Seminar presented by historian Gavin McLean at the Ministry for Culture and Heritage on 6 November 2013.
In 1915 the New Zealand government converted the liners Maheno and Marama into state-of-the art floating hospitals. Fitted out partly with funds raised by high profile public appeals, the ships had a busy war, eventually carrying 47,000 people. Painted distinctively in accordance with international requirements, they were the public face of our merchant marine's war, with the Maheno's crew making a direct civilian contribution to the Gallipoli campaign. Not everything went according to plan. There were tensions between the governor and ministers and shipboard disputes between army officers and mariners and between doctors and nurses. The political left also muttered about profiteering by the Union Steam Ship Company. Come along and hear the story of New Zealand's white ships.
Gavin McLean is a senior historian in the History Group of the Ministry for Culture and Heritage. He is about to start on writing a book on New Zealand's First World War at sea.
The tragedy of the SS Talune and the 1918 influenza pandemic
Polly Plum and the first wave of feminism
‘Researching kindergarten: the endeavours of women for the play of children’
‘The Dictionary of New Zealand Biography, redux’
Jazzy Nerves, Aching Feet, and Foxtrots: New Zealand’s Jazz Age
How does a city make a writer?
Māori Women, Politics and Petitions in the 19th Century
The Great War for New Zealand
Counting redcoats: Who were the imperial soldiers serving in New Zealand in the 1860s?
The Broken Decade: 1928 - 39 by Malcom McKinnon
Past Caring? Gender, Work and Emotion - A talk by Professor Barbara Brookes
Hearth and Home: Reconstructing the Rural Kitchen, c1840–1940’
The Māori War Effort at Home and Abroad 1917
New Zealand’s Rivers: can we learn from history?
Reflections on the Big Smoke
KŪPAPA - the bitter legacy of Māori alliances with the Crown
Richard Seddon: King of God’s Own
Dr Steven Loveridge: New Zealand Society at War
Dr Grant Morris: ’Legal Villain’
Andrew Francis: Enemy aliens and the New Zealand experience
Create your
podcast in
minutes
It is Free
Irish Songs with Ken Murray
History Obscura
Historycal: Words that Shaped the World
The Rest Is History
Everything Everywhere Daily