Today in History
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Historic NZ events in December
Dec
1
1933 First flight from North Cape to Bluff
22-year-old pilot E.F. 'Teddy' Harvie and his passenger, 18-year-old Miss Trevor Hunter, set a record for the longest flight within New Zealand in a single day. They completed the 1880 km journey in 16 hrs 10 mins. more...
Dec
2
1917 'Six o'clock swill' begins
Six p.m. closing of pubs was introduced as a 'temporary' wartime measure. It ushered in what became know as the 'six o'clock swill', as patrons aimed to get their fill before closing time. The practice lasted for the next 50 years. more...
Dec
3
1960 Bluff Island Harbour opened
The 40-hectare (100-acre) man-made Island Harbour, eight years in the making, is the centrepiece of the modern port facilities at Bluff, the southern-most commercial deepwater port in New Zealand. more...
1863 Land confiscation law passed
This law allowed for the confiscation (Raupatu) of Maori land as punishment of those North Island tribes who were deemed to have been in rebellion against the British Crown in the early 1860s. New settlers would be introduced onto confiscated lands. more...
Dec
4
1966 Radio Hauraki rules the waves
The state monopoly on commercial radio broadcasting was challenged by the pirate station Radio Hauraki's first scheduled transmission from the vessel Tiri in the Colville Channel. more...
Dec
5
1890 First 'one man one vote' election
From the 1890 election no New Zealander could vote in more than one district, ending the longstanding practice of 'plural voting' by those who owned property in more than one electorate. more...
Dec
6
1935 First Labour government takes office
The first Labour government assumed office as a result of its landslide victory in November's general election. Led initially by the charismatic Michael Joseph Savage, this government is best remembered for its significant social welfare reforms. more...
Links
- The first state house - state housing in New Zealand
- Michael Joseph Savage
- Michael Joseph Savage
- The history of the Labour Party (Labour Party)
- Liberal to Labour (Te Ara)
- Social Security: scope of 1938 legislation (1966 encyclopaedia)
- Labour Party (1966 encyclopaedia)
- Michael Joseph Savage biography (DNZB)
Dec
7
1963 Bassett Road machine-gun murders
The bullet-ridden bodies of Frederick George Walker and Kevin James Speight were found in a house at 115 Bassett Road, Remuera. Ron Jorgensen and John Gillies were convicted of the killings. more...
Dec
8
1942 Fire at Seacliff Mental Hospital kills 37
The fire that swept through Ward 5 of the Seacliff Mental Hospital, near Dunedin, killed 37 female patients. Most of the windows in the ward were locked and could only be opened by a key from inside. more...
1941 New Zealand declares war on Japan
New Zealand's declaration followed the surprise attack on the United States naval base at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii. Japan also invaded the Philippines, Malaya and Thailand. more...
Dec
9
1899 NZ troops fire first shots during South African War
Having answered the Empire's call to arms against the breakaway Boer states in South Africa, New Zealand troops fired their first shots in anger in northern Cape Colony. more...
Dec
10
1908 Rutherford wins Nobel Prize in Chemistry
Ernest Rutherford's discoveries about the nature of atoms shaped modern science and paved the way for nuclear physics. Einstein referred to him as a 'second Newton' who had ‘tunneled into the very material of God'. more...
1962 Wilkins wins Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine
New Zealand-born Maurice Wilkins and his colleagues James Watson and Francis Crick shared the prize for their studies on the structure of deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA), the genetic molecule found in all organisms. more...
Dec
11
1907 Parliament's library escapes great fire
Old wooden buildings and books were a highly combustible combination, and many colonial library collections went up in flames. When a great fire swept through most of Parliament Buildings in 1907, the General Assembly Library had a narrow escape. more...
1931 Statute of Westminster passed
The British Parliament passed the Statute of Westminster, confirming the complete autonomy of its six Dominions. Australia and New Zealand held back from adopting this status, but in 1947 New Zealand became the last of the Dominions to do so. more...
Dec
12
1961 First Golden Kiwi lottery draw
The Golden Kiwi lottery replaced the euphemistically named ‘art union'. The government saw this new lottery, with its bigger prizes, as a way to regain the ground that had been lost to more glamorous overseas lotteries. more...
1769 De Surville first sights NZ near Hokianga
As James Cook rounded the northern tip of the North Island, the French explorer Jean François Marie de Surville was in the same waters. A storm prevented an historic meeting with Cook. more...
Dec
13
1939 Battle of the River Plate
The cruiser HMS Achilles goes into action against the German 'pocket battleship' Admiral Graf Spee, becoming the first New Zealand warship to take part in a naval battle.
more...
1642 First recorded European sighting of NZ
Towards noon the Dutch explorer Abel Tasman sighted 'a large land, uplifted high'. What he saw was most likely the Southern Alps, perhaps the peaks of Aoraki/Mt Cook and Mt Tasman. more...
Dec
14
1843 First Auckland A and P Show
The Agricultural and Pastoral show aimed to demonstrate excellence in agriculture and animal husbandry. These shows became an annual event in communities throughout New Zealand. more...
Dec
15
1944 Poll tax on Chinese immigrants abolished
The Finance Act (No. 3) abolishes the poll tax, introduced in 1881, which is described by Minister of Finance Walter Nash as a 'blot on our legislation'. more...
1951 Belmont viaduct blown up
The 38-metre-high railway viaduct, near Johnsonville, Wellington, was first built in 1885 but had not been used since 1937. It was demolished by Army engineers as a training exercise. more...
Dec
16
1905 All Black's 'non-try' hands Wales historic win
A great rugby rivalry was born when a last-minute try to All Black Bob Deans was disallowed, handing the Welsh victory. The incident remains a source of debate amongst rugby fans of both nations. more...
Dec
17
1773 Ten crew of Cook's ship Adventure killed and eaten
At Wharehunga Bay, Queen Charlotte Sound, 10 men who were with Cook's navigator Tobias Furneaux died at the hands of Ngati Kuia and Rangitane. more...
1944 Major Major, mascot of 19 Battalion, dies of sickness
Major Major, No. 1 Dog, 2NZEF, and member/mascot of 19 Battalion since 1939, died of sickness in Italy. He was buried with full military honours at Rimini. more...
Dec
18
1642 First contact between Maori and Europeans
On the evening of 18 December Abel Tasman and his men had the first known European encounter with Maori. Although this initial meeting was peaceful, misunderstanding and fear soon led to violence. more...
Dec
19
1915 The evacuation of Suvla Bay
In a well-planned operation which contrasted sharply with those mounted earlier in the campaign, the troops were successfully withdrawn on 19 and 20 December. more...
Dec
20
1913 Waterfront strike ends
The Great Strike of 1913, which had begun in late October when Wellington waterside workers stopped work, finally ended when the United Federation of Labour (UFL) conceded defeat. more...
Dec
21
1971 Full steam ahead for Kingston Flyer
A few months after the last steam locomotives had been withdrawn from this country's scheduled rail operations, New Zealand Railways launched a new tourist-oriented steam passenger venture in the South Island. more...
1964 NZ whalers harpoon their last victim
More than 170 years of New Zealand whaling history ended when J. A. Perano and Company caught its last whale off the coast near Kaikoura. more...
Dec
22
1916 Future PM Fraser charged with sedition
Peter Fraser's trial at the Wellington Magistrates' Court was the sequel to an anti-conscription speech. A number of union leaders were charged with the same crime. He was convicted and served 12 months in gaol. more...
Dec
23
1953 Queen Elizabeth II arrives for summer tour
For those New Zealanders who are old enough to have experienced it, the visit of the young Queen and her dashing husband, Prince Philip, in the summer of 1953-4 is a never-to-be forgotten event. more...
Dec
24
1953 Tangiwai railway disaster
The worst railway disaster in New Zealand's history occurred on Christmas Eve 1953, when the Wellington-Auckland night express plunged into the flooded Whangaehu River at Tangiwai. Of the 285 people on board, 151 were killed. more...
Dec
25
1814 NZ's first Christian service?
At Oihi Beach in the Bay of Islands, Marsden preached in English to a largely Maori gathering, launching the Christian missionary phase of New Zealand history. more...
Dec
26
1879 Sectarian violence in Canterbury
In Christchurch, 30 Irishmen attacked an Orange procession with pick-handles, while in Timaru 150 men from Thomas O'Driscoll's Hibernian Hotel surrounded Orangemen and prevented their procession taking place.
more...Dec
27
1987 Rewi Alley dies
Rewi Alley, friend of China, died of heart failure and cerebral thrombosis at his Beijing residence, aged 90. A few weeks earlier, Alley had celebrated his birthday with Communist Party leader Zhao Ziyang. more...
Dec
28
1929 'Black Saturday' - NZ police open fire in Apia
New Zealand had been granted a mandate over the former German colony following the First World War. Growing Samoan calls for independence came to a head during a Mau demonstration in Apia which left twelve people dead. more...
Links
- Influenza hits Samoa
- Black Saturday - NZ in Samoa
- Group photograph of leaders and committee of the Women's Mau (National Library)
- Chief Tupua Tamesese lies in state (Te Ara)
- Robert Logan biography (DNZB)
- George Richardson biography (DNZB)
- Stephen Allen biography (DNZB)
- Mau movement (Wikipedia)
- The Mau (NZETC)
Dec
29
1880 Tuhiata hanged for murder of Mary Dobie
Tuhiata, or Tuhi, was hanged in Wellington for the murder of the artist Mary Dobie at Te Namu Bay, Opunake. Tuhi wrote to the Governor days before his execution asking that ‘my bad companions, your children, beer, rum and other spirits die with me'. more...
Dec
30
1835 Charles Darwin leaves NZ after 9-day visit
Darwin's visit to the Bay of Islands on HMS Beagle was brief and unspectacular from his viewpoint. The Beagle's captain, Robert FitzRoy, would later serve as Governor of New Zealand. more...
Dec
31
1853 Grey leaves NZ after first term as Governor
During his first term as Governor, Grey was praised for ending the Northern War but also angered settlers by delaying the implementation of a constitution giving them political power. more...
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