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Bruce Beetham was one of New Zealand’s best-known politicians during the 1970s and early 1980s. Under his leadership the New Zealand Social Credit Political League mounted a sustained but ultimately unsuccessful third-…

Thomas Bracken, the son of Margaret Kiernan and her husband, Thomas Bracken, was baptised a Catholic at Clonee, County Meath, Ireland, on 30 December 1841. His mother died in 1846, and his father, a postmaster, died in…

Robert (Bob) Chapman, the inaugural professor of Political Studies at the University of Auckland, was an academic leader and an insightful and penetrating commentator on current affairs. He was involved in a wide range…

Alfred Domett is said to have been born on 20 May 1811 at Camberwell Grove, Surrey, England, and was baptised on 4 November 1812 at Bermondsey. His father, Nathaniel Domett, was a ship owner of naval and merchant…

Howard Karl Kippenberger was born at Ladbrooks, south of Christchurch, on 28 January 1897. He was the eldest child of Karl Kippenberger, a head teacher and Methodist local preacher, and his wife, Annie Elizabeth Howard…

Hōne Heke Rankin, also known as John Rankin, was born at Gisborne on 13 January 1896 to Matire Ngāpua of Ngāpuhi, and her husband, John Claudian (Claudius) Rankin, a Kaikohe storekeeper. Matire was the daughter of…

Joan Wiffen was a self-taught palaeontologist who greatly advanced knowledge of fossil reptiles in New Zealand. Wiffen, who described herself as ‘a rank amateur, a Hawkes Bay housewife in fact, with no scientific…

Bill Wilson was a key figure in Group Architects, an Auckland collective instrumental in developing a modern architecture responsive to New Zealand’s culture and conditions. This interest informed the buildings he…

John Ross Marshall was born in Wellington on 5 March 1912, the son of Allan Marshall, a clerk, and his wife, Florence May Ross. His father was from Perthshire, and his mother’s family had also originally come from…

Alfred Walter Averill was born on 7 October 1865 at Castle Church, Staffordshire, England, the son of a pharma­cist, Henry Alcock Averill, and his wife, Sarah Ellen Wootton. He was educated at King Edward VI Grammar…

William Darby Brind was born in England, the eldest child of William Brind and his wife, Elizabeth. According to family information he was born in 1794. He was baptised on 28 July that year at St Philip's parish,…

David Buddo was born on 23 August 1853 in Edinburgh, Scotland, the son of Euphemia Stevenson Dorward and David Buddo, a surgeon in the Indian civil service. A rural childhood gave him a lifelong love of farming and…

Francis Raymond Callaghan was born at Lincoln, Canterbury, on 15 April 1891, the son of Irish Catholic parents Bridget Moran and her husband, Bernard Bryan Callaghan, a farmer. Frank attended the local primary school,…

James Walter Chapman Taylor was born in London, England, on 24 June 1878, the son of Theodore Chapman Taylor and his wife, Ada Thomas. Theodore was an agricultural graduate and quantity surveyor and Ada a teacher,…

Anne Maria Maynard, daughter of Sarah Binfield and her husband, Thomas Maynard, a butcher, was born on 13 January 1791, at Henley-on-Thames, Oxfordshire, England. Her future husband, Thomas, was also born there on 20…

Frank Livingstone Combs was born on 19 July 1882 at Napier, the son of Annie Clara Coles and her husband, Willis Edmund Combs, a draper. The family knew hard times during the late 1880s and early 1890s, and Frank’s…

Edward John von Dadelszen is among those who shaped New Zealand's national institutions, but even at the height of his public service career more attention was paid to his brief, albeit romantic, adventures as a…

Joseph McMullen Dargaville, the son of Anderson Dargaville, a physician, and his wife, Eliza McMullen, was born in Cork, County Cork, Ireland, and baptised there on 27 June 1837. His paternal ancestors were Huguenots…

Pearl Howard Dawson was a leading figure in the formative years of women’s team sports in New Zealand, particularly hockey, both as a player and administrator. She sought to raise the status of women’s sport by…

Arthur Leonard Downes was born at Warwick, England, on 27 May 1895, the son of Richard Downes, a fishmonger and game dealer, and his wife, Lavinia Tomlinson. He attended secondary school, then was employed by the…