PIONEER WOMEN

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXIII, Issue 22402, 24 April 1936, Page 23

PIONEER WOMEN

EARLY DAY HARDSHIPS WONDERFUL CO-OPERATION Anecdotes and vivid descriptions that presented a moving panorama of the life of New Zealand women from tho earliest days of settlement' wore given yesterday by Mrs. Bertram Lowin, who is •spending a holiday in Now Zealand. Mrs*. Lewin, who now lives in Adelaide, has spent some tiino in tho South Island visiting relatives, and is the guest of Mrs. J. M. Baxter, of Remuera, for a few days. Mrs. Lewin has always taken an enthusiastic interest in tho early women pioneers of tho Dominion, and yesterday related experiences of her girlhood life, her mother's and 'her grandmother's lives with a delightful mixture of humour and admiration. Describing the cooking facilities, Mrs. Lewin traced their evolution from tho camp oven to the colonial oven, then to the wood and coal range, the gas and electric ranges. Lighting, too, she described from tho early use of candles made from mutton fat to keroseno lamps. £as and electricity. •In Wellington and in Auckland tho pleasures wero greater than in the country, but even then they were very few. Women's societies gradually came into existence. Tennyson was at tho height of his poetic career and was at that time worshipped by all. " When I compare our cities with tho cities of the world I know that they are half-grown and incomplete, but when I-compare them with tho pioneer days that 1 and tho rest of my family have known they have progressed out of recognition," said Mrs. Lewin. She said that it was the poverty, the will to do and to achieve, and the adventurous spirit of the younger ones that made that progress possible. The women in thoso days had earned the admiration and the respect of all women to-day for a co-operation that was not only spiritual but also practical. They had worked with their hands willingly.