Nau mai ki te pānui
o Ngā Taonga
Welcome to our newsletter In this edition, we mark the 80th anniversary of Polish war refugees arriving in New Zealand and look at the infamous ‘Mr Asia’ crime case. We also share the latest blog by sound history researcher Sarah Johnston, about a long-lost soldier and a precious recording of his voice, and report back from the Fantastic Futures 2024 conference in Canberra. November 1 marked the 80th anniversary of New Zealand welcoming 733 children and 102 adults from Poland as war refugees. They were the country's first official refugees, invited by then-Prime Minister Peter Fraser.
After travelling from Iran to Wellington on a troop ship, the children and their caregivers were housed at a camp at Pahīatua. In the 1975 two-part Spectrum documentary Will There Be Bread Tomorrow? Polish refugees recall their wartime displacement and resettlement in New Zealand. The ‘Mr Asia’ drug syndicate, headed by the notorious Terry Clark, imported heroin into New Zealand in the 70s. ‘Mr Asia’ refers to Christopher Martin Johnson, a Singapore-based New Zealand drug smuggler whose murder led to the eventual demise of the syndicate.
In this 1979 audio from the RNZ Collection, journalist, author and Auckland Star deputy editor Pat Booth talks about his investigation into the syndicate and contextualises the New Zealand drug trafficking scene at the time.
Tākuta Te Wharehuia Milroy 1937– 2019 (Ngāi Tuhoe, Ngāti Koura) Hei taunaki i te hunga rikarika ki ngā kupu hamumu o te arero pounamu, waihoki he hokinga mahara ki te ranea toka tū moana i kaha whawhai, i tū rangatira mō te whakarauoratanga o te reo Māori te take. Anei ko tētahi pūranga oro hei whakakipakipa i te onetū me te rangaranga kōrero. Dr Te Wharehuia Milroy was an esteemed champion of te reo Māori. He served as a trustee of the Kōhanga Reo National Trust, was a member of Te Taura Whiri i te Reo Māori (The Māori Language Commission) and the Waitangi Tribunal. A stalwart of te reo Māori, he was well known for his work as a Professor of Māori at the University of Waikato. Additionally, alongside veterans of te reo, in 2004 Te Wharehuia Milroy set up Te Panekiretanga o Te Reo – The Institute of Excellence in the Māori Language. Tāwhitia ngā kōrero rongomaiwhiti, he wāhinga kōrero, he kaponga irirangi i rere ki te tai ki wīwī, te tai ki wāwā. In this audio from the online collection, Te Wharehuia Milroy discusses his perspective in regard to Iwi Māori affairs and the role the media plays in portraying these affairs to the world. In the latest blog from sound history researcher Sarah Johnston, she explores the story of a WWII sound disc, and how it enabled a woman to hear her father’s voice for the first time, 82 years after his death.
You can read Sarah’s blog on our website now and listen to the newly uploaded recording. Fantastic Futures 2024 In October, our Tumu Whakarae Chief Executive Honiana Love presented to audiences at Fantastic Futures '24 at the NFSA – National Film and Sound Archive of Australia in Canberra.
Honiana spoke of changes in emerging technology, how these impact the archive, and how to navigate these changes. News briefs 1) Prime Minister, Peter Fraser, with children of Polish Children's Camp. Palmerston North City Library, Manawatū Heritage Collection. 2) Stock image from Pexels.com. Image by cottonbro studio.
3) Wharehuia Milroy with former Governor-General Jerry Mateparae at a morning investiture ceremony at Government House in Wellington, May 2012. Credit: Office of the Governor-General.
4) Unidentified members of the Royal New Zealand Air Force arriving in Vancouver, Canada, for training in the Empire Air Training Scheme, 27 November, 1940. Alexander Turnbull Library, DA-00658-F.
5) Kaimahi photo of Honiana Love presenting at the Fantastic Futures 2024 conference in Canberra.
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