Hikurangi Memorial Hall

The Hikurangi District War Memorial Hall was built in the 1950s. It includes a Second World War roll of honour board.

The MP for Marsden, D.N. McKay, formally opened the Hikurangi War Memorial Hall on 24 November 1956. He was assisted by Archdeacon C.G. Palmer, the vicar of Whangārei. The building was the town’s old Criterion Theatre, which had been refurbished and given a new façade. The roll of honour unveiled in the hall listed 14 men from the district who had given their lives during the war. (A framed and printed roll of honour listing a total of 116 men and women who served is also held in the Hikurangi Museum.)

In 2014 the Hikurangi RSA commissioned a new First World War roll of honour for the hall. At the same time two names were added to the Second World War roll of honour. The new and updated rolls of honour were unveiled on 23 February 2015.

Sources: ‘Hikurangi Memorial Hall Officially Declared Open’, Northern Advocate, 26/11/1956, p. 3; ‘MP Opens War Memorial Hall for District’, Auckland Star, 26/11/1956; Madge Malcolm, Hikurangi: The Story of a Coalmining Town, Kamo, 1997, pp. 120-2, 209; ‘All names on new Hikurangi memorial’, Northern Advocate, 28/2/2015.