Dedicated to democracy, enjoying and restoring the Mahurangi, meaningful climate action, and curiosity—
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Breakfast brainstorming on the next bit
What John Clarke said of the neoliberal de-democratisation of Aotearoa, in the New Zealand Listener, could equally be said of fossil-fuel use: “Complaining about what’s wrong but not taking action, has the same effect as not noticing what’s wrong…”
Surveyor-general consulted character of the land
Ronald Locker’s dismissive description of Felton Mathew’s plan for “The Town of Auckland”, as “grandiose and impractical”, adds to the unfortunate injustice referred to by editor of the surveyor-general’s journals, Professor James Rutherford: “Since it has become…
Never-to-be-made-official surveyor-general calls
Scribblings in the diaries of missionary visitors have been presented here in full, because although brief, they are valuable records. These transients were too busy to explore or to eulogise during their brief rests at Mahurangi Harbour, in the course of long and arduous…
Introduction
The colony spawned a host of would-be entrepreneurs. Perhaps it is not surprising that among those adventurous enough to leave home and loved ones for a raw colony on the other side of the world, there should have been so many willing to try their hand at anything. There were…
Regatta rush to help push the boat out for 175th anniversary of Makaurau
It might have been better had Lieutenant-Governor William Hobson named the entire country Auckland; and Tāmaki Makaurau, Bourke. That way, Aucklanders might have long-since rejected their town’s colonially imposed name in favour of reverting to the indigenous title of...
Mahurangi Regatta 1865 comparable with Cowes
Dr Ronald H Locker writes in Jade River : A History of the Mahurangi, the first Mahurangi Regatta is not remembered, but Joseph Gard noted in his diary that he saw the event in progress on New Year’s Day, 1858, while passing up-river on his…
Irish–Māori
The scattered tangata whenua who filtered back to their old lands around the Mahurangi after the Treaty of Waitangi managed, after struggle, to reclaim some of their lands, but failed to hold them. Doomed as communities by the trends of colonial history, they…
John Sullivan
John Sullivan was the son of Daniel and Sarah (Hands). He was born in London about 1810, but an early photo shows features as Irish as his name. He went to sea, making his first New Zealand landfall in 1832. When he made his second in 1834, after…