UNESCO honours for magnificent seven heritage collections

UNESCO honours for magnificent seven heritage collections

Seven significant heritage collections of New Zealand documents have been inscribed onto the UNESCO Memory of the World New Zealand documentary heritage register.

The Memory of the World New Zealand Trust announced the inscription of the John A Lee Papers, and J. T. Diamond West Auckland History Collection (Auckland Libraries), New Zealand Official Photographs, World War 1914-1918 (Alexander Turnbull Library), Kaleidoscope – a weekly television arts documentary programme 1976-1989 (Ngā Taonga Sound & Vision), the Ng New Zealand Chinese Heritage Collection (Presbyterian Research Centre), Salmond Anderson Architects Records (University of Otago’s Hocken Collections, Uare Taoka o Hākena) and the Tyree Studio Collection (Nelson Provincial Museum and Alexander Turnbull Library) today.

There are now 27 documentary heritage collections on the New Zealand register. Each is a valuable source of research for historians, researchers, educators and many others in New Zealand and the world.

UNESCO recognition draws attention to the significance of documentary heritage and the importance of ensuring it is preserved and made accessible.

The Memory of the World New Zealand Trust Chair Dianne Macaskill said, “the Memory of the World Trust is delighted to have these seven new inscriptions on the register. Inscription on the UNESCO register makes our history, our culture and our values more visible to New Zealanders and to the world The inscriptions include collections that cover the Great War, 20th century politics, the arts and literature, Chinese culture and experiences in New Zealand, architectural design and social and industrial developments.

“All greatly contribute to the story of our nation’s history and heritage and are significant to the identity of New Zealanders today. The Memory of the World Trust congratulates the successful institutions and the people who have cared for these taonga.

“You should all be proud of the work you have achieved to safeguard these valuable collections and make them accessible so that we understand our past and its significance for our future.”

Councillor Cathy Casey, Chair of the Community Development and Safety Committee for Auckland Council, is delighted to see Auckland Libraries’ John A. Lee and J.T Diamond collections recognised as being of national significance and inscribed on the UNESCO Memory of the World New Zealand register.

John Alexander Lee was a dynamic and outspoken member of the first New Zealand Labour government and advocate for social justice. The Auckland Libraries John A. Lee Collection of his personal papers covers every aspect of his eventful life as a war hero, politician, champion of the working class, novelist, correspondent and friend to other writers.

“This collection occupies a significant place in New Zealand’s history as very few personal political archives survive from the first half of the 20th century. It is rich with political papers from the inter-war years, capturing both social and political insights and a crucial period in the development of social welfare programmes,” Councillor Casey says.

The J.T Diamond Collection comprise John (Jack) Thomas Diamond’s meticulous research and documentation of West Auckland’s history that he compiled over 60 years from the 1930’s. The collection documents many local industries and locations that have since disappeared or altered significantly and includes detailed and unique archival records of the first two generations of colonial settlement in New Zealand. The collection is made up of manuscript material, extensive photographs, plans and site records including Diamond’s notebooks which describe the exact location and details of his photographic record of the West.

These photographs continue to be used in publications and are widely referenced by local and regional government authorities, historians and national heritage organisations.

Displays from the John A. Lee and J.T Diamond collections can be seen at the Auckland Central City Library and Henderson Library. Digitised items can be accessed here.

Chris Szekely, Chief Librarian, Alexander Turnbull Library, says: ‘’this collection of New Zealand’s official First World War photographs, held at the Turnbull Library, is the most extensive visual record of New Zealanders at the Western Front during WWI. These 1838 black and white glass plate negatives, four photograph albums, and two loose photographic prints are deeply evocative of New Zealand’s experience of the War. They capture the efforts of our soldiers at the Somme, Passchendaele and Le Quesnoy, and they record daily life at the camps and in hospital. They are a powerful and significant record that has continued to engage and inform a wide audience since their first publication, 100 years ago.’’
Ngā Taonga Sound & Vision’s Chief Executive, Rebecca Elvy says “Ngā Taonga is delighted to see the television series, Kaleidoscope inscribed onto the prestigious Memory of the World register. This award-winning documentary series showcased New Zealand artists and their work at an important time in the country’s cultural history. Broadcast from 1976 to 1989, it provided a forum for exploring our ideas of nationhood and reflected the country’s increasingly Pacific-centric identity. The series contains hundreds of unique, longer-form interviews with New Zealand artists and has become an invaluable resource which continues to be heavily used in many arts programmes. The series was originally produced and broadcast by Television New Zealand (TVNZ) and is part of the TVNZ collection cared for by Ngā Taonga and owned by Manatū Taonga – the Ministry for Culture and Heritage.
Heather Baggott, Group Manager Delivery Ministry for Culture and Heritage Manatū Taonga said, “We are thrilled to see the television taonga Kaleidoscope added to the Memory of the World New Zealand register as the series has a unique place in our nation’s documentary history.”

“Kaleidoscope is a precious visual record of our arts and culture at a time when our nation’s distinctive cultural identity was rapidly changing and evolving.

“Broadcast from 1976 to 1989, it was the first television series dedicated to New Zealand’s arts and culture showcasing both established and emerging artists, from painters and poets to dancers and stained-glass artists.

“Capturing stories of the past that might otherwise be lost forever, Kaleidoscope’s rich content has been widely used to illustrate resources and documentaries on our artistic and cultural history, including by the Ministry’s own Te Ara online encyclopedia.”

Jane Thomsen, Director of the Presbyterian Research Centre of the Presbyterian Church of Aotearoa New Zealand, says she is extremely pleased that the Ng collection has been recognised by UNESCO for its importance to New Zealand.

She says the Ng New Zealand Chinese Heritage Collection has been gathered since 1959 by Presbyterian Church members Dr James Ng and his wife Eva Ng. It documents the history and experiences of Chinese New Zealanders from the first arrival of Chinese miners in the 19th century to the eventual reunification of Chinese families in the late 1940s to early 1950s after the second World War.

Jane Thomsen emphasises that the collection is “unique in the voice it gives to Chinese on their experiences of life in New Zealand, through their own words, as recorded by missionaries and in later oral histories, or as documented in letters they wrote”.

She says it is hard to single out one item from the vast collection but a ‘Roll of Chinese’ which belonged to Reverend Alexander Don, a Presbyterian minister/missionary, is a significant item in the collection. “No other document like it exists anywhere else in the world. It dates from 1883 to 1929 and contains the names and details of more than 3,500 New Zealand Chinese, including personal, work, travel and financial details, and it shows the changing nature of the New Zealand Chinese community.”

Nelson Museum’s Darryl Gallagher says the Tyree Studio Collection, dating from the 1860s until the 1940s is a nationally significant pictorial record documenting the development of the Nelson Tasman district from soon after settlement.

“The 123,000 plus negatives are remarkable in having survived intact and today provide an invaluable insight into the development of regional New Zealand. Industry, social interaction and portraits of the people are presented in a resource that is utilized regionally, nationally and internationally. This access has been enabled with a major digitzation project that was initiated in 2010 and completed in 2017.”

Today most of these images are viewable on Nelson Provincial Museum’s Collection Online: https://collection.nelsonmuseum.co.nz/explore

Co-nominator of the Tyree Collection, Chris Szekely, the Chief Librarian at Alexander Turnbull Library says, ‘’The Tyree Studio Collection of photographs, held in part by the Turnbull Library, is a unique chronicle of early life in Nelson, a rich social and cultural resource of national significance.’’

Hocken Library’s Chief Curator Archives, Anna Blackman says, “The Salmond Anderson Architects Records document nearly 150 years (1862-2008) of architectural development in southern New Zealand.

“The extensive collection charts the broad development of architectural style and the technology of design and draughting representative of architectural history in New Zealand.

“Architects represented include R.A. Lawson, James Louis Salmond, Robert Vanes, Arthur Louis Salmond (son of the founder), Henry Burt, Arthur John Salmond (grandson of the founder), Donald Anderson, and Timothy Heath.

“The plans include Category 1 historic places such as First Church of Otago, Knox Presbyterian Church, Larnach Castle, Bank of New South Wales (Oamaru), Otago Boys’ High School, Dunedin Municipal Chambers, and what was known at the time as the Seacliff Lunatic Asylum (demolished).

“Numerous Category 2 places are represented as well as smaller ordinary domestic buildings. Many of the finely drawn architectural drawings are of outstanding aesthetic value.

“For the Hocken, Memory of the World registration is a wonderful and lasting way we can recognise the significance of these records to the history of architecture and the built environment in NZ.”
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