Women's Right to Vote

With all of the hubbub about the rugby world cup, it completely slipped my mind that this week was the 118th anniversary of women gaining the right to vote - 19 September 1893. It's a landmark event in New Zealand but also worldwide as New Zealand was the first country in the world to achieve this measure of equality for women.

We have the signatures of the original Otautau petition on permanent display in the museum, but I was thinking it might be nice to add photos of these women someday to our display. If anyone has a photo of any of these women and is willing to have it copied for display, please contact us.

You can search the NZ History's women's suffrage database to see if your ancestor signed this petition and made history.

Otautau Petition Signatories

Acheson	Jane
Blatch	Ellen M
Cameron	M.
Cameron	C
Campbell	Catherine
Carmichael	M.
Clothier	A L.
Cotter	E. F.
Croft	Annie
Cupples	Jane
Cupples	Jemima
Forbes	Margaret
Forbes	Mrs
Forbs	Isibella
Gaines	Alice
Gardiner	J
Gilchrist	Annie
Greenslade	J.
Hill	Elen
Hill	Annie
Hogan	M. T.
Johnston	M. P.
Ketteg	Mrs Anne
Keveney	Catherine
Lawson	I
Lee	Jane
Lindsay	Barbara
Manson	Mary
Matheson	L C
McAfee	Margaret
McDonald	Florrie
McLaren	B. S.
McNeil	C.
Morrison	Jane
Norman	Elizabeth
Pankhurst	Jessie
Parmenter	Isabella
Price	Elizabeth
Raitton	Mrs
Rogers	Emily
Shaw	Jane
Sinclair	Sarah
Smith	Jessie
Swap	A.
Thomson	M.
Walker	A.
Wohlmann	Rebecca

We're open Wednesdays and Sundays, 2pm-4pm, and by request. Your comments are always welcome!

Oral History

For a few years, we've talked about adding oral history recordings into our collection - to help capture some of the stories of people's lives and share them through our displays and things. We currently have copies of oral histories about the 1984 floods in Otautau derived from the Southland Oral History Project. But we haven't yet started our own collection of oral histories.

This week, we've inched closer to that goal. We've drafted an oral history agreement form which is different from most others. Most oral history agreements state that the copyright belongs to the institution or group who are doing the project unless the interviewee or 'depositor' stipulates otherwise. This is bad news for someone who might not read the form in detail and just sign it faithfully. Also most forms don't allow the person to name who will take over their copyright once they are no longer able to exercise it.

Our form, which is still in draft, covers these issues and places all power and control in the hands of the interviewee. They retain their copyright, even if they just sign the form without reading. And we, as an institution, must seek their written permission to access (listen to) and use the recording. And the same will go for any member of the public.

The next step is to develop a simple questionnaire that will be a good jumping off place for oral history interviews.

This year, we hope to do our first oral history recording. So if you know of anyone who wants to be interviewed or you want to be interviewed yourself, please drop us a line. This is going to be an exciting opportunity for people to record their life stories for their family/whanau and potentially the community. If you want to jump on board and move this project forward, please get in touch.

We're open Wednesdays and Sundays, 2pm-4pm, and by request. Your comments are always welcome!

Memorial in Waiting

This week, I visited a local resident who shared about a woman from Aparima who was very involved with the Methodist Church there. Several years ago my friend was given a white marble plaque with a very touching inscription about this woman who died in 1928. She wasn't sure what to do with it. It's not really appropriate for the museum but where should it go? These people, the Kellows, had no children. I suggested the Otautau Cemetery but then the woman wasn't sure that Mrs Kellow was buried there. She thought they might be up in Christchurch. So I got onto the SDC Cemetery Search page and found she was buried at the Calcium Cemetery. Maybe that is the place for this memorial plaque to go. I gave my friend this information so we'll see what happens next.

My friend has written a bit about Mrs Kellow's life, and hopefully will contribute it to our biography files. As a side note, we have over 70 obituaries in our files of early settlers and the succeeding generations, and we're always keen to receive more.

It just goes to show the interesting things people have that relate to the past and how rewarding it can be to volunteer at the museum.

We're open Wednesdays and Sundays, 2pm-4pm, and by request. Your comments are always welcome!

Research Enquiries

This week people we received two new research enquiries. We were of no help to one and some help to another.
The Winton A&P Show
A book is going to be written about the Winton A&P Show in the near future so people are gathering information now. Winton is out of the museum's district so we had nothing significant for the researchers. But we know that many local farmers would've shown their stock at the Winton A&P and may have a lot of stories to share. The Wallace A&P stopped running several years ago, but the Winton A&P keeps going.

The Densems
Rev. George and Mrs Alice Densem lived in Otautau roughly between 1937 and 1942. They lived in the Methodist Manse on Lieman Street. We verified to their grandson that one of his old photos was this manse and provided a transcription from the Otautau Standard for an anniversary service that was given in 1938. In addition, I photographed the manse and Methodist Church building as they are today and passed them on to him.

If you have further information on these enquiries, please contact us, and we will put you in contact with these folks. Thanks!

We're open Wednesdays and Sundays, 2pm-4pm, and by request. Your comments are always welcome!