History of Dunedin
Encyclopedia
The city of Dunedin
, New Zealand has played an important role in the history of New Zealand. Archaeological evidence points to the area having been long inhabited by Māori prior to the European arrival. It was a significant centre in the Archaic period when the North Island was scarcely inhabited. It was one of a few places of European sojourn and occupation in the Contact Period before 1840. It saw the establishment of perhaps the most utopian Wakefield settlement in 1848 by the Free Church of Scotland.
The discovery of gold
inland from Dunedin in 1861 led to the new city becoming the colony's main industrial and commercial centre. The successful export of frozen meat provided an extra impetus to Dunedin's importance and growth, as did the establishment of the country's first university.
) being established about 1650.
In this period there were Māori settlements in what is now central Dunedin (Otepoti), above Anderson's Bay (Puketai), on Te Rauone Beach (Te Ruatitiko and Tahakopa), around Otago Harbour
. There were also settlements at Whareakeake (Murdering Beach), Purakaunui, Mapoutahi (Goat Island Peninsula) and Huriawa (Karitane
Peninsula) to the north, and at Taieri Mouth
and Otokia (Henley
) to the south, all inside the present boundaries of Dunedin.
Central Dunedin was still occupied about 1785 but was abandoned before 1826. Purakaunui and Mapoutahi were abandoned late in the 18th century and Whareakeake about 1825.
Māori tradition speaks of Rakaihautu excavating Kaikorai Valley in ancient time, of Kahui Tipua and Te Rapuwai, ancient peoples of shadowy memory, and then Waitaha, followed by Kati Mamoe, the latter arriving late in the 16th century, and then Kai Tahu ('Ngai Tahu' in modern standard Māori) from about the middle of the 17th century. European accounts of these arrivals have often represented them as invasions. Modern scholarship has cast doubt on that and they are probably really migrations, incidentally attended by bloodshed, like the later European arrival.Personalities from this time and later, such as Taoka and Te Wera, Tarewai and Te Rakiihia are identified with events at Huriawa, Mapoutahi, Pukekura and Otepoti and have descendants known in the historical period. Te Rakiihia died and was buried somewhere in what is now central Dunedin about 1785.
The sealer John Boultbee recorded in the 1820s that the 'Kaika Otargo' (settlements around and near Otago Harbour) were the oldest and largest in the south.
stood off what is now the coast of Dunedin between February 25 and March 5, 1770 and named Cape Saunders
on the Otago Peninsula
and Saddle Hill. He charted the area and reported penguins and seals in the vicinity which led sealers to visit, their first recorded landings being late in the first decade of the 19th century. A feud between sealers and Māori, sparked by an incident on a ship in Otago Harbour in 1810, continued until 1823. With peace re-established Otago Harbour went from being a secret sealers' haven to an international whaling port.
Before the Scottish settlement William Tucker
settled at Whareakeake (Murdering Beach) near Otago Heads
in 1815. The Weller brothers
, Joseph, George and Edward, established their whaling station at Wellers Rock, at what is now called Otakou
on the Otago Harbour
, in 1831. Long, Wright & Richards started a whaling station at Karitane
in 1837 and Johnny Jones sent pioneers to settle land at Waikouaiti
in 1840, all inside the territory of the modern City of Dunedin. The settlements at Wellers Rock, Karitane and Waikouaiti
have endured making modern Dunedin one of the longest European settled territories in New Zealand.
founded Dunedin at the head of Otago Harbour in 1848 as the principal town of its Scottish settlement. The name comes from Dùn Èideann, the Scottish Gaelic name for Edinburgh
, the Scottish capital. Charles Kettle the city's surveyor, instructed to emulate the characteristics of Edinburgh, produced a striking, 'Romantic' design. The result was both grand and quirky streets as the builders struggled and sometimes failed to construct his bold vision across the challenging landscape. Captain William Cargill, a veteran of the war against Napoleon, was the secular leader. The Reverend Thomas Burns
, a nephew of the poet Robbie Burns, was the spiritual guide.
In 1852 when the provinces were created Dunedin became the capital of the Otago Province, the whole of New Zealand from the Waitaki
south. It was the only one of New Zealand's original six provinces to have a Māori name - a reflection of the area's European settlement in pre-colonial times. There were squabbles between 'the Old Identity' - the Scottish, Presbyterian majority, and 'the Little Enemy' - the English, Anglican minority. Dunedin developed a reputation for furious public debate which continues to the present in the letters columns of the local newspapers.
In 1861 the discovery of gold at Gabriel's Gully
led to a rapid influx of population and saw Dunedin become New Zealand's first city by growth of population in 1865. The new arrivals included many Irish, but also Italians, French, Germans, Jews and Chinese, all lumped together by the earlier settlers as 'the New Iniquity'. The old settlers were called "the identities" and the new ones "the iniquities". The Catholic church
established a strong presence and also the Jewish population established a synagogue
. Some people made fortunes and built grand houses. Slums developed in the inner city. Dunedin and the region industrialised. Dunedin's first railway, the Port Chalmers Branch
, was opened on 1 January 1873 and was the first railway built to the newly adopted narrow gauge to open in New Zealand. The Main South Line
, linking Dunedin with Christchurch
and Invercargill
, was opened on 22 January 1879. After ten years of gold rushes the economy slowed but Julius Vogel's immigration and development scheme brought thousands more especially to Dunedin and Otago before recession set in during the 1880s.
In this first time of prosperity many institutions and businesses were established in Dunedin, New Zealand's first daily newspaper, its first university, art school and medical school among them. A combination of money, good building stones and the then Scottish international pre-eminence in architecture saw a remarkable flowering of substantial and ornamental buildings, unusual for such a young and distant colony. R.A. Lawson's First Church of Otago and Knox Church are notable examples. Maxwell Bury's clock tower complex for the University and F.W. Petre
's St Joseph's Roman Catholic Cathedral are others started in this time. The city's landscape and burgeoning townscape were vividly portrayed by George O'Brien
.
Difficult economic conditions led to the 'anti-sweating' movement led by a Presbyterian Minister, Rutherford Waddell, and the Otago Daily Times
(under the editorship of Sir George Fenwick
). From it came the establishment of the New Zealand Labour Party
. Early in the 1880s the inauguration of the frozen meat industry, with the first shipment leaving from Port Chalmers
, saw the beginning of a later great national industry. In the mid 1890s the gold dredging boom began and by the turn of the century Dunedin was experiencing another time of prosperity.
This was a fertile period in the visual arts. William Mathew Hodgkins, the 'father of art in New Zealand' - according to his daughter Frances Hodgkins
- certainly presided over a vital scene. From the interlocking circles of Turneresque Romantic landscape painters and younger impressionistic practitioners, G.P. Nerli helped to launch Frances Hodgkins on her career as New Zealand's most distinguished expatriate artist.
From the 1890s the Assyrians
, religious refugees from what is now Lebanon
, started to arrive, packing into the inner city slums largely occupied by Chinese. It was in this milieu John A. Lee
grew up, the later Labour firebrand whose novels exposing these conditions would shock the country. But merchants like Edward Theomin built his grand town house Olveston
and the Dunedin Railway Station
was an opulent building, both completed in 1906. More companies and institutions were founded in these years, the Dunedin Public Art Gallery
in 1884, the Otago Settlers Museum
in 1898 and the Hocken Collections in 1910, all first of their types in New Zealand. But Dunedin was no longer the biggest city.
Determined to defeat demographic gravity Otago and Dunedin sent proportionately more personnel to the First World War than the other New Zealand districts and the losses were proportionately greater. The Anglican Cathedral, St. Paul's started in 1915 and consecrated in 1919 was the last great Gothic Revival building, and remains uncompleted. In another act of demographic defiance the 1925 New Zealand and South Seas Exhibition was staged at Logan Park to coincide with the five yearly census. 3.3 million people visited, more than attended any New Zealand exhibition before or since. The tramways' profits paid for a new town hall, still New Zealand's largest. But population growth continued to slow. With the 1930s the international depression set in. In early 1932 there were urban riots later repeated in the northern centres.
Despite the city's slow growth the university continued to expand boosted by its monopoly in health sciences. The developing Colleges and Halls saw the establishment of a student quarter. In this time too people started to notice Dunedin's mellowing, the ageing of its grand old buildings, with writers like E.H. McCormick pointing out its atmospheric charm. R.N. Field at the art school inspired young students to break from tradition with M.T. (Toss) Woollaston
, Doris Lusk, Anne Hamblett, Colin McCahon
and Patrick Hayman
forming the first cell of indigenous Modernism. The Second World War saw the dispersal of these painters, but not before McCahon had met a very youthful poet, James K. Baxter
, in a central city studio.
After the war prosperity and population growth revived, although Dunedin trailed as the fourth 'main centre'. A generation reacting against Victorianism started demolishing its buildings for redevelopment, which in Dunedin often meant open air car parks. Many buildings were lost, notably William Mason
's Stock Exchange in 1969. The university expanded, the rest of the city did not. Between 1976 and 81 it went into absolute decline. This lent support to the proposal to establish an aluminium smelter at Aramoana as one of Sir Robert Muldoon
's 'think big' projects.Its economics were doubtful and once exposed by Otago Professor, Paul Van Moeseke, the government backed off. But the city became bitterly divided.
This was a culturally vibrant time with the university's new privately endowed fellowships for writers, composers and visual artists, bringing such luminaries as James K Baxter, Ralph Hotere
, Janet Frame
, Hone Tuwhare
, back to the city, or to Dunedin for the first time, where some stayed and many lingered. Good Modernist buildings appeared, such as the Dental School and Ted McCoy
's Otago Boys' High School and Richardson building, evidence that this born-in-Dunedin designer could find a way of marrying Modernism to the revivalist inheritance.
In the 1980s, these trends were paralleled by a burgeoning popular music scene which made Dunedin and its "Dunedin Sound
" well-known to rock music fans. Local bands such as The Chills
, Straitjacket Fits
, The Clean
, and The Verlaines
became popular both nationwide and internationally.
Population decline steadied. By 1990 Dunedin had re-invented itself as the 'heritage city' with its main streets refurbished in Victorian style and R.A Lawson's Municipal Chambers in the Octagon handsomely restored. The university's growth accelerated. North Dunedin became New Zealand's largest and most exuberant residential campus. Local body reform saw the creation of the present huge territorial Dunedin, the country's largest city, in 1989, a distinction many found dubious.
The city has continued to refurbish itself, rehousing the Dunedin Public Art Gallery in the Octagon in 1996 and buying and restoring the Railway Station and now embarking on a large development of the Otago Settlers Museum. Dunedin continues to be preoccupied with its population and economic future but people have lived here for nine centuries through radically changing fortunes. Unlike other New Zealand cities something of that is reflected in its atmosphere with its constant recall of the past and promise of future surprises.
, the oldest university in New Zealand, was founded in Dunedin in 1869. Otago Girls' High School
(1871) is said to be the oldest state secondary school for girls in the Southern Hemisphere. The first Catholic school
was established in 1863. Dunedin became wealthy during the Central Otago goldrush which began at Gabriel's Gully
near Lawrence
in 1861. Between 1881 and 1957, Dunedin was home to the Dunedin cable trams
, being both one of the first and last such systems operated anywhere in the world. During the 20th century, influence and activity moved north to the other centres ("the drift north"), but by the end of the century Dunedin had re-established its identity as a centre of excellence in tertiary education and research.
Dunedin
Dunedin is the second-largest city in the South Island of New Zealand, and the principal city of the Otago Region. It is considered to be one of the four main urban centres of New Zealand for historic, cultural, and geographic reasons. Dunedin was the largest city by territorial land area until...
, New Zealand has played an important role in the history of New Zealand. Archaeological evidence points to the area having been long inhabited by Māori prior to the European arrival. It was a significant centre in the Archaic period when the North Island was scarcely inhabited. It was one of a few places of European sojourn and occupation in the Contact Period before 1840. It saw the establishment of perhaps the most utopian Wakefield settlement in 1848 by the Free Church of Scotland.
The discovery of gold
Gold
Gold is a chemical element with the symbol Au and an atomic number of 79. Gold is a dense, soft, shiny, malleable and ductile metal. Pure gold has a bright yellow color and luster traditionally considered attractive, which it maintains without oxidizing in air or water. Chemically, gold is a...
inland from Dunedin in 1861 led to the new city becoming the colony's main industrial and commercial centre. The successful export of frozen meat provided an extra impetus to Dunedin's importance and growth, as did the establishment of the country's first university.
Pre-European history
Archaeological evidence shows the first human (Māori) occupation of New Zealand occurred around AD 1250–1300, with population concentrated along the south east coast. A camp site at Kaikai's Beach, near Otago Heads, has been dated about that time. From this Moa Hunter (Archaic) phase of Māori culture there are numerous sites in the Dunedin area, including ones interpreted as permanent villages at Little Papanui and Harwood Township in the 14th century. With reduced moa numbers the population slumped but grew again with the evolution of a new Classic culture producing fortified villages (pa), the one at Pukekura (Taiaroa HeadTaiaroa Head
Taiaroa Head is a headland at the end of the Otago Peninsula in New Zealand, overlooking the mouth of the Otago Harbour. It lies within the city limits of Dunedin...
) being established about 1650.
In this period there were Māori settlements in what is now central Dunedin (Otepoti), above Anderson's Bay (Puketai), on Te Rauone Beach (Te Ruatitiko and Tahakopa), around Otago Harbour
Otago Harbour
Otago Harbour is the natural harbour of Dunedin, New Zealand, consisting of a long, much-indented stretch of generally navigable water separating the Otago Peninsula from the mainland. They join at its southwest end, from the harbour mouth...
. There were also settlements at Whareakeake (Murdering Beach), Purakaunui, Mapoutahi (Goat Island Peninsula) and Huriawa (Karitane
Karitane
The seaside settlement of Karitane is located within the limits of the city of Dunedin in New Zealand, 35 kilometres to the north of the city centre....
Peninsula) to the north, and at Taieri Mouth
Taieri Mouth
Taieri Mouth is a small fishing village at the mouth of the Taieri River, New Zealand. Taieri Island lies in the ocean several hundred metres off the river's mouth.It has a white sand beach for swimming and several picnic areas...
and Otokia (Henley
Henley, New Zealand
Henley is a township on New Zealand's Taieri Plains, presumably named after the rowing centre Henley-on-Thames in England. It lies close to the confluence of the Taieri and Waipori Rivers at the eastern edge of the plain, at the foot of a low range of coastal hills.Henley is near the south-west...
) to the south, all inside the present boundaries of Dunedin.
Central Dunedin was still occupied about 1785 but was abandoned before 1826. Purakaunui and Mapoutahi were abandoned late in the 18th century and Whareakeake about 1825.
Māori tradition speaks of Rakaihautu excavating Kaikorai Valley in ancient time, of Kahui Tipua and Te Rapuwai, ancient peoples of shadowy memory, and then Waitaha, followed by Kati Mamoe, the latter arriving late in the 16th century, and then Kai Tahu ('Ngai Tahu' in modern standard Māori) from about the middle of the 17th century. European accounts of these arrivals have often represented them as invasions. Modern scholarship has cast doubt on that and they are probably really migrations, incidentally attended by bloodshed, like the later European arrival.Personalities from this time and later, such as Taoka and Te Wera, Tarewai and Te Rakiihia are identified with events at Huriawa, Mapoutahi, Pukekura and Otepoti and have descendants known in the historical period. Te Rakiihia died and was buried somewhere in what is now central Dunedin about 1785.
The sealer John Boultbee recorded in the 1820s that the 'Kaika Otargo' (settlements around and near Otago Harbour) were the oldest and largest in the south.
The arrival of the Europeans
Captain James CookJames Cook
Captain James Cook, FRS, RN was a British explorer, navigator and cartographer who ultimately rose to the rank of captain in the Royal Navy...
stood off what is now the coast of Dunedin between February 25 and March 5, 1770 and named Cape Saunders
Cape Saunders
Cape Saunders is a prominent headland on the Pacific Ocean coast of the Otago Peninsula in New Zealand's South Island. It is home to the Cape Saunders Lighthouse....
on the Otago Peninsula
Otago Peninsula
The Otago Peninsula is a long, hilly indented finger of land that forms the easternmost part of Dunedin, New Zealand. Volcanic in origin, it forms one wall of the eroded valley that now forms Otago Harbour. The peninsula lies south-east of Otago Harbour and runs parallel to the mainland for...
and Saddle Hill. He charted the area and reported penguins and seals in the vicinity which led sealers to visit, their first recorded landings being late in the first decade of the 19th century. A feud between sealers and Māori, sparked by an incident on a ship in Otago Harbour in 1810, continued until 1823. With peace re-established Otago Harbour went from being a secret sealers' haven to an international whaling port.
Before the Scottish settlement William Tucker
William Tucker (settler)
William Tucker was a British convict, a sealer, a trader in human heads, an Otago settler, and New Zealand’s first art dealer....
settled at Whareakeake (Murdering Beach) near Otago Heads
Taiaroa Head
Taiaroa Head is a headland at the end of the Otago Peninsula in New Zealand, overlooking the mouth of the Otago Harbour. It lies within the city limits of Dunedin...
in 1815. The Weller brothers
Weller brothers
The Weller brothers, Englishmen of Sydney and Otago, New Zealand, were the founders of a whaling station on Otago Harbour and New Zealand’s most substantial merchant traders in the 1830s.-Immigration:...
, Joseph, George and Edward, established their whaling station at Wellers Rock, at what is now called Otakou
Otakou
The settlement of Otakou lies within the boundaries of the city of Dunedin, New Zealand. It is located 25 kilometres from the city centre at the eastern end of Otago Peninsula, close to the entrance of Otago Harbour.-Overview:...
on the Otago Harbour
Otago Harbour
Otago Harbour is the natural harbour of Dunedin, New Zealand, consisting of a long, much-indented stretch of generally navigable water separating the Otago Peninsula from the mainland. They join at its southwest end, from the harbour mouth...
, in 1831. Long, Wright & Richards started a whaling station at Karitane
Karitane
The seaside settlement of Karitane is located within the limits of the city of Dunedin in New Zealand, 35 kilometres to the north of the city centre....
in 1837 and Johnny Jones sent pioneers to settle land at Waikouaiti
Waikouaiti
Waikouaiti is a small town in East Otago, New Zealand, within the city limits of Dunedin. The town is close to the coast and the mouth of the Waikouaiti River....
in 1840, all inside the territory of the modern City of Dunedin. The settlements at Wellers Rock, Karitane and Waikouaiti
Waikouaiti
Waikouaiti is a small town in East Otago, New Zealand, within the city limits of Dunedin. The town is close to the coast and the mouth of the Waikouaiti River....
have endured making modern Dunedin one of the longest European settled territories in New Zealand.
Scottish settlement diluted
The Lay Association of the Free Church of ScotlandFree Church of Scotland (1843-1900)
The Free Church of Scotland is a Scottish denomination which was formed in 1843 by a large withdrawal from the established Church of Scotland in a schism known as the "Disruption of 1843"...
founded Dunedin at the head of Otago Harbour in 1848 as the principal town of its Scottish settlement. The name comes from Dùn Èideann, the Scottish Gaelic name for Edinburgh
Edinburgh
Edinburgh is the capital city of Scotland, the second largest city in Scotland, and the eighth most populous in the United Kingdom. The City of Edinburgh Council governs one of Scotland's 32 local government council areas. The council area includes urban Edinburgh and a rural area...
, the Scottish capital. Charles Kettle the city's surveyor, instructed to emulate the characteristics of Edinburgh, produced a striking, 'Romantic' design. The result was both grand and quirky streets as the builders struggled and sometimes failed to construct his bold vision across the challenging landscape. Captain William Cargill, a veteran of the war against Napoleon, was the secular leader. The Reverend Thomas Burns
Thomas Burns (New Zealand)
Thomas Burns was a prominent early European settler and religious leader of the province of Otago, New Zealand.Burns was baptised at Mauchline, Ayrshire, Scotland in April 1796, the son of estate manager Gilbert Burns, who was the brother of the poet Robert Burns...
, a nephew of the poet Robbie Burns, was the spiritual guide.
In 1852 when the provinces were created Dunedin became the capital of the Otago Province, the whole of New Zealand from the Waitaki
Waitaki River
The Waitaki River is a large river in the South Island of New Zealand, some 110 km long. It is the major river of the Mackenzie Basin.It is a braided river which flows through Lake Benmore, Lake Aviemore and Lake Waitaki. These are ultimately fed by three large glacial lakes, Pukaki, Tekapo,...
south. It was the only one of New Zealand's original six provinces to have a Māori name - a reflection of the area's European settlement in pre-colonial times. There were squabbles between 'the Old Identity' - the Scottish, Presbyterian majority, and 'the Little Enemy' - the English, Anglican minority. Dunedin developed a reputation for furious public debate which continues to the present in the letters columns of the local newspapers.
In 1861 the discovery of gold at Gabriel's Gully
Gabriel's Gully
Gabriel's Gully is a locality in Otago, New Zealand, three kilometres from Lawrence township and close to the Tuapeka River.The discovery of gold at Gabriel's Gully by Gabriel Read in May 1861 led to the Central Otago goldrush...
led to a rapid influx of population and saw Dunedin become New Zealand's first city by growth of population in 1865. The new arrivals included many Irish, but also Italians, French, Germans, Jews and Chinese, all lumped together by the earlier settlers as 'the New Iniquity'. The old settlers were called "the identities" and the new ones "the iniquities". The Catholic church
Roman Catholic Diocese of Dunedin
The Latin Rite Catholic Diocese of Dunedin is a suffragan diocese of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Wellington. It was formed on 26 November 1869 from a portion of the territory in the Diocese of Wellington, before it was elevated to an archdiocese....
established a strong presence and also the Jewish population established a synagogue
Synagogue
A synagogue is a Jewish house of prayer. This use of the Greek term synagogue originates in the Septuagint where it sometimes translates the Hebrew word for assembly, kahal...
. Some people made fortunes and built grand houses. Slums developed in the inner city. Dunedin and the region industrialised. Dunedin's first railway, the Port Chalmers Branch
Port Chalmers Branch
The Port Chalmers Branch was the first railway line built in Otago, New Zealand, and linked the region's major city of Dunedin with the port in Port Chalmers...
, was opened on 1 January 1873 and was the first railway built to the newly adopted narrow gauge to open in New Zealand. The Main South Line
Main South Line
The Main South Line, sometimes referred to as part of the South Island Main Trunk Railway, is a railroad line that runs north and south from Lyttelton in New Zealand through Christchurch and along the east coast of the South Island to Invercargill via Dunedin...
, linking Dunedin with Christchurch
Christchurch
Christchurch is the largest city in the South Island of New Zealand, and the country's second-largest urban area after Auckland. It lies one third of the way down the South Island's east coast, just north of Banks Peninsula which itself, since 2006, lies within the formal limits of...
and Invercargill
Invercargill
Invercargill is the southernmost and westernmost city in New Zealand, and one of the southernmost cities in the world. It is the commercial centre of the Southland region. It lies in the heart of the wide expanse of the Southland Plains on the Oreti or New River some 18 km north of Bluff,...
, was opened on 22 January 1879. After ten years of gold rushes the economy slowed but Julius Vogel's immigration and development scheme brought thousands more especially to Dunedin and Otago before recession set in during the 1880s.
The development of modern Dunedin
Francis Petre
Francis William "Frank" Petre was a prominent New Zealand-born architect based in Dunedin. He was an able exponent of the Gothic revival style, one of its best practitioners in New Zealand. He followed the Roman Church's initiative to build Catholic places of worship in Anglo-Saxon countries in...
's St Joseph's Roman Catholic Cathedral are others started in this time. The city's landscape and burgeoning townscape were vividly portrayed by George O'Brien
George O'Brien (painter)
George O'Brien was an engineer of aristocratic background who turned to art in 19th century Australasia, dying in poverty but leaving a body of remarkable work.-Biography:...
.
Difficult economic conditions led to the 'anti-sweating' movement led by a Presbyterian Minister, Rutherford Waddell, and the Otago Daily Times
Otago Daily Times
The Otago Daily Times is a newspaper published by Allied Press Ltd in Dunedin, New Zealand.-History:Originally styled The Otago Daily Times, the ODT was first published on November 15, 1861. It is New Zealand's oldest surviving daily newspaper - Christchurch's The Press, six months older, was a...
(under the editorship of Sir George Fenwick
George Fenwick
Sir George Fenwick was a New Zealand newspaper proprietor and editor.Born in Sunderland, England, his family emigrated to Australia in 1852, and subsequently to Otago, New Zealand four years later...
). From it came the establishment of the New Zealand Labour Party
New Zealand Labour Party
The New Zealand Labour Party is a New Zealand political party. It describes itself as centre-left and socially progressive and has been one of the two primary parties of New Zealand politics since 1935....
. Early in the 1880s the inauguration of the frozen meat industry, with the first shipment leaving from Port Chalmers
Port Chalmers
Port Chalmers is a suburb and the main port of the city of Dunedin, New Zealand, with a population of 3,000. Port Chalmers lies ten kilometres inside Otago Harbour, some 15 kilometres northeast from Dunedin's city centre....
, saw the beginning of a later great national industry. In the mid 1890s the gold dredging boom began and by the turn of the century Dunedin was experiencing another time of prosperity.
This was a fertile period in the visual arts. William Mathew Hodgkins, the 'father of art in New Zealand' - according to his daughter Frances Hodgkins
Frances Hodgkins
Frances Mary Hodgkins was a painter chiefly of landscape and still life, and for a short period was a designer of textiles. She was born in New Zealand, but spent most of her working life in Britain...
- certainly presided over a vital scene. From the interlocking circles of Turneresque Romantic landscape painters and younger impressionistic practitioners, G.P. Nerli helped to launch Frances Hodgkins on her career as New Zealand's most distinguished expatriate artist.
From the 1890s the Assyrians
Assyrian people
The Assyrian people are a distinct ethnic group whose origins lie in ancient Mesopotamia...
, religious refugees from what is now Lebanon
Lebanon
Lebanon , officially the Republic of LebanonRepublic of Lebanon is the most common term used by Lebanese government agencies. The term Lebanese Republic, a literal translation of the official Arabic and French names that is not used in today's world. Arabic is the most common language spoken among...
, started to arrive, packing into the inner city slums largely occupied by Chinese. It was in this milieu John A. Lee
John A. Lee
John Alfred Alexander Lee DCM was a New Zealand politician and writer. He is one of the more prominent avowed socialists in New Zealand's political history.-Early life:...
grew up, the later Labour firebrand whose novels exposing these conditions would shock the country. But merchants like Edward Theomin built his grand town house Olveston
Olveston
Olveston is a small village and larger parish in South Gloucestershire, England. The parish comprises the villages of Olveston and Tockington, and the hamlets of Old Down, Ingst and Awkley. Alveston became a separate parish in 1846...
and the Dunedin Railway Station
Dunedin Railway Station
Possibly the best-known building in the southern half of New Zealand's South Island, Dunedin Railway Station is a jewel in the country's architectural crown. Designed by George Troup, the station is the fourth building to have served as Dunedin's railway station...
was an opulent building, both completed in 1906. More companies and institutions were founded in these years, the Dunedin Public Art Gallery
Dunedin Public Art Gallery
The Dunedin Public Art Gallery holds the main public art collection of the city of Dunedin, New Zealand. Located in The Octagon in the heart of the city, it is close to the city's public library, municipal chambers, and other facilities such as the Regent Theatre.-History:The gallery was founded by...
in 1884, the Otago Settlers Museum
Otago Settlers Museum
The Otago Settlers Museum is a regional history museum in Dunedin, New Zealand. Its brief covers the territory of the old Otago Province, that is, New Zealand from the Waitaki River south. It is New Zealand's oldest and most extensive history museum...
in 1898 and the Hocken Collections in 1910, all first of their types in New Zealand. But Dunedin was no longer the biggest city.
Determined to defeat demographic gravity Otago and Dunedin sent proportionately more personnel to the First World War than the other New Zealand districts and the losses were proportionately greater. The Anglican Cathedral, St. Paul's started in 1915 and consecrated in 1919 was the last great Gothic Revival building, and remains uncompleted. In another act of demographic defiance the 1925 New Zealand and South Seas Exhibition was staged at Logan Park to coincide with the five yearly census. 3.3 million people visited, more than attended any New Zealand exhibition before or since. The tramways' profits paid for a new town hall, still New Zealand's largest. But population growth continued to slow. With the 1930s the international depression set in. In early 1932 there were urban riots later repeated in the northern centres.
Despite the city's slow growth the university continued to expand boosted by its monopoly in health sciences. The developing Colleges and Halls saw the establishment of a student quarter. In this time too people started to notice Dunedin's mellowing, the ageing of its grand old buildings, with writers like E.H. McCormick pointing out its atmospheric charm. R.N. Field at the art school inspired young students to break from tradition with M.T. (Toss) Woollaston
Toss Woollaston
Sir Mountford Tosswill "Toss" Woollaston was one of the most important New Zealand painters of the 20th century.Born in Toko, Taranaki on April 11, 1910, Woollaston studied art at the Canterbury School of Art in Christchurch...
, Doris Lusk, Anne Hamblett, Colin McCahon
Colin McCahon
Colin John McCahon was a prominent New Zealand artist. During his life he also worked in art galleries and as a university lecturer...
and Patrick Hayman
Patrick Hayman
Patrick Hayman was an English artist who worked in a variety of media including painting, drawing and three-dimensional constructions. Although he only lived in Cornwall, for a few years, he was closely associated with the St Ives School of painters and sculptors.Hayman acknowledged he was...
forming the first cell of indigenous Modernism. The Second World War saw the dispersal of these painters, but not before McCahon had met a very youthful poet, James K. Baxter
James K. Baxter
James Keir Baxter was a poet, and is a celebrated figure in New Zealand society.-Biography:Baxter was born in Dunedin to Archibald Baxter and Millicent Brown and grew up near Brighton. He was named after James Keir Hardie, a founder of the British Labour Party. His father had been a conscientious...
, in a central city studio.
After the war prosperity and population growth revived, although Dunedin trailed as the fourth 'main centre'. A generation reacting against Victorianism started demolishing its buildings for redevelopment, which in Dunedin often meant open air car parks. Many buildings were lost, notably William Mason
William Mason
William Mason may refer to:*William Mason , American engineer and inventor working for Remington, Colt, and Winchester*William Mason , American composer and pianist...
's Stock Exchange in 1969. The university expanded, the rest of the city did not. Between 1976 and 81 it went into absolute decline. This lent support to the proposal to establish an aluminium smelter at Aramoana as one of Sir Robert Muldoon
Robert Muldoon
Sir Robert David "Rob" Muldoon, GCMG, CH served as the 31st Prime Minister of New Zealand from 1975 to 1984, as leader of the governing National Party. Muldoon had been a prominent member of the National party and MP for the Tamaki electorate for some years prior to becoming leader of the party...
's 'think big' projects.Its economics were doubtful and once exposed by Otago Professor, Paul Van Moeseke, the government backed off. But the city became bitterly divided.
This was a culturally vibrant time with the university's new privately endowed fellowships for writers, composers and visual artists, bringing such luminaries as James K Baxter, Ralph Hotere
Ralph Hotere
Hone Papita Raukura "Ralph" Hotere is a New Zealand artist of Māori descent . He was born in Mitimiti, Northland and He is widely regarded as one of New Zealand's most important living artists...
, Janet Frame
Janet Frame
Janet Paterson Frame, ONZ, CBE was a New Zealand author. She wrote eleven novels, four collections of short stories, a book of poetry, an edition of juvenile fiction, and three volumes of autobiography during her lifetime. Since her death, a twelfth novel, a second volume of poetry, and a handful...
, Hone Tuwhare
Hone Tuwhare
Hone Tuwhare was a noted New Zealand poet of Māori ancestry. He is closely associated with The Catlins in the Otago region of New Zealand, where he lived for the latter part of his life.-Early years:...
, back to the city, or to Dunedin for the first time, where some stayed and many lingered. Good Modernist buildings appeared, such as the Dental School and Ted McCoy
Ted McCoy
Edward John "Ted" McCoy ONZM is a retired Dunedin, New Zealand architect. He designed the sanctuary of St Pauls Cathedral, completed in 1970 and the Richardson Building of the University of Otago, completed in 1979, among many others...
's Otago Boys' High School and Richardson building, evidence that this born-in-Dunedin designer could find a way of marrying Modernism to the revivalist inheritance.
In the 1980s, these trends were paralleled by a burgeoning popular music scene which made Dunedin and its "Dunedin Sound
Dunedin Sound
The Dunedin sound was a style of indie pop music created in the southern New Zealand university city of Dunedin in the early 1980s.-Characteristics:...
" well-known to rock music fans. Local bands such as The Chills
The Chills
The Chills are a guitar and keyboard-based rock band from Dunedin, New Zealand. In the 1980s and 1990s, they were one of the proponents of the Dunedin Sound.- History :...
, Straitjacket Fits
Straitjacket Fits
Straitjacket Fits formed in Dunedin, New Zealand in 1986 and were a prominent band in the Flying Nun label's second wave of the Dunedin Sound.-Biography:...
, The Clean
The Clean
The Clean are an influential Indie rock band that formed in Dunedin, New Zealand in 1978. Led through a number of early rotating line-ups by brothers Hamish and David Kilgour, the band settled down to their well-known and current line-up with bassist Robert Scott...
, and The Verlaines
The Verlaines
The Verlaines are a rock band from Dunedin, New Zealand. Formed in 1981 by Graeme Downes, Craig Easton, Anita Pillai, Phillip Higham and Greg Kerr, the band went through multiple line-ups before going on an extended hiatus after their 1997 album Over The Moon. In 2003 a career retrospective, You're...
became popular both nationwide and internationally.
Population decline steadied. By 1990 Dunedin had re-invented itself as the 'heritage city' with its main streets refurbished in Victorian style and R.A Lawson's Municipal Chambers in the Octagon handsomely restored. The university's growth accelerated. North Dunedin became New Zealand's largest and most exuberant residential campus. Local body reform saw the creation of the present huge territorial Dunedin, the country's largest city, in 1989, a distinction many found dubious.
The city has continued to refurbish itself, rehousing the Dunedin Public Art Gallery in the Octagon in 1996 and buying and restoring the Railway Station and now embarking on a large development of the Otago Settlers Museum. Dunedin continues to be preoccupied with its population and economic future but people have lived here for nine centuries through radically changing fortunes. Unlike other New Zealand cities something of that is reflected in its atmosphere with its constant recall of the past and promise of future surprises.
Historical notes
The University of OtagoUniversity of Otago
The University of Otago in Dunedin is New Zealand's oldest university with over 22,000 students enrolled during 2010.The university has New Zealand's highest average research quality and in New Zealand is second only to the University of Auckland in the number of A rated academic researchers it...
, the oldest university in New Zealand, was founded in Dunedin in 1869. Otago Girls' High School
Otago Girls' High School
Otago Girls' High School is a secondary school in Dunedin, Otago, New Zealand. It was opened 6 February 1871, after a long campaign by educationalist Learmonth Whyte Dalrymple...
(1871) is said to be the oldest state secondary school for girls in the Southern Hemisphere. The first Catholic school
Kavanagh College
Kavanagh College is a Catholic Secondary school in Dunedin, New Zealand. The school in its present form dates from 1989 but its origins as a secondary school go back to 1871....
was established in 1863. Dunedin became wealthy during the Central Otago goldrush which began at Gabriel's Gully
Gabriel's Gully
Gabriel's Gully is a locality in Otago, New Zealand, three kilometres from Lawrence township and close to the Tuapeka River.The discovery of gold at Gabriel's Gully by Gabriel Read in May 1861 led to the Central Otago goldrush...
near Lawrence
Lawrence, New Zealand
Lawrence is a small town of 474 inhabitants in Otago, in New Zealand's South Island. It is located on State Highway 8, the main route from Dunedin to the inland towns of Queenstown and Alexandra...
in 1861. Between 1881 and 1957, Dunedin was home to the Dunedin cable trams
Dunedin cable tramway system
The Dunedin cable tramway system was a group of cable tramway lines in the New Zealand city of Dunedin. It is significant as Dunedin was the second city in the world to adopt the cable car .- History :...
, being both one of the first and last such systems operated anywhere in the world. During the 20th century, influence and activity moved north to the other centres ("the drift north"), but by the end of the century Dunedin had re-established its identity as a centre of excellence in tertiary education and research.