Many of you will know about the visit former US President Jimmy Carter made to Palmerston North in February 1984. Journalist Tina White did a write-up of the event for her Memory Lane column in 2018 [available to read on Manawatū Heritage]. In it she mentions that Carter accepted the request from the police photographer for an impromptu photograph in his hotel room at the Fitzherbert Ave Motor Inn. This photograph has now surfaced and comes with an interesting story!

 

The photographer's son brought in this huge portrait [pencil included for scale as bananas are not allowed in the archives] and said it was one of five prints from that informal and unplanned photo shoot back in 1984. All of the prints were sent to Jimmy Carter. One he kept and four were returned, three signed and one unsigned. The signed versions were given out over the years by the photographer, but this unsigned copy was retained and is now held by the Ian Matheson City Archives. An amazing moment in history is now a little bit easier to picture.

 

Do you have a piece of Palmerston North history to share? Stories large and small can illustrate so much about the history of the city and surrounds. Send an email to heritage@pncc.govt.nz to discuss making a donation to the Ian Matheson City Archives.

The family farm is deep into the hill country north of Whanganui but I grew up in New Plymouth at the beginning of the oil and gas boom in the 1970s.

 

I came here to Massey University as a student in 1978 and never quite left.

 

My training would have been the last of ‘on the job’ before formal university Museum Studies courses. This was with Manawatū Museum director Mina McKenzie who set a high standard and challenged us staff constantly to think about the whys and wherefores of our museum work. I also got to spend an interesting month in 1987 behind the Iron Curtain in Czechoslovakia at an International Museum Studies school.

 

Despite other people’s hopes perhaps, I have never risen to management level. But then I would miss the pleasures of working with the collection objects, never knowing quite what might be offered yet to the museum. I have enjoyed meeting so many people over the years and the long-term friendships developed with them. I hope also that I am remembered kindly by the many students, interns and volunteers whom I have been asked to introduce to the heritage sector.

 

It’s just the right size that a person can make a difference.

 

I am a real bookworm and am to be found religiously at the Red Cross book sale every year stocking up on supplies. But with a bit more free time I will take up roller skating again. If you see a blur passing you on the Pioneer Highway footpath, that might be me.

 

When I told my family years ago I was going to work in a museum with precious breakable objects they burst out laughing. I was the family klutz known for tripping up and dropping things.

 

As Chairwoman of Historic Places Manawatū Horowhenua I am currently seeking a more permanent home for the plaster cherubs which once adorned the old Palmerston North Opera House ceiling. The Opiki bridge and its broken cabling is still a concern to prevent this sagging into the Manawatū river.

 

Three generations of heritage champions: those who have gone such as Mina McKenzie, Merv Hancock and the Palmerston North Teachers College cohort of Jim Lundy, Brian Mather and Margaret Tate.

Our current historians to be found working across many small but vocal heritage committees.

And the new generation of archivists who are preserving our local history and working to put it online.

 

I intend to go urban exploring. There are still so many interesting neighbourhoods and heritage buildings to be discovered by walking the streets of Palmerston North.