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Rata and Colin Lovell-Smith were leading artists of the Canterbury School, a regionalist movement which expressed a growing awareness of a local identity and harboured aspirations for a distinctive New Zealand art.…

James Mills was born at Wellington, New Zealand, on 30 July 1847, the third son of Catherine Miller and her husband, William Mills, a carpenter. Two years later William became landing waiter at Port Chalmers and in 1853…

John Morgan was born in Dublin, Ireland, probably in 1806 or 1807. His parents' names are unknown. He was employed as a clerk, and then taught at a Church of England adult Sunday school, before entering the Church…

James O’Brien belonged to the cluster of Australian labour activists who reached New Zealand in the first decade of the twentieth century, as the nation’s trade union movement was beginning to assert itself industrially…

John Lochiel Robson was born at Halcombe, near Feilding, on 4 June 1909, the son of John Templeton Robson and his wife, Margaret Catherine O’Brien. His father was a teacher, as was his mother before her marriage. After…

Jane Elizabeth Runciman, born at Waterford, County Waterford, Ireland, on 4 June 1873, was the eldest child of Susan Propert Williams and her husband, William Edward Runciman, a grocer. Susan Runciman and four daughters…

Edward Cephas John Stevens was born on 18 October 1837, at Salford, Oxfordshire, England, the youngest son of the local rector, the Reverend William Everest Stevens, and his wife, Mary James. He was educated at…

On 3 August 1870 17-year-old Marianne Allen Manchester arrived at Auckland on the Excelsior. She was one of a group of single women brought out from Britain on assisted passages by the Hawke's Bay provincial government…

Hirini Te Kani, also known as Hirini Tuahine, was of Te Aitanga a Hauiti and Rongowhakaata. He lived at Kaitī at Tūranga (Gisborne). He was the son of Rāwiri Te Eke and his principal wife, Riria Taheke. He was…

Taiāwhio Tikawenga Te Tau was a leader of the major Māori political and religious movements in Wairarapa in the 15 years following 1910. He was the younger son of Kaipāoe, a high-ranking woman of Ngāti Rākairangi, and…

Johann Friedrich Heinrich Wohlers, known in New Zealand as John Frederick Henry Wohlers, was born on 1 October 1811 at Mahlenstorf, a village several miles from Bremen on the border of the kingdom of Hanover and the…

Ruth Gray was born on 27 April 1908 at Pipiriki on the Whanganui River. She was one of many children of Robert Gray, a farmer of English and Māori descent, and his wife, Ngāraiti Tuatini of Ngāti Kura. Through her…

Frederick George Young was born in the East End of London, England, on 9 June 1888, the son of Emily Judge and her husband, William Young, a police constable. Fred arrived in New Zealand around 1905 and found work as a…

Robert (Bob) Semple was born on 21 October 1873 at Crudine Creek, near Sofala, on the New South Wales goldfields. He was the son of John Semple, a shepherd, and his wife, Mary Ann Ryan. He attended the Sofala school,…

Charles and Neil Begg came from a well-known Dunedin family, their paternal grandparents having been among the early Scottish settlers of Otago. Their father, Charles Mackie Begg, was a physician and surgeon, who…

Peter Michael Butler was born in Whiteabbey, County Antrim, Ireland, on 31 May 1901, the youngest of nine children of Jane Gormley, a dressmaker, and her husband, John Butler, a flax-dresser. Before Peter was two years…

Frederick Revans Chapman was born at Wellington, New Zealand, on 3 February 1849. He was the fifth child of Henry Samuel Chapman, puisne judge of the Supreme Court of New Zealand, and his wife, Catherine Brewer, the…

Pāora (Paul) Kīngi Delamere was born, according to family information, in May 1889 at Whitianga, near Ōmāio on the eastern shore of the Bay of Plenty, and was first given the name Te Rata. His father was Te Kohi Edward…

During her life as a professional actor Mrs Foley took her second husband’s name and initials, but she was baptised Catherine Huggins in Louth, Lincolnshire, England, on 2 January 1821. She was the second of ten…

Born in Dunedin, New Zealand, on 23 May 1879, Elizabeth Catherine Gunn was the daughter of William Gunn and his wife, Elizabeth Jane Melton. William was an ironmonger at the time of her birth and later became a chemist…