Post researched and written by Christopher Meech, Head Curator Publications, Hocken Collections Every now and then a find quite unexpected and novel comes through the doors at Hocken. A small book titled Original Poetry, by Mrs C. Fulton, to which are added a few Poems by her Father Mr James Dods[1], is such a remarkable find. This modest publication has […]

Post researched and written by Nick Austin, a General Assistant at the Hocken. He was the 2012 Frances Hodgkins Fellow and presented the exhibition The Liquid Dossier (16 February – 13 April 2013) at the Hocken Gallery. Sitting and reading. These verbs take on a vocational significance at the Hocken; users of our material are called ‘readers’, after […]

Post researched and written by Emma Scott, Collections Assistant – Publications Are you a machine knitter, cat fancier, Ruritanian folk dancer, Chrysler restorer, lace maker, ship wreck welfare specialist or antique bottle collector? If so, then you will be interested in some of the  approximately 3145 club and society periodicals located in the Hocken Journals […]

Post by Kari Wilson-Allan, Library Assistant – Reference Papers Past is undoubtedly a valuable and convenient resource for historical research.  It is easy, however, in using it, to overlook other avenues of journalistic endeavour. While working on a response to a recent reference enquiry, I came across a reel of microfilm in the stack containing […]

Post by Emma Scott, Library Assistant – Periodicals Tucked away within our publications collection are approximately 149 zines spanning from the 1970s to the present day. For those of you who haven’t come across a zine before, zines are self published publications that are on a variety of different topics. Many of the zines in […]

Post by Dr Ali Clarke, Library Assistant – Reference We’re always pleased to see images from our collections featuring on the cover of new books! Each year we put together a list of published items – from books to theses, blogs to journals, television series to exhibitions – which have made use of Hocken resources. […]

Blog post prepared by Kate Hyland, Library Assistant The Hocken’s periodicals collection is home to a range of fashion-related material. Perhaps one of the most glamorous titles we hold is Vogue New Zealand – our nation’s very own edition of the famous title published from 1957 to 1968. Though New Zealand’s Vogue was short-lived, the […]

Blog post prepared by Periodicals Library Assistant, Megan Vaughan For the past several years Hocken staff have been working on rehousing our oldest and most precious newspapers in archival boxes. We discovered this copy of the Otago News copied out by hand. The rest of Dr Hocken’s collection of the Otago News are the printed […]

In 19th century Aotearoa New Zealand, Māori-language newspapers carried the written word of the day throughout the land. The first newspapers in te reo Māori were published by the colonial government shortly after the signing of the Treaty of Waitangi. Māori quickly realised the benefits of this new instrument of communication and by 1862 embraced […]

Blog post prepared by Emma Scott, Library Assistant – Periodicals The Mail Minor, Oamaru, September 13 1940, v.2:no.37, p.1 While working on a project for the Hocken Collections in 2010, my colleague and I came across a delightful supplement to the Oamaru Mail that ran from 1939 to 1942 called: The Mail Minor: for the […]