(1869–1956).

Pioneer of the pumice country.

A new biography of Vaile, Edward Earle appears in the Dictionary of New Zealand Biography on this site.

Edward Earle Vaile was born at Hampstead, London, on 3 March 1869, the son of Samuel Vaile, founder of the Auckland land agency of Samuel Vaile and Sons, and grandson of George Vaile, an architect, who arrived in Auckland in 1843 with his family of seven children. His paternal grandmother was interested in the Maori people and established a school for Maori girls at Rangiaowhia on the Waikato River. His mother's education had been continued in France; it was after her father, Edward Earle, that young Vaile was named. The lad attended the Auckland College and Grammar School, as it was then called, and though in 1885 he topped the list of candidates in the Senior Civil Service Examination, passed the Matriculation Examination, and was offered a job in the Civil Service, his father secured for him a position in the South British Insurance Co. – at £2 1s. 8d. a month. A year later he was taken into his father's firm, just in time to experience the financial crisis general in the eighties, precipitated in the Vaile firm's case by the defalcations of a partner. After some years the business was restored to prosperity, and in 1902 the father was bought out and a brother taken into the partnership.

In 1907 Vaile purchased an area of approximately 53,000 acres of pumice country fronting the Waikato River, north of Taupo. The story of this estate, which Vaile named Broadlands, and of its development, which he undertook personally, is the subject of his book Pioneering the Pumice and the basis of his reputation. Vaile and his neighbour, W. G. Butcher, also published an important paper – Breaking-in of Light Pumice Lands – in the September 1920 issue of the New Zealand Journal of Agriculture. Vaile opened up his country with roads and bridges: the roads over the pumice were in large part made by the traffic itself, but as an amateur engineer he made some fine timber bridges of which he was very proud. He produced some good pastures, and grew some fine root crops with specimens of which he took many prizes at leading North Island agricultural shows. Edward Vaile was indeed a pioneer, but it is necessary to recall that he concentrated his efforts chiefly on the better land. Much of the rest was left in a state of nature, and Vaile later attained wealth by the sale of 30,000 acres for forestry. He maintained his stock generally in good health, mainly by using limonite (which usually contained enough adventitious cobalt) on the advice of his friend B. C. Aston, chemist to the Department of Agriculture.

On his retirement in 1936, Vaile gave much time to political pamphleteering – he had been a strenuous advocate of a Rotorua-Taupo railway in earlier years – and to philanthropic works. He endowed both the Auckland Institute and Museum, and the Auckland Grammar School with valuable property, and donated books to several libraries. He was awarded the honour of O.B.E. in 1953, and died, unmarried, in Auckland on 11 January 1956.

by Leonard John Wild, C.B.E., M.A., B.SC.(HON.), D.SC., formerly Pro-Chancellor of the University of New Zealand, Otaki.

• New Zealand Herald, 12 Jan 1956 (Obit).

Note—Since 1953 fractions of seconds are shown as decimals.

Men

*110 yards

*From 1953 teams comprise four members

*110 yards

*In 1915 the distance swum was 200 metres

*110 yards

*110 yards

*From 1947 to 1955 inclusive the distance was 100 yards

†220 yards

Women

*110 yards

*220 yards

*110 yards

*110 yards

*From 1938 to 1941 inclusive the distance was 200 metres

*110 yards

*440 yards

The first European to swim Cook Strait was Barrie Devenport, who on 20 November 1963 made the crossing in the time of 11 hours 13 minutes. This feat was repeated by Keith Hancox on 7 February 1964 in the time of 9 hours 34 minutes. Foveaux Strait was swum by a Dutch immigrant, John van Leeuwen, on 7 February 1963 in the time of nearly 14 hours. On 7 August 1965 Keith Hancox became the first New Zealander to swim the English Channel, in the time of 15 hours 33 minutes.

Although the Christchurch Amateur Swimming Club had held a New Zealand championship meeting in 1886, the national swimming titles were instituted officially in 1890. These were the men's 100, 220, and 440 yards free-style events. For some years these were decided at different carnivals, but the arrangement proved unsatisfactory and, since 1905, they have been competed for at a single carnival. From time to time new championship events have been added. These include 220 and 100 yards breast-stroke titles (1906 and 1939); back-stroke (1938); butterfly stroke (1948); medley championships (1947); long-distance championships (1950); and the 1,650 yards free-style championship (1953). The race was previously known as “The Mile”, and had been swum over this distance since 1901. In 1912 women's national titles were instituted, the first event being the 100 yards freestyle championship. Later, women's 440 yards (1921) and 220 yards (1924) free-style events were established, and, since then, breast-stroke (1924), back-stroke (1929), and butterfly-stroke (1948) events have been introduced.

Though the New Zealand Amateur Swimming Association had considered competitive diving as early as 1909, this was not added to the championship programme until 1920 (women, 1924). Tower diving was added in 1952. The principal national swimming trophies are the Yaldhurst Shield (1912) – the senior teams' points trophy-and the Freyberg Shield (1954), for senior and junior teams.

From 1892 until 1951 water polo was controlled by the N.Z.A.S.A., and the national water polo championship was held under the auspices of the association. In 1951 the sport was transferred to the New Zealand Water Polo Board, which administers it under the N.Z.A.S.A. rules.

In 1894 a New South Wales swimming team visited Auckland to compete in the first intercolonial championship carnival, and, four years later, the first official Australasian championship meeting was held at Christchurch. Since then competitions have taken place regularly between the two countries. In 1910 New Zealand was elected to membership of the Fédration International de Natation Amateur (founded 1908) and thus became eligible to compete in international fixtures, including the Olympic Games. Malcolm Champion represented New Zealand at the 1911 Festival of Empire Games, London, and, in the following year, competed at the Olympic Games at Stockholm. Violet Walrond competed at the 1920 Olympic Games at Antwerp, and Gwitha Shand and E. C. Heard represented New Zealand at Paris in 1924. Since then the New Zealand teams have competed at most Olympiads, so far, however, without significant success. New Zealand swimmers have competed at the various Empire Games and, at Auckland in 1950, the New Zealand team won the 4 × 220 yards free-style relay. In 1954 J. A. Doms won the gold medal in the 220 yards breast-stroke event. In 1958 T. Stavely won the silver medal for the 110 yards butterfly-stroke event, while P. Gould won the bronze medal for the 110 yards back-stroke event. At Perth, 1962, Vivienne Haddon won a silver medal in the 100 yards and a bronze medal in the 220 yards breast-stroke events, while F. A. Thomas won a bronze medal in the 220 yards men's back-stroke.

From 1891, when the Royal Life Saving Society was founded, the N.Z.A.S.A. kept in close touch with the movement, and finally became affiliated in 1908. After 1910, when the New Zealand branch was established, swimming authorities continued to encourage the society's aims by arranging courses of instruction in lifesaving techniques.

In 1892 the N.Z.A.S.A. approached the Minister of Education with the suggestion that swimming should be recognised as an alternative to physical drill in New Zealand schools. The Association offered to train swimming instructors and award proficiency certificates in swimming and lifesaving. In 1899 the Government agreed to make a small annual grant to subsidise the cost of printing the certificates. Over the years the Association has taught many thousands of young people to swim and has expanded its national championships to cater for schoolboys and girls who have thus been induced to take up the sport. In addition the New Zealand swimming champions have undertaken educational tours on many occasions.

The centres held schoolboy championships for the first time in 1907. These proved so successful that, in the following year, events for schoolgirls were added. During the First World War, when the national championships had to be abandoned, the N.Z.A.S.A. established national junior (under 14 years) boys' and girls' championships. These were first competed for in February 1917 at Wellington.

On 4 January 1890 Roland W. St. Clair, secretary of the Auckland Swimming Club, convened the first of a series of meetings which led to the formation, later in the year, of the New Zealand Amateur Swimming Association, the first officers of the Association being Sir William Fox, president, and R. W. St. Clair, secretary. With variations to make them applicable to local conditions, the rules of the Amateur Swimming Association (England) were accepted by the New Zealand clubs. At first the association's headquarters were in Auckland, but this was not acceptable to South Island members. In 1896, therefore, they were transferred to Christchurch, though the change was opposed bitterly by Auckland. St. Clair withdrew his club from the Association and in January 1898 formed a rival body, the New Zealand Amateur Association Registered. For several years these two organisations fought for the control of New Zealand swimming. The breach between the two was not healed until 1904, when the centre system was devised to meet Auckland's and other localities' demands for a measure of autonomy. Since then the N.Z.A.S.A. has remained the controlling body of the sport in New Zealand.

In the 75 years since the N.Z.A.S.A. was founded, swimming has become one of the country's major summer sports. There were only three clubs in existence in 1890, but, by 1963, these had increased to 197 clubs – grouped in 16 regional centres – having a total registered membership of 26,000.

Although the art of swimming has been practised for many centuries it did not achieve status as a sport until the 1830s, the first clubs being organised in England about 1837. The earliest swimming club in New Zealand was the Christchurch Amateur Swimming Club, which was formed on 11 October 1880. This was followed by the formation of similar clubs at Hamilton (1881), Auckland (1888), East Christchurch (1890), Ashburton and Gisborne (1891), Lyttelton, Port Ahuriri, and St. Albans (1892), Sydenham, Richmond, and Whangarei (1893), and Dunedin, Napier, Wellington, and Palmerston North (1894).

Attorney-General, member of the Executive and Legislative Councils, and writer.

A new biography of Swainson, William appears in the Dictionary of New Zealand Biography on this site.

William Swainson was born in Lancaster, England, in 1809. The eldest son of a merchant, he was educated at the local grammar school, admitted to the Middle Temple in 1836, and called to the Bar two years later. He was employed as a conveyancer up to his appointment in 1841 by Lord John Russell as the second Attorney-General of New Zealand, in succession to Francis Fisher, the first Attorney-General of the colony.

Swainson sailed to New Zealand on the barque

which arrived at Auckland on 25 September 1841. Associated with Swainson on board and in preparation of legislative ordinances were William Martin, the Chief Justice, and Thomas Outhwaite, later Registrar of the Supreme Court in Auckland. A sincere churchman, Swainson was strongly inclined to the humanitarian viewpoint so pronounced in relation to the treatment of native peoples by the Evangelicals of the day. As he indicated in his own book,

, he conceived the British Government's principal object in establishing its authority to be the promotion of the civilisation and development of the Maori people. This idea was basic to much of his thinking and activity as a member of the Executive and Legislative Councils. While he was deeply concerned with the establishment of law and order and the appropriate Courts to secure these ends, he was primarily concerned with protecting the Maoris from the ills which might follow from colonisation of the country by Europeans or by the introduction of responsible government.

Swainson held the office of Attorney-General until 7 May 1856 by which time the Crown colony period of New Zealand history had ended. He continued as a member of the Legislative Council, as created under the 1852 Constitution Act, until July 1868, thus providing a measure of continuity through the early decades of British government. His most important work was done in the years immediately after his arrival in Auckland.

Swainson showed great skill and sound knowledge in the drafting of ordinances designed to provide for the good government of the country, its legal system and the administration of land laws, conveyancing and a host of general matters. He also steered these laws through the Legislative Council of the regimes of Hobson, Shortland, FitzRoy, and Grey. A total of 19 Acts were passed between 14 December 1841 and 21 March 1842. Some provided for a Supreme Court, County Courts of civil and criminal jurisdiction, juries, and the powers of Magistrates and Justices of the Peace. Others dealt with the registration of deeds and with property; the Conveyancing Act was his greatest triumph. Both Lord Stanley and James Stephen at the Colonial Office praised the clarity and intelligibility of Swainson's laws and the degree to which he had laid down a completely new basis for the legal system of the colony without trying to build on the complicated survivals from the distant past in English law.

Swainson failed to get his land legislation adopted because he so completely neglected public opinion. Over the Wairau Affray he upheld the need to respect Maori titles to land. In his enthusiasm to uphold the Waitangi principles, he advanced theories as to the origin and extent of British sovereignty that were quite unacceptable in the Colonial Office and he was rebuked and threatened with loss of office by Lord Stanley. Nevertheless, under Governor Grey, Swainson did defeat, for a time, threats of land grabbing on the part of vigorous colonists.

Together with Judge Martin, Swainson assisted Grey in drawing up proposals which were in large measure translated in England into the Constitution Act of 1852. He had already been prominent in providing for municipal and provincial institutions in keeping with the geographical and historical circumstances which had led to separate colonising schemes in different parts of New Zealand. He was the first member appointed to the new Legislative Council, of which he also became Speaker from 16 May 1854 to 8 August 1855. Swainson was Acting Governor Wynyard's principal adviser. From internal evidence it is clear that he wrote many of Wynyard's speeches and dispatches. During the discussions of 1854, on whether or not responsible government could be introduced by Wynyard, Swainson stood firmly against any such move although he acted as a channel of communication between the Governor and E. G. Wakefield and others. As Attorney-General, Swainson held that neither the Constitution Act nor the instruments, whereby the Government was established, enabled the Governor to establish ministerial responsibility without reference to the Colonial Office. He did, however, concede that a mixed Ministry made up of the permanent office-holders, such as the Attorney-General, Colonial Secretary, and Colonial Treasurer, and two or three elected members of the Assembly, might be tried as it was. Swainson obviously considered himself answerable to the Crown alone and not in any degree to the colonial legislature. He has been criticised by some as defending his own position and salary which, in effect he was doing, but in fact he had no faith in the principle of responsible government and was utterly opposed to its introduction if it meant placing the Maoris, the great majority of Her Majesty's subjects in New Zealand at that time, at the mercy of a land-hungry European minority. After the Assembly was prorogued, partly on his advice, on 16 September 1854, Swainson departed on leave for England. The Colonial Office authorised the introduction of responsible government and in 1856 provision was made for the retirement of Swainson and the other officials on pension. In Swainson's case, he was to receive an annuity of two-thirds of his previous salary of £400. He remained a member of the Legislative Council, however, until 1868, although he did not attend after 1864.

Swainson apparently hoped to see the Church of England made the established church as in England but the opposition of other denominations was too strong. In 1847 he tried to give Church of England clergymen more extensive rights than others in the solemnising of marriages but again he was defeated. With Bishop Selwyn, he played an important part in drafting the constitution of the Church of the Province of New Zealand in 1857 and in getting it passed by the General Synod in 1859. For several years he held responsible offices in the Auckland synod.

Swainson's books—Auckland and its Neighbourhood (1852), Auckland, the Capital of New Zealand (1853), New Zealand and its Colonization (1859), and New Zealand and the War (1862) contain useful descriptions of the early Auckland scene and demonstrate his concern for Maori interests.

Small, precise, dapper, Swainson was always the careful lawyer, careful of precedents, careful in giving opinions, and careful to sustain those principles in which he believed. Although naturally retiring and modest in that he never sought publicity for his successes, Swainson was self-assured almost to the point of being self-conceited when it came to dealing with legal questions. He was almost completely indifferent to public reactions to his views and proposals, holding that the public were not equipped as he was to deal with such matters. Especially in his later years, he acquired a reputation of being a cultured English gentleman. He died at Judges Bay, Auckland, on 1 December 1884. His importance in New Zealand history lies in his ordinances, many of which are now incorporated in consolidating legislation, which did so much to establish government, Courts, and law in this country.

by Angus Ross, M.C. AND BAR, M.A.(N.Z.), PH.D.(CANTAB.), Professor of History, University of Otago.

• New Zealand Rulers and Statesmen, Gisborne, W. (1897)
• Crown Colony Government in New Zealand, McLintock, A. H. (1958)
• New Zealand Herald, 2 Dec 1884 (Obit).