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Kōrero: Culture and recreation in the city

Fisk Jubilee Singers, about 1905

Fisk Jubilee Singers, about 1905

Another type of music which entertained city audiences from 1874 to the 1920s was spirituals played by visiting troupes of American black minstrels. This group is the Fisk Jubilee Singers, some of whom were ex-slaves. On their 1886 tour the group included Robert Bradford Williams, who later settled as a lawyer in Wellington and served five terms as the mayor of Onslow.

Te whakamahi i tēnei tūemi

Alexander Turnbull Library, Irene Cox Collection

Reference: PA1-q-242-477

Permission of the Alexander Turnbull Library, National Library of New Zealand, Te Puna Mātauranga o Aotearoa, must be obtained before any re-use of this image.

Ngā whakaahua me ngā rauemi katoa o tēnei kōrero

Me pēnei te tohu i te whārang

Jock Phillips, Culture and recreation in the city – Organised culture before 1900, Te Ara – the Encyclopedia of New Zealand, https://teara.govt.nz/mi/photograph/25671/fisk-jubilee-singers-about-1905 (accessed 4 June 2026).

He kōrero nā Jock Phillips, i tāngia i te 26 February 2010.

Comments

adele pentony-graham
21 November 2016
I have a lot of information about one of the Fisk Jubilee Singers, Edward Ralph Martin, born in Bloomington. USA> who he married here in NZ.. children, one in particular, a daughter Maida who in later life lived in Eketahuna.. Edward was a composer, miner. con man... have read a lot about him on Papers Past, lived in Tokomaru, a photograph off him in a book off the area which I have here at home, also a photograph of his daughter, Maida at school there... one day will write up the story of Maida, most of it was pure fiction, but she believed it to be true.. not so, I have done my homework even to Buckingham Palace! not joking there either.. She died June 2014.