Research Notes

Turnbull Library Record, Volume 30, 1 January 1997, Page 87

Research Notes

From 17 June 1996 to 9 August 1996, the National Library hosted a two-month Library Attachment (Special Collections) for Mr Solomon Andili, a trained librarian at the National Library of Papua New Guinea. The training grant was arranged through NZODA (New Zealand Official Development Assistance). His local knowledge was put to good effect, in updating and enhancing the descriptions of library materials from Papua New Guinea, especially the language books and photographs in the collection. Ratu Sela Vuinakasa Rayawa, Librarian at the Fij i Museum, was granted a two-week NZODA Library Attachment at the National Library, from 29 July 1996 to 9 August 1996, one week of which was spent in the Alexander Turnbull Library. He was able to provide staff with additional information about resources and sources in Fiji, and Fijian materials in the collections.

July 1996 saw the return of Professor Abigail Van Slyck, the Assistant Professor at the College of Architecture, University of Arizona, Tucson, who was a Lulbright Scholar at the Library in 1993. She was the guest curator of the exhibition Knowledge is Power: Carnegie Libraries in New Zealand , mounted in the National Library Gallery from 12 July to 3 November 1996, and described in Off the Record, 1996. Staff were delighted to see Professor Van Slyck again, and to hear her illustrated public talk about Carnegie libraries in New Zealand on 12 July 1996. She also gave a public tour of the exhibition on 17 July 1996, and a special tour for Library staff on 19 July 1996. Almost half the users of the Printed Ephemera Collection are pictorial researchers and half those seeking textual information. There are now several hundred records for pictorial items on the TAPUHI database and an increase in New Zealand Bibliographic Network (NZBN)/ Integrated Library System (ILS) records for text items. Researchers have included staff from Wellington Polytechnic collecting images for a course on the history of graphic design, a staff member searching for images for the CD-ROM New Zealand Encyclopedia, several researchers looking at the way Maori were depicted on tourist publications, and researchers using early New Zealand Labour Party pamphlets, and Vietnam protest pamphlets. A display of some of the Ephemera Collection’s protest posters called / protest attracted some attention from the press and public in February and March 1997.

A unique copy of the ‘sixth’ edition of John Bunyan’s Pilgrim’s Progress, bound with the spurious Second Part of the Pilgrim 's Progress , both published in Edinburgh in 1696, has been generously loaned to the Library for microfilming. The original remains in private ownership in New Zealand. A welcome increase has been made in the use of the Special Printed Collections by both staff and students of Victoria University of Wellington (Library and Information Studies, History, and English Literature), Massey University (English Literature, History) and Wellington

Polytechnic (Design). Awareness of the value of these collections for both research and teaching continues to be encouraged. An exhibition titled Subsequent Positions was mounted in the Library’s foyer from November 1996 to January 1997. It comprised works by eight New Zealand poets, visually interpreted by Tara McLeod and printed by letterpress on blocks of paper handmade by John Mitchell. The Library has acquired the Illustrated Incunabula Short Title Catalogue on CD-ROM, which provides detailed access to the growing collection of microfiche editions of pre-1501 books produced by the Incunabula project. These microfiche resources are available on interloan.

The 1997 National Library Fellow (from April 1997 until March 1998) is Margot Fry, who was a teaching assistant in the History Department at Victoria University of Wellington, and who has been working on a history of the National Film Unit. The subject of her Fellowship project is how nineteenth-century men living in New Zealand regarded relationships and family. She is centring her research on the correspondence between Thomas King and his wife Mary, written in 1854, when Thomas was in Auckland and Mary was residing temporarily in Nelson during the New Zealand wars. This topic is also the basis of her article elsewhere in this issue. A report from Margot Fry, and last year’s Fellow, Philip Temple, was published in the New Zealand Historical Association Newsletter , June 1997, pp. 14-16.

Former National Library Fellows have published or will publish the following books, based on their research in the Library: Rory Sweetman, the first (1988) Fellow, published his book on Archbishop Liston, Bishop in the Dock: The Sedition Trial of James Liston, through Auckland University Press, Auckland, in 1997. Margaret Scott, the second (1989) Fellow, will have her meticulous transcriptions and research on Katherine Mansfield’s journals and notebooks published in two volumes in September 1997, by Daphne Brasell Publishers, Wellington. Michael King, the 1990 Fellow, published Frank Sargeson: A Life, through Viking/ Penguin, Auckland, in 1995. Adrienne Simpson, the 1991 Fellow, published Opera’s Farthest Frontier: A History of Professional Opera in New Zealand, through Reed, Auckland, in 1996.

Robert Headland, Archivist, Curator and Historian of the Scott Polar Research Institute, Cambridge, was at the Library in June 1997 to use Antarctic collections in connection with his research on an Antarctic chronology, looking at C.W. Poynter’s manuscript log ‘His Majesty’s hired brig “Williams” on discovery towards the South Pole, 1819-1820’ (which is discussed elsewhere in this issue), and a recently acquired drawing of the Astrolabe caught in pack-ice in 1838. Researchers may be interested to know that Manuscripts and Archives now hold photocopies of all the current handouts of the Scott Polar Research Institute.

A small foyer display was organised relating to David Alexander De Maus (1847-1925). De Maus was a colourful personality who eventually served as Mayor of Port Chalmers for four terms between 1899 and 1913. He was a professional photographer, a comic entertainer, composer of humorous songs and an inveterate community worker. On display were items reflecting his varied activities and included his version of‘God Defend New Zealand’, with words by Thomas Bracken, possibly composed as an entry in the 1876 contest for the best national hymn for New Zealand.

In November 1996 Steven Chrisp was appointed to the position of Coordinator, Maori Language Collections. The primary function of this position is to enhance access to the Maori language material held in the Library. Steven has been working in the Manuscripts and Archives section on the unique Maori language material available. He has enhanced the records of the New Zealand Maori Purposes Funds Board, the Colenso Maori letters, the Ben Keys papers and the Maori language material in the Polynesian Society collection, among other things.

In response to public and internal requests, over 10,000 images from the Turnbull Library collections were copied during the last financial year by Image Services. The service is able to offer customers a wide range of products, from black and white laser copies or colour digital photographs, to digital images on disk. The largest customer group, publishers, have requested images of Turnbull Library collection material for publications, television documentaries and interactive CD-ROMs. Timeframes , New Zealand’s Heritage in Pictures, was launched on the Internet in February 1997. The site went live with 1,000 images from the pictorial collections of the Turnbull Library. Images are continually added to Timeframes. By 30 June 1997 over 2,500 images were available for browsing, searching and printing low resolution images. It is expected the target of 5,000 images online by December 1997 will be reached, and for the year 2000 the goal set is 25,000 images. Timeframes is proving popular with school libraries and individuals, who are able access the heritage collections without coming to the National Library in Wellington. The public also have use of PC’s at the Pictorial Reference Service, to search the Timeframes site when they are at the Library. In the month of March 1997 a total of 2,157 different computers visited the site of which 1,220 were from New Zealand and 937 were international visitors - an average of 540 visitors a week in the first full month of the site being made live. Timeframes is available on the Internet at the following address: http://timefirames.natlib.govt.nz/ (user name: timeframes; password: images).

Niupepa 1842-1933, Maori Newspapers on Microfiche , released this year, contains 35 titles of periodicals published predominantly in Maori. Seventy percent of the content is Maori and 30 percent bilingual. The titles are presented on close to 400 fiche, and are accompanied by a guide. This resource has proved to be a popular release for researchers. The Photographic Archive has experienced a considerable increase in use over the past year. Between October 1996 and June 1997 the number of clients grew by seventy-six percent over the same period in the previous year. This reflects the increased accessibility of the collection since the installation of the public access online catalogues (OPACs) in the Pictorial

Reference Service and other pictorial sections, and the inauguration of Timeframes. The growing use of e-mail and the Internet, both as a medium for enquiries and a source of information, has been particularly noticeable. Areas of interest to researchers over the past year have been the Pacific islands, the subAntarctic Islands, and the professional theatre in New Zealand. The collections have also been extensively used in the preparation of exhibitions, both inside and outside the Library. Photographs were lent to the Wellington City Gallery for the exhibition honouring the jubilee of the Wellington Architectural Centre.

Over the past three years the Library has acquired over 6,500 original cartoons, strengthening holdings for the 1950 s and 60s (Neil Lonsdale’s work) and the 1970 s and 80s (Nevile Lodge and Eric Heath’s work). Many of these cartoons have been entered on the TAPUHI database, and some are available as images on Timeframes, supplemented by photocopies accessible for quick reference in Pictorial Reference Service.

Two TAPUHI development projects are being undertaken in the 1997/1998 year; the continuation of the development of the present online public access catalogue (OPAC) on the Internet and the creation of a TAPUHI database for Oral History. The current TAPUHI public access database was developed at the end of 1996 to improve access to the existing Manuscripts and Archives OPAC, and to include access to the pictorial collections. This involved shifting the OPAC onto an Internet site which is available within the research areas of the Turnbull Library. A project is underway to enable the TAPUHI database to be accessible outside the Library, and it is hoped that this will be completed by April of 1998. TAPUHI is also being developed to improve access to recordings of interviews and events held in the Oral History Centre. Until recently the oral history collection had been catalogued on the National Library’s Kiwinet database, but was not available for public access. Once this project is completed, details of oral history recordings will be available from the same database as the rest of the Library’s unpublished collections, and researchers will be able to do their own searches online. It is hoped this extension of TAPUHI will be available to researchers by the end of March 1998.