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John Whiteley was born at Kneesall, Nottinghamshire, England, the son of James Whiteley, a grocer, and his wife, Elizabeth Rainor. He was born on 20 July 1806, which was also the day of his baptism. He went to primary…

Gilbert Mair is said to have been born at Whāngārei, New Zealand, on 10 January 1843, the eighth of twelve children of Elizabeth Gilbert Puckey and her husband, Gilbert Mair, a merchant trader. Gilbert Mair senior was…

George Eric Oakes Ramsden was born in Martinborough, Wairarapa, on 1 August 1898, the eldest of three children of Henry Oakes Ramsden, an Englishman, and his New Zealand-born wife, Sophia Jane Harris. Henry Ramsden was…

James West Stack, born on 27 March 1835 in a tent in a Māori pā at Pūriri in the Thames district, New Zealand, was the oldest of seven children of the missionary James Stack and his wife, Mary West. He married Eliza…

Edward Robert Tregear, son of William James Tregear and his wife, Mary Norris, was born in Southampton, Hampshire, England, on 1 May 1846. He led a comfortable life there with his mother and younger sisters, Mary and…

Tipi Tainui Rōpiha was of Ngāi Toroiwaho of Ngāti Kahungunu and Rangitāne. He was born in Waipāwa on 8 August 1895, the second child of Reginald Pinckney, an English-born clerk, and Mihi Mere Pānapa, the daughter of…

Gustavus Ferdinand von Tempsky was born at Königsberg (Kaliningrad), East Prussia, on 15 February 1828. He was the younger son of Julius Louis von Tempsky and his wife, Karoline Henriette Friederike Wilhelmine von…

William Thomas (Tom) Young was born in Karori, Wellington, New Zealand, on 27 April 1870, the son of Jessie Dykes and her husband, William Young, a farmer. Tom Young began work when he was 11 and went to sea soon after…

Early life and education David Lange was born in Ōtāhuhu, Auckland, on 4 August 1942. A fourth-generation New Zealander, he was the son of Eric Roy Lange, a medical practitioner, and his wife, Phoebe Fysh Reid. The…

Cherry Raymond was a broadcaster, journalist and opinion-leader, and a household name during the 1960s and 1970s when few women achieved such prominence in the media. Although she particularly campaigned on women’s…

John Thomas Paul was born near Boort, Victoria, Australia, on 16 August 1874, the son of Mary Tomkins and her husband, Daniel Fisher Paul, who farmed a small selection and worked as a railway employee. Tom served his…

William (Wiremu) Leonard Parker was born at Mākarika station near Waipiro Bay, on the East Coast, on 4 February 1914, the son of Ngāti Porou parents William Leonard Parker, a farmer, and his wife, Te Oharepe Ruta (Ruth…

Te Tirarau Kūkupa, the son of Kūkupa and his first wife, Whitiao, was born probably in the late 1790s. He was descended from Rāhiri, an ancestor of Ngāpuhi; his grandmother was Te Toka-i-Tawhio, leader of Ngāti Ruangaio…

Peter Barr, son of Dunedin's first chief postmaster, Archibald Barr, and his second wife, Sarah Hepburn, was born in Dunedin, New Zealand, on 9 July 1861. He was educated at Middle District School and then at the High…

Joan Isabel Faulkner, born in Cambridge on 30 January 1921, was the second of three daughters of Edward Ernest Faulkner, a storekeeper, and his wife, Rhoda Vera White, a milliner. After schooling in Waikato and Auckland…

Eric Stanley George Graham, known as Stan, was born at Kokatahi, Westland, on 12 November 1900, the son of John Graham, a farmer and proprietor of the Longford Hotel, and his wife, Mary Spring. Little is known of his…

Kate Challis Excelsa Hooper was born at Devonport, Auckland, on 25 June 1894 to Sophia Frances Hould and her husband, Richard Henry Hooper, a farmer who later became a journalist. As a girl Challis lived in Wellington…

George Marshall McCall Smith was born on 13 November 1882 at Nairn, Scotland, the second son of Ann Mein Andrews and her husband, Samuel McCall Smith, who farmed at Laggan, Speyside. He was educated at Laggan School,…

Henry Despard, who commanded British forces in the northern war in New Zealand in the 1840s, was born probably in 1784 or 1785. His military family had Huguenot and Irish connections. His father was Captain Philip…

Augustus Earle was born probably on 1 June 1793, and was baptised on 27 June in the church of St Marylebone, London, England. (His surname appears in the parish register as Earl, but in later records is spelled with a…