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Harry Joseph Beswick
Harry Joseph Beswick (2 May 1860 – 11 April 1934) was Mayor of Christchurch in 1896. Early life Beswick was born in Kaiapoi in 1860, the son of Joseph Beswick. In the mid-1860s, his father was a member of parliament for the Kaiapoi electorate. Beswick Jr received his education at Christ's College in Christchurch. Beswick played rugby union for Christchurch Football Club and also played for the Canterbury representative team. On 25 October 1899, Beswick married Florence Ethel Mills (known as Florence) at St. Matthew's Church in Dunedin. She was the second daughter of James Mills, the founder of the Union Steam Ship Company in Dunedin. Professional life After school, he trained at Harper and Harper, solicitors in Christchurch. Later, he worked for Thomas Duncan and Henry Cotterill; the law firm still exists under the name Duncan Cotterill. Political career John Anderson resigned from Christchurch City Council in mid-April 1894 to visit England. Anderson was succeed ...
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Walter Cooper (mayor)
Walter Henry Cooper ( 1845 – 17 April 1941) was Mayor of Christchurch in 1895, and again in 1897. Born in Somerset, he came to New Zealand early in his life via Australia. A butcher by trade, he later worked in trade and export. He was for many years a member of Christchurch City Council. After his wife died, he lived with his daughter in Victoria, Australia. Early life Cooper was born in Somerset in circa 1845. He emigrated to Australia in 1852 and shortly after that went to New Zealand. Professional life In Christchurch, he joined the firm of Messrs Hopkins and Co., butchers, as their manager. Three years later, he left Hopkins and Co, and bought the business from an estate. He worked in wholesale and export trade until he retired in 1893. Political career Cooper first stood for Christchurch City Council in September 1888, when he defeated Henry Thomson in the North-East Ward. A mayoral election was held on 28 November 1894. The incumbent, Thomas Gapes, stood again and was ...
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John Anderson (New Zealand Engineer)
John Anderson (9 May 1849 – 26 May 1934) was a Scottish-born New Zealand engineer. He played rugby union for West of Scotland during his time in Scotland for his education and represented Scotland internationally. He lived in New Zealand from infancy and together with his brother, took over his father's company. The company flourished under their guidance and became one of New Zealand's largest builder of bridges for roads and rail. Early life Anderson was born at Edinburgh in 1850. His father was John Anderson, who was to become mayor of Christchurch and an influential businessman. His mother was Jane Anderson (née Gibson). The Andersons emigrated to Canterbury in New Zealand at the end of 1850 on , one of the First Four Ships, and settled in Christchurch. His parents, who had married in 1845, had previously lost two children during infancy and it is thought that this contributed to their decision to emigrate; John Anderson Jr. was their only child alive at that point. Anot ...
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1934 Deaths
Events January–February * January 1 – The International Telecommunication Union, a specialist agency of the League of Nations, is established. * January 15 – The 8.0 1934 Nepal–Bihar earthquake, Nepal–Bihar earthquake strikes Nepal and Bihar with a maximum Mercalli intensity scale, Mercalli intensity of XI (''Extreme''), killing an estimated 6,000–10,700 people. * January 26 – A 10-year German–Polish declaration of non-aggression is signed by Nazi Germany and the Second Polish Republic. * January 30 ** In Nazi Germany, the political power of federal states such as Prussia is substantially abolished, by the "Law on the Reconstruction of the Reich" (''Gesetz über den Neuaufbau des Reiches''). ** Franklin D. Roosevelt, President of the United States, signs the Gold Reserve Act: all gold held in the Federal Reserve is to be surrendered to the United States Department of the Treasury; immediately following, the President raises the statutory gold price from ...
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1860 Births
Year 186 ( CLXXXVI) was a common year starting on Saturday (link will display the full calendar) of the Julian calendar. At the time, it was known as the Year of the Consulship of Aurelius and Glabrio (or, less frequently, year 939 ''Ab urbe condita''). The denomination 186 for this year has been used since the early medieval period, when the Anno Domini calendar era became the prevalent method in Europe for naming years. Events By place Roman Empire * Peasants in Gaul stage an anti-tax uprising under Maternus. * Roman governor Pertinax escapes an assassination attempt, by British usurpers. New Zealand * The Hatepe volcanic eruption extends Lake Taupō and makes skies red across the world. However, recent radiocarbon dating by R. Sparks has put the date at 233 AD ± 13 (95% confidence). Births * Ma Liang, Chinese official of the Shu Han state (d. 222) Deaths * April 21 – Apollonius the Apologist, Christian martyr * Bian Zhang, Chinese official and ...
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Christchurch City Libraries
Christchurch City Libraries is operated by the Christchurch City Council and is a network of 21 libraries and a mobile book bus. Following the 2011 Christchurch earthquake the previous Christchurch Central Library building was demolished, and was replaced by a new central library building in Cathedral Square, ''Tūranga'', which opened in 2018. Early history The library began as the Mechanics' Institute in 1859, when 100 subscribers leased temporary premises in the then Town Hall. The collection consisted of a few hundred books. By 1863, with the help of a grant from the Provincial Government, the Mechanics' Institute opened a building on a half-acre of freehold land on the corner of Cambridge Terrace and Hereford Street, purchased the year before at a cost of £262.10.0. This site was to remain the home of the library until 1982. Debt, dwindling subscribers and other problems forced the institute to hand over the building to the Provincial Government in 1873. By this time t ...
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Christchurch Botanic Gardens
The Christchurch Botanic Gardens, located in the central city of Christchurch, New Zealand, were founded in 1863 when an English oak was planted to commemorate the solemnisation of the marriage of Prince Albert and Princess Alexandra of Denmark. The gardens sprawl over an area of 21 hectares and lie adjacent to the loop of the Avon River next to Hagley Park. The Christchurch Botanic Gardens have a variety of collections of exotic and local plants of New Zealand, several conservatories, a nursery, playground and Climatological Station. History *1863 English oak planted for Prince Albert and Princess Alexandra of Denmark's marriage. *1882 International Industrial Exhibition held in South Hagley Park. Acclimatisation Gardens formally opened to the public. *1901 Magnetic Observatory complex constructed in the domain. It is used by explorers Robert Scott and Ernest Shackleton to calibrate their compasses before heading to Antarctica. *1910 First domain fête held, attracting ...
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Ashburton Guardian
The ''Ashburton Guardian'' is a tri-weekly newspaper published in Ashburton, New Zealand according to the Audit Bureau of Circulation in New Zealand it has a readership of approximately 11,000 and a circulation of 5,554. It was founded in 1879 and has since 1900 been owned by the Bell family History According to the Newspaper Publishers Association of New Zealand the ''Ashburton Guardian'' was first published in September 1879. Almost 11,000 editions of the ''Ashburton Guardian'' have been digitised and are available through PapersPast, a service offered by the National Library; those editions cover the period from 1 January 1887 to 31 December 1921. In 2000, the ''Ashburton Guardian'' was the first newspaper in New Zealand to go to a compact format; this was done for the Saturday edition only. In July 2013, the weekday editions also went from broadsheet to compact. The newspaper was a member of the now defunct New Zealand Press Association. Ownership Charles Dixon and Horace ...
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Christchurch (New Zealand Electorate)
Christchurch was a parliamentary electorate in Christchurch, New Zealand. It existed three times. Originally it was the Town of Christchurch from 1853 to 1860. From the 1860–1861 election to the 1871 election, it existed as City of Christchurch. It then existed from the 1875–1876 election until the 1881 election. The last period was from the 1890 election to the 1905 election. Since the 1946 election, a similarly named electorate called Christchurch Central has been in existence. The historic electorate was represented by 21 members of parliament. For some of the time, it was represented by one member at a time. During other periods, it was one of the few three-member electorates in New Zealand. Population centres In December 1887, the House of Representatives voted to reduce its membership from general electorates from 91 to 70. The 1890 electoral redistribution used the same 1886 census data used for the 1887 electoral redistribution. In addition, three-member el ...
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Fred Hobbs
Frederick (Fred) Hobbs (17 December 1841 – 13 May 1920) was Mayor of Christchurch, New Zealand 1874–1877 for two terms; he was the first mayor who served more than one term. He is credited with having made significant improvements to the drainage system, and thus improving health in the wider Christchurch area. Upon his lobbying, The Christchurch District Drainage Act 1875 was passed, and Hobbs became the first chairman of the Christchurch Drainage Board. The family were tailors and the location of their business premises in the north-east quadrant of Cathedral Square gave the area the name of Hobbs' corner. Fred Hobbs commissioned a new building of permanent materials for the site, which became known as Cathedral Chambers and which stood there from the mid-1880s to the 1970s. The locality changed name to Broadway corner, based on the popular café that occupied the first floor; this name is no longer in use in Christchurch. The Hobbs family was known for singing. Fred Hobb ...
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Andrew Duncan (mayor)
Andrew Duncan (1834 – 10 December 1880) was Mayor of Christchurch 1869–1870. From a working-class background in Scotland, he emigrated to New Zealand as a young man and became a highly respected member of the Christchurch community. He is remembered for his later work as an immigration agent in Scotland on behalf of the Canterbury Province. Early life Duncan was born in western Scotland in 1834 to the gardener George Duncan (1791–1866) and his wife Christina. The four members of the Duncan family (the parents with Andrew and his younger sister Agnes) came out to New Zealand in 1858, arriving in Lyttelton on 21 September on the ''Zealandia''. Life in New Zealand Duncan recalled in 1873 that in his early days, he was "not ashamed to turn his hand to whatever employment presented itself". He ploughed, sowed and worked in road construction. He regarded the portion of the Great North Road from the Styx River to Chaneys that he had formed as "one of the best in the colony". For ...
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1895 Christchurch Mayoral Election
The Christchurch mayoral election held on 27 November 1895 was contested by city councillors Howell Widdowson and Harry Beswick. Both candidates were young solicitors with few prior civic roles. Initially, the incumbent mayor— Walter Cooper—was one of the candidates but he withdrew. Widdowson attracted some controversy over the question whether he put his nomination forward ahead of a more senior city councillor; many voters still expected at the time that a mayoralty should be assigned to the most senior councillor. Another important issue for many voters was that Widdowson was a tee-totaller and was thus regarded as a prohibitionist, with Beswick seen as the representative of the liquor lobby. Beswick won the election with a clear majority and was installed as mayor of Christchurch on 18 December 1895. Background and campaign Walter Cooper, the incumbent mayor, had served one term; at the time a mayoral term was one year. Cooper had always maintained that mayors should on ...
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Lyttelton Times
The ''Lyttelton Times'' was the first newspaper in Canterbury, New Zealand, publishing the first edition in January 1851. It was established by the Canterbury Association as part of its planned settlement of Canterbury and developed into a liberal, at the time sometimes seen as radical, newspaper. A successor paper, ''The Star'', is published as a free bi-weekly newspaper. James FitzGerald was the newspaper's first editor, and it was FitzGerald who in 1861 set up its main competitor, ''The Press'', over the ''Lyttelton Times support for the Lyttelton Rail Tunnel. In 1935, it was ''The Press'' that won the competition for the morning newspaper market in Christchurch; the ''Lyttelton Times'' was the oldest newspaper in the country when it ceased that year. History The Canterbury Association was formed in order to establish a colony in what is now the Canterbury Region in the South Island of New Zealand. Part of the plan was to have a newspaper, and a prospectus was published in A ...
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