster Cloisters, 15th April 1847.” Ref: Second leaf inscription from 'William Wordsworth, 'The poetical works...'  London: Edward Moxon, 1845.' Sir George Grey Special Collections. The writing matches other surviving examples from the poet’s pen. Biographies and Wordsworth’s published letters verify that he was acquainted with Anna Hoskyns. Anna’s maiden name was Ricketts. Born in 1814, she belonged to a family that became part of Wordsworth’s circle in the late 1830s. She was among the group of friends that accompanied the po...

Cataloguing and preservation tasks can lead librarians working in heritage collections to come across items which may not have been accessed for some time. These encounters provide an opportunity to explore the lives of historical figures, both locally and internationally, who are connected to the objects. Ref: AWNS-19381005-50-2, portrait of Signor Mussolini, dictator of Italy, 1938, Sir George Grey Special Collections A recent 'rediscovery', which sparked a conversation in the  Sir George Grey Special Collections  workroom, was a telegram sent in 1933 under instructions from the Italian leader, Mussolini. Ref: AWNS-19350925-41-2, king of Italy with Signor Mussolini during the Bolzano maneuvers, 1935, Sir George Grey Special Collections

Three long lost Robert Burns (1759-1796) manuscripts including letters from the well loved Scottish poet and his friends were discovered earlier this year. Chris Rollie, a researcher discovered the manuscripts inside an Extra Illustrated W. Scott Douglas edition of 'The Works of Robert Burns', from 1877-79. This edition belonged to Burns's publisher, William Paterson. Ref: 35-R1480, unveiling of the Robert Burns statue in Timaru Botanical Gardens, no date, Sir George Grey Special Collection One of the discovered letters is from 'Clarinda' the pseudomny for Agnes McLehose. Burns was in love with Agnes and she was the subject of several of his poems including: ' Clarinda (Mistress of My Soul ' and ' To Clarinda '. After Burns' death in 1796, Agnes had requested that the intimate letters she had written to Burns be returned to her by Burns' friend and doctor William Maxwell.

'Protest! a cry for freedom', is an exhibition about revolution and reform and runs from 1 August to 11 November at the Sir George Grey Special Collections, 2nd floor, Auckland Central Library.  Ref: Introduction, Thomas Paine, 'Rights of Man', 1961, Sir George Grey Special Collections The exhibition looks at universal themes of race, religion, power, land, peace, work, gender and the environment, which over the centuries have brought the ordinary man to react against the status quo in both peaceful and violent ways.  Ref: Case 7 Land, Meeting of six Ngati Maniapoto chiefs, 7-A16127, Sir George Grey Special Collections Examples through history and from around the world are given in the exhibition using rare books, letters, photographs, posters and memorabilia drawn from the Sir George Grey Collections. Examples include: the 1863 Waikato land confiscations in New Zealand, suffragette movement in the UK and environmental issues & organisations in New Ze...