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The 1940 Centennial - classroom activities

Case study: the 1940 Centennial

Playland - New Zealand Centennial, 1940

Dodgems and Crazy Houses

Most of the 2.6 million people who filed through the turnstiles went there to be entertained at Playland, the exhibition's big amusement park. They were following a well-worn path recognised by exhibition organisers who knew that successful high-profile rides would lure patrons back for the return visits that really made exhibitions pay.

After much debate, the New Zealand Centennial Exhibition Company gave the amusement park concession to a British company, the Double Grip Tubular Steel Amusement Devices Company. Its Henry Seff organised the arrangements for 'Playland', which took shape rapidly on the Rongotai College playing fields available from 1 April 1939. The flagship ride, the Cyclone roller-coaster, cost £15,000 to build; the three next most expensive were the Crazy House and Scoota Boats (£4,500 each) and the Dodgem Track (£4,000).

Mechanical troubles sidelined the Highland Fling ride for weeks and the large helter-skelter, the Jack & Jill, also performed badly. Local enthusiasm seems to have dampened after some patrons slipped off their mats and suffered friction burns. Star performer was the Cyclone. Next best was the Crazy House, followed by the Speedway and the Ghost Train. The show was promoted 13 hours a day by a mechanical barker, the Laughing Sailor, imported from the Glasgow Empire Exhibition. He sat over the main door and filled the entire grounds with the sound of his raucous laughter.

The Trains

Playland's 10 acres (4 hectares) of grounds was the largest yet built in the southern hemisphere. Motorised 'Kiwi Trains' carried fare-paying passengers around the grounds and a 'giant scenic railway' swept and soared along the northern boundary of 'Playland'. The Coronation Scot model train carried children around a 1,500-metre track in 'Kiddieland', the 4,000 square metres of Playland set aside for children.

Other Amusements

Playland also included a Devil Plane, Wall of Death, a Shark Pool (with live sharks), H.C. Harcourt's 'Little Theatre', a graphology stand, Pat Gamble and May Wong ('the Daredevil International Lady Stunt Motor-Cyclists') and the human freaks in the 'Odditorium'. Heavyweight superstar of the freak show was 54-stone [343 kg] Mexican Rose, 'the world's fattest girl'. A 'Chamber of Horrors' displaying reconstructions of local murders caused controversy and was censored by the police.

Over the 1939/40 summer 2,870,995 people — 200,000 more than the total number who visited the exhibition — spent their pounds and shillings in Playland.

Text derived from an essay by Gavin McLean in Creating a National Spirit: Celebrating New Zealand's Centennial, ed. William Renwick, VUP, 2005.

The Centennial and progress - New Zealand Centennial, 1940

New Zealand grows up

The 1940 Centennial, planned for five years and publicly funded, was a deliberate act of national self-definition by the first Labour government. Labour wanted to unify the country through commemorations of collective achievement and history, and used a variety of devices: historical themes (such as revised versions of the pioneer myths of New Zealand settlement), memorials and a big exhibition. It was a gigantic rewriting of the country's past.

The New Zealand pioneer

Labour ministers had a number of concerns. Some feared that younger New Zealanders had lost the pioneering values and ideals on which these older men liked to think New Zealand had been founded. Complacency had replaced an earlier vitality, they complained. Others felt that an overly imperial mother complex towards Britain had replaced Julius Vogel's erratic but more assertive foreign policy of the 1870s and 1880s.

Those who worried about declining national spirit thought that people needed to rediscover some of the hardiness and resourcefulness of the pioneers. In this stereotype lay a story of courage, industry, vision and faith, a heritage to be celebrated and a source of comfort and inspiration in times of recession and war fever.

As Governor-General Lord Galway preached when laying the Exhibition's commemorative tablet in October 1938, 'the self sacrifices and physical hardships of the early pioneering days must be followed up with continuity of effort, accompanied by corresponding sacrifices in other directions, if necessary to ensure the progress of this fair dominion. I feel sure that the present generation is capable of tackling whatever is demanded of it as effectively as the early pioneers.'

Labour's aspirations went beyond simply paying nostalgic tribute; it wanted to encourage the revival of these imagined qualities.

The spirit of the pioneer was an old national foundation myth, but some modern tweaking was deemed necessary. To make it more relevant, the 'Britishness' of the first immigrants was downplayed in favour of the mythic qualities of the rural New Zealand-born settler. The hope was that this would obscure regional, class and ethnic differences, and simplify the message - the strengths and ideals of the pioneers were part of the make-up of every Pakeha New Zealander.

The other artful modernising of the stereotype was placing the pioneering woman/mother alongside the pioneering man. This was a big advance on earlier times when, for example, groups such as the Otago Early Settlers' Association, who championed the celebration of the first pioneers, had restricted membership to men.

Christianity still found a place in the imagery and the celebrations championed the contribution of the missionaries and the early churchmen to the transformation of the country from a 'pagan, cannibal land' into a 'civilised Christian community'.

A national affair

The Centennial Exhibition in Wellington captured the most attention, but more money was spent constructing monuments and memorials throughout the country, consolidating the image of national unity and collective achievement.

The government preferred utilitarian memorials to purely symbolic ones. Parks, Plunket rooms, rest rooms, community halls and swimming baths added to the image of progress and maturity and reinforced Labour's message that it was pulling New Zealand out of the Depression.

Construction of the Centennial Highway

Some memorials were the very epitome of modernity. While not initially conceived as monuments, in Wellington, the Ngauranga Gorge, Hutt Road, and in particular Coastal Road developments, were rebranded as symbols of progress. At the opening of the Coastal Road in November 1939, much was made of the fact it had been constructed alongside the pre-1848 coastal route. 'How few will realise or ever know as they speed in comfort along the new road of the difficult journeys made by our early mailmen and travellers on foot along this same path and difficulties they encountered', the Evening Post trumpeted.

Not everything went the government's way. Anxious not to lose government funding for projects, Gisborne and Taranaki fell into step with government requirements, but Nelson, Otago and Canterbury, decided to hold back the grandest of their celebrations to the anniversary of their own provincial centenaries, even if that meant digging into their own pockets.

Writing New Zealand's past

By the early 1930s it was also felt that the dominion needed a more thorough historical record of its past. There were books, but most local histories were principally concerned with the pioneers and the building of prosperous communities out of the wilderness. At the professional level, historians who had come of age in the 1930s preferred to write about Empire and New Zealand's 'Englishness' to the neglect of the country's own history. Efforts had been made to give New Zealand history greater prominence in the school curriculum, but without much effect. Academics argued that creating a lectureship in New Zealand history at any university college would only emphasise a narrow and parochial view of history.

With its emphasis on plotting the country's progress over the previous 100 years, the Centennial presented the perfect opportunity for a historical stock-take. Joe Heenan, the Under-Secretary of Internal Affairs, made publications a cornerstone of the celebrations. The flagships were the 11 historical surveys, profiling in detail the evolution of the country since the signing of the Treaty of Waitangi. At the popular level, the pictorial Making New Zealand series, and a raft of journal, periodical and newspaper articles got the message across. These included the 'one hundred years ago' series, which traced the social, economic and religious steps to colonisation, and the 'fifty years ago' pioneer reminiscence. Twenty-six regional and provincial histories were also completed as official memorials.

All in all, the centennial publications broke new ground in stimulating interest in New Zealand history. They ultimately replaced old myths with new. By focussing on European settlement and progress, for example, the centennial publications marginalised Maori history, which was usually limited to a skimpy prologue. There was also little criticism of current government initiatives or processes, presenting instead a history in which state experiments worked harmoniously.

Inevitably, the blatancy of the government's historical re-engineering drew some criticism. The poet Denis Glover got in the best shot:

In the year of Centennial splendours,
There were fireworks and decorated cars,
And pungas drooping from verandas,
- But no-one remembered our failures.

The spirit of progress

In 1940 New Zealanders still thought of themselves as primarily a rural people, dependent economically upon the produce of their farms and distinguished from the old world by their more innocent, less urban way of life. They still suspected that city life made people soft and immoral and that Anglo-Saxon vigour thrived best under the tough conditions of the frontier. By the 1930s, with many of them now townies, that view was becoming less comfortable and doubts were being expressed about the nation's true identity. The Centennial became a way of re-injecting some of the pioneer spirit.

The great contradiction, of course, was that this desire for a revival of the pioneer spirit was not accompanied by any harking after the physical conditions that had given birth to the spirit. The constant contrast of old and new celebrated progress and modernity. The country was a paradise, but it had become so only after progress in the form of the pioneer man had taken his axe to it.

The Treaty of Waitangi - New Zealand Centennial, 1940

The Centennial and Māori

When the Centennial Bill was introduced into Parliament in 1938, the MP for Stratford declared that it provided for the celebration

of one hundred years of progress in this wonderful Dominion....the history of those hundred years is amazing, and one which has never been outshone in any other country. Ours is one of the brightest gems in the Pacific: a real pacific haven away from the troubles of a distracted older world.

'I think we did well that day'

This 'one hundred years of progress' was clearly the celebration of European progress in New Zealand; the Labour government used the opportunity to proclaim and reinforce a national value system. Despite all the talk of the 'birth of a nation', the place of the Treaty of Waitangi or Māori in these celebrations was less obvious.

Heavily directed by the National Centennial Committee, the key Māori contribution to the Centennial centred around the completion of the Whare Runanga on the Waitangi Estate. This was to be a celebration of Māori integration into modern New Zealand. The fact that Māori were 'loyally working to the end of having the Whare Runanga on the Waitangi Estate completed in time for 1940', commented Minister of Internal Affairs William Parry in 1936, 'shows that to them the centennial will be no occasion for mourning an alien conquest, but an occasion for rejoicing.'

A Māori carver demonstrating his skills

Many Europeans saw the Whare Runanga as complementing the Treaty House; together jointly symbolised the apparent strength of New Zealand's race relations. The previous Governor-General, Lord Bledisloe, had seen the Māori decision to build the whare as their testimony to the sincerity of British honour and integrity, but in fact Māori saw it as a reminder to Pakeha that the agreement they had entered into had not been honoured.

Protest at Waitangi

In 1940 many Pakeha shared the views of Parry and Bledisloe. Many Māori, however, including leaders such as Te Puea and the Māori King, Koroki, boycotted the 1940 Waitangi commemorations because of the raupatu, or land confiscations of the nineteenth century, which had not been settled. The celebrations were, one Waikato leader said, but 'an occasion for rejoicing on the part of the pakehas and those tribes who have not suffered any injustices during the past 100 years'.

Ngata leading a haka at Waitangi

Ngāpuhi attended the 1940 ceremony, but displayed red blankets in protest at the compulsory acquisition of what had been deemed 'surplus lands' in Northland. As Sir Apirana Ngata reflected - many Pakeha considered him as a Māori voice of reason and evidence of Māori progress, 'I do not know of any year the Māori people have approached with so much misgiving as this Centennial Year... In retrospect what does the Māori see? Lands gone, the power of chiefs humbled in the dust, Māori culture scattered and broken.'

The protests were largely ignored. Only the positive aspects of Ngata's speech had much interest to the press. For most Pakeha the Treaty was not about obligations not met, but the vehicle for British settlement and government. Cheviot Bell, president of the New Zealand Founders' Society, chose Waitangi Day 1940 to declare that 'What we seek to mark today is the free entry one hundred years ago of the Māori race into the great privilege of membership of the Commonwealth of peoples that we are proud to call the British Empire.' Māori, it seemed, should be grateful, and not dampen Pakeha self congratulation.

Official response was equally clear. Speaking at the official ceremony at Waitangi, Governor-General Lord Galway advised Māori to 'look to the sun and the shadows will fall behind you by way of acknowledging the need to move forward together'. Acting Prime Minister, Peter Fraser also maintained that now was not the time for brooding over ancient wrongs. 'It is more sensible and efficient to try to put them right, and endeavours are repeatedly made to that end. At the close of 100 years we see signs of great progress.'

Māori group performing

The tone of centennial year celebrations was to reinforce the sense of pride in the success of the country's race relations. The Treaty, in the words of Prime Minister Michael Savage, symbolised friendship and the desire of two widely different races to live together in peace. Great effort was made to avoid reference to racial conflict. A proposed centennial survey volume on war was rejected principally because it was not possible to undertake without reference to the New Zealand Wars, and James Cowan's discussion of the Waikato War was cut from the volume on Settlers and Pioneers for the same reason.

Representations of Māori in the centenary celebrations

Overall, three main representations of Māori were employed during the Centennial, all of which supported the theme of progress and the success of European colonisation of New Zealand.

First, the romanticised 'Old-time Māori' was used to give some sense of tradition and mystery to New Zealand's otherwise short history. This ploy was especially marked in the pictorial survey Making New Zealand, the sole issue about Māori was confined to pre-European Māori. At worst, Māori culture was employed in a principally decorative sense, highlighting the superficial character of Pakeha attitudes to Māori culture.

The second theme presented Māori as great explorers, pioneers in their own right, and supposedly giving them kinship with their Anglo-Saxon countrymen, while also validating European colonisation as simply a second wave.

Carvers and builders at the Exhibition

The third and most significant theme explained the progress of Māori from a Stone Age people to modern New Zealanders. This view presented the Treaty and European colonisation as the saviour of Māori, rescuing them from destructive tribal warfare, uniting them and restoring their population through the introduction of European 'civilisation' and 'fair and equitable treatment' by early administrators. Pakeha, not Māori, could claim responsibility for Māori recovery and progress.

Māori were expected to participate in the Centennial on European terms. While the signing of the Treaty was made a national celebration, it was mostly a Pakeha affair. So too were the Waitangi celebrations, with Māori guests limited to 500 people and their role confined largely to entertainment.

Months before, Ngata had complained that 'the centennial year looked easy for the Māori, who could join in national singing the national anthem, but the spectacle of whole tribes stripping for the haka as their ancestors had done seemed to be deprecated'. He joked that 'the only way to show the progress of the Māori in the century was to provide a place at the exhibition where the influence of civilization could be shown by the spectacle of gentlemen in plus fours with a bag of iron sticks going out to fool around acres of grass paddocks'.

The Centennial Exhibition - New Zealand Centennial, 1940

Exhibiting a century

Centennial Exhibition souvenir

The New Zealand Centennial Exhibition ran from 8 November 1939 to 4 May 1940. During this time 2,641,043 people went through the main gates with a daily average attendance of 17,149. The exhibition covered 55 acres (22.2 hectares) of land just to the west of Wellington's airport. After the exhibition closed the buildings were used as extra accommodation by the Air Force. Following the war they were used to store wool. The buildings burned down in September 1946.

New Zealand's commemoration of the 1940 centennial was a major event. The centrepiece was the Centennial Exhibition or fair at Rongotai in Wellington. There was also a large ceremony at Petone on Wellington's anniversary and another at Waitangi on 6 February. Communities throughout the country held pageants as hundreds dressed up in colonial costume, and paraded through the streets. Christchurch's procession on 6 April was two miles long.

Pioneering Spirit

On either side of the central tower at the fair were enormous sculptures of a pioneer man and a pioneer woman. This vision of a people of sterling British stock braving high seas, bush and fierce Maori enemies was at the heart of the pioneer ideal. The intention of the fair was not simply to pay a nostalgic tribute, but even more to encourage a revival of the 'pioneering spirit'.

The success of the Exhibition, and the country's support of it under wartime conditions was also seen as representing the very pioneering spirit and ideals that the Exhibition itself was illustrating. When, following the outbreak of war in Europe in September 1939 the question of postponing the Exhibition arose, it was greeted by heated confrontation on the public front and in Parliament. In the end many decided that the most important thing was to keep up the morale of the 'nation'. To fold in the face of such a challenge was against the very 'national characteristics' that the Exhibition and Centennial were celebrating.

The Exhibition and material progress

The fair was a physical demonstration of the wonders of material progress. The strong lines of the buildings showed the possibilities of modern construction; and the central tower 'symbolised the progress and ambition of the young nation'. The dramatic use of electricity and neon — there were over 37,000 lights expending over a million watts — was a display of the latest source of power. And inside the buildings were endless displays of modern technological wonders. The Dominion Court featured a huge diorama of New Zealand with roads, railways, ports and cities. The miniature transport and city models were out of scale relative to the physical landscape, so exaggerating the human contribution to the land.

Beneath the Dominion Court was a model of the Waitomo Caves, a physical display of 'beautiful New Zealand', illustrating the tension between material progress and natural beauty. The sense of the country as a tourist's paradise was contained in much of the 1940 publicity. William Parry, the minister in charge of the Centennial, encouraged New Zealanders to form a 'strong enduring friendship with forests'.

But most visitors made straight for the Crazy House and roller coaster in Playland. Some visited the Dominion Court and the Waitomo Caves. Perhaps on a third or fourth visit, they might make it to the Government Court, a mammoth display of over 100,000 square feet. There were displays by the Department of Agriculture, Industries and Commerce, and Defence. The Health Department's display was 'The Healthy Family', and included a visit to a walking, talking robot doctor, Dr Wellandstrong.

Women's Rights

Since New Zealand was the first nation of the British Commonwealth to grant women the vote, a women's section was made a special feature.

It included two domestic displays of furniture and household knickknacks, one a pioneer hut and the other an affluent Victorian home. It also displayed women's arts and crafts ranging from drawing to needlework and weaving — very much a genteel middle class ideal.

In the lecture hall each day there was a programme of talks interspersed with dress parades. The talks were on 'the latest developments in the solution of the housewife's many problems', such as 'Picnic and camping dishes', 'Simple meals to satisfy the family', 'Children's fears', 'Summer salads and salad dressing', 'What to do for burns', and 'The art of icing'. These were intelligent and helpful attempts to discuss matters of concern to women, whose boundaries were defined by their domestic role.

The Benevolent State

Another ideal of the exhibition, represented by the Government Court, was the beneficence of government activity. The fair received a substantial investment of £75,000 from the government, which also invested heavily in the Government Court. Government was represented as the supporter and promoter of economic growth and the guarantor of social security. The state was a provider in a spirit of public 'service' and the official guide to the display included a detailed description of the manifold services offered to the people of New Zealand by government departments.

A British Nation

Although the centennial was conceived as a way of reinforcing New Zealand nationalism, it is striking how large a part Britain, the 'mother country', played within this national definition. 1940 signified not just the centenary of the signing of a treaty with Maori, nor a century of settlement and government, but also a hundred years of membership in the British Empire. The first building inside the Exhibition was the United Kingdom Court, and there was barely an opening or an unveiling where either the Governor-General or the British Government's special representative at the centennial, Lord Willingdon, were not present. Willingdon commented shortly before his departure, 'Wherever I have been I have found New Zealand as British as ever before.'

Despite Bill Parry's strenuous efforts to encourage the planting of native trees during the year, when the national flower show opened at the centennial exhibition hall, the British High Commissioner to New Zealand Sir Harry Batterbee commented that it was 'a delight to find in New Zealand flowers that were seen in English gardens because they formed a link between Britain and the Dominion.'

The New Zealand Centennial, 1940

Centennial Exhibition certificate

In 1940 New Zealand celebrated its national coming of age. Maori history and the centenary of the signing of the Treaty of Waitangi took a back seat to the celebration of a century of European effort and progress in New Zealand. Local and provincial events plugged into a full diary of national events - the unveiling of memorials, historical re-enactments, and music and drama festivals. An array of specially commissioned publications recorded the stories of progress, re-writing the country's past.

The jewel in the centennial crown was the vast 55-acre Centennial Exhibition in Wellington. To many New Zealanders, its modern buildings and soaring central tower seemed to symbolise 'the progress and ambition of the young nation'. Others were more interested in the thrills of Playland, the exhibition's big amusement park.