Heritage Week 2015: Sentimental journeys

BECA Heritage Week starts this week though it should more correctly be called “Heritage Fortnight” since this year it runs from 9-26 October – with an impressive range of events on offer (more than you could fit in a mere 7 days, even).

This year the theme is “Arrivals and departures – the journeys that have shaped us” and events over the course of the “week” include Akaroa’s French Fest, tours, seminars and talks, and heaps and heaps of other stuff. Check out the brochure of Heritage Week events [9MB PDF] for the full roster of heritage-goodies.

The big event on Saturday 18 October is a Central City Family Fun Day. All sorts of fun activities will take place at various “hubs” dotted about the inner city including face-painting, Highland Games, bouncy castle, ki-o-rahi (the traditional Māori ball game), music and performances.

As well as the entertainments there will be opportunities for people to investigate their own heritage with genealogists and whakapapa offering advice. And best of all, a free double-decker bus will be available to travel between hubs.

Have a look at the Family Fun Day map.

Library events

The library has a range of activities to celebrate our local heritage:

Spirited cemetery tours with Richard Greenaway 10-25 October (various locations)

Join Richard Greenaway, local historian and genealogist, on one of his colourful tours of local cemeteries. Richard will share information on the graves of people – important, interesting or about whom there is a positive,sad or quirky story. Useful for local historians, genealogists and those whose children need an original subject for a school project. Handout material will be supplied for a gold coin. Walking shoes recommended. Tours are one to three hours.

Explore your family connections Sunday 18 October – Victoria Square

Visit us at the Mobile Library Van to discover more about your family history. Staff will show you how to access resources where you can find key information such as births, deaths and marriages as well as migration and military information, or build on what you already know.

Planes, Trains, and Automobiles – Storytime on the Double Decker Sunday 18 October

Join Zac and Tania for stories, rhymes and songs all about transport as we ride on the double decker bus. Stories are best suited to children aged 3 to 7 years, caregiver required. Departs from Victoria Square, Armagh Street bus stop at 11 am and 12 noon. Bookings essential! Please phone 941 6649 or email libraryevents@ccc.govt.nz

Christchurch Photo Hunt

Our annual photo hunt takes place in October. As well as helping to boost important historical records, entrants are in line for some great prizes – an eReader or a tablet.

So dig out your photos of any and all modes of transport, people heading off on, or arriving home from trips big and small, images that document our travels, homecomings, and journeys of all kinds.

Entries can be made online, or by dropping into your local library.

Previous years’ photo hunt entries can be found on Kete Christchurch.

Oxford to Oxford: The emigration of Henry Smith

Another treasure of Christchurch City Libraries archives (namely Arch 1029) has been digitised and is now online for the enjoyment and edification of all.

The latest is the shipboard diary of Henry Smith, who journeyed from Plymouth to Wellington aboard the R.M.S. Rimutaka in 1885. Written in pencil, the diary documents shipboard life and includes many interesting observations about what it was like to live aboard a ship for weeks. Not the least of which was food and meals which Smith describes thusly –

Opened a tin of condensed milk today, also pickled cabbage, which was very acceptable indeed. Our meals are something like feeding wild animals. Every man helps himself, or else he falls short, that is the case at the present anyhow.

Mmm. Sounds delicious.

Henry, a blacksmith in his mid-twenties, is quite interested in music and seems often to enjoy a singalong with his fellow passengers, though others prefer to read.

H. Smith, H. & G. Harwood Photographers [1875] CCL-Arch1029-2-007

Borrowed a concertina from one of my mates & had a few tunes this morning. Lent Miss Morrison “The Old Curiosity Shop” this afternoon, lent another young man on Friday last “Percival Keene”.

Where travellers these days might purchase easy to read “airport fiction” along the lines of James Patterson or Lynda La Plante to occupy the time on a journey, longer sea voyages meant Dickens was probably an appropriately-sized read, though it’s interesting to see that coming-of-age adventure novels like Percival Keene obviously had their place too.

According to the letter of reference that Smith brought with him from England he had been active in his church in his home town of Oxford as part of the choir, so clearly he had a musical bent. Indeed, even his last entry in his diary is concerned with music.

Went to church in the morning, congregation scanty, singing went very well.

Henry Smith went on to settle at View Hill, just west of Oxford setting up a blacksmithing business before becoming a sheep farmer with a freehold estate of 4280 acres. In 1890 he married a local woman named Mary Mounsey and they had several children. Smith was very active in the community,  taking interest in the local library, school committee and eventually as a member of the Oxford County Council.

This digitised archive in addition to the shipboard diary includes photographs, letter of reference, and an invoice for a View Hill property in te reo Māori.

• View the digitised shipboard diary of Henry Smith
• Henry Smith’s entry in the Cyclopedia of New Zealand

Te Kupu o Te Wiki – Mahana (warm)

Kia ora. To encourage the use of Te Reo Māori we are publishing weekly kupu (words) and phrases that can be used with children.

Whakatauki

Tā te tamaiti mahi, he wawāhi tahā

It is the job of the children to smash the calabash

This proverb is similar to “boys will be boys”. The calabash was a valuable tool for the transportation of food and water and was also used to heat water. A child who has clumsy and of a playful nature has no idea of the importance of this tool and through neglect may accidentally break it. This is not the fault of the child and they should not be punished for what is their nature.

Kīwaha (idiom)

Koia kei a koe
What a sad guy

Kupu (word)

mahana
warm

Kei te mahana te wai?
Is the water warm?

• Hear the Ngā Rerenga Kōrero o te Wiki – Phrase of the week.
• Browse our Te Reo Māori resources.
• Previous Te Kupu o te reo Māori posts.

 

This week in Christchurch history (5 to 11 October)

5 October 1899
First Boer War contingent leaves Lyttelton.

5 October 1982
Paraplegic archer Neroli Fairhall (in competition with able-bodied athletes) wins gold medal at Brisbane Commonwealth Games.

8 October 1989
Redesigned portion of Victoria Square opened.

Christchurch Town Hall view, Flickr CCL-CWF10-P1100071

9 October 1962
Christchurch Town Hall site chosen in Kilmore Street. Assisted by advice from visiting Professor Gordon Stephenson, the unanimously accepted proposal ended years of dispute over this choice. Other sites considered were the old public library site in Hereford Street and an area near Latimer Square. Another often debated site was Victoria Square.

10 October 1885
Life insurance fraud (The Case of the Severed Hand) at Taylor’s Mistake. The perpetrator, Arthur Howard, was sentenced to 2 years’ prison on April 11 the following year.

11 October 1988
“The Wizard” wages war against the “Tasteless tyrants of Telecom” by repainting the new blue telephone boxes traditional red.

11 October 1989
Waitangi Tribunal Hearing of land claim by Ngai Tahu closes at Tuahiwi Marae.

The Ngai Tahu land claims : a South Island hui : Maori gathering at Tuahiwi, North Canterbury. [1925], CCL PhotoCD 7, IMG0001

More October events in the Christchurch chronology: a timeline of Christchurch events in chronological order from pre-European times to 1989.