Times
Emilia Maude Nixon in her Garden of Memories c1960.
Miss Emilia Maude Nixon of Uxbridge Road, Howick, valued the recommendation of Lord Bledisloe, the former Governor-General of New Zealand, that we should follow the practice of open-air museums of Scandinavia by recording the history of Maori and pakeha in Aotearoa.
In 1935 she developed the “Garden of Memories” honouring Ngai Tai and settlers of Owairoa [later called Howick] “to promote understanding, harmony and goodwill between all people.”
Miss Nixon recognised the importance of The Treaty of Waitangi and that it was signed not far away by the Tamaki River.
She wrote to the Mayor of Auckland City, Sir John Allum, who on March 4, 1953, unveiled a plaque at Karaka Bay commemorating the 17 Maori who signed the Treaty there on March 4, 1840.
Distinguished historian Claudia Orange says recent Treaty settlements form a revolutionary pathway towards true partnership in Aotearoa. In an extract from the up-to-date edition of her award-winning book
The Treaty of Waitangi / Te Tiriti o Waitangi: An Illustrated History, she vividly describes the gathering and debate at Waitangi on the day before rangatira began to sign the Treaty.
OPINION: Letters, reports and diaries left by officials and missionaries provide a good record of the events of 5 and 6 February. From early on the 5th, Māori groups began to arrive. The waters of the Bay of Islands came alive with waka converging from all directions, each with thirty or more paddlers keeping time to the stroke. Settlers’ boats joined the stream, and the ships anchored offshore had all their flags flying.