ISSN: 1175 4222 ENNZ: Environment and Nature in New Zealand · ENNZ: Environment and Nature in New...

ISSN:1175‐4222

ENNZ:EnvironmentandNatureinNewZealand

Volume8,Number1,November2013

ENNZ: Environment and Nature in New Zealand

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AboutusENNZ provides a forum for debate on environmental topicsthroughtheacceptanceofpeerreviewedandnon‐peerreviewedarticles, aswell as book and exhibition reviews and postings onupcomingevents,includingconferencesandseminars.ContactIf you wish to contribute articles or reviews of exhibitions orbooks,pleasecontact:Dr.PaulStar,246HaringtonPointRoad,RD2Dunedin9077,NewZealand.Ph:[email protected]

Dr.PaulStarFoundingeditor

Dr.JamesBeattieAssociateeditors

Dr.ClaireBrennan Dr.CharlesDawson OndineGodtschalk Dr.CatherineKnight Dr.JulianKuzma Dr.MattMorris Dr.JonathanWest Dr.JoanneWhittle


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ENNZwebsite

http://environmentalhistory‐au‐nz.org/category/ennz

Publisher HistoryProgramme, UniversityofWaikato, PrivateBag3105, Hamilton3240, NewZealand.Thanks

Thanks to Dr. Libby Robin and Cameron Muir, both of theAustralian National University, and the Fenner School ofEnvironmentandSocietyforhostingthissite.

ISSN:1175‐4222.


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Contents

5 PaulStar,‘Editor’sintroduction’.

7 JoWhittle, ‘Into the backyard: Huntly Power Station andthehistoryofenvironmentalisminNewZealand’.

39 IanTyrrell,‘ReviewEssay:BernhardGissibl,SabineHöhlerand Patrick Kupper (editors), Civilizing Nature: NationalParksinGlobalHistoricalPerspective’.

49 BillHowie,‘Landmarks:Cumberland’smagnumopus?’.

59 Andrew Gregg, ‘Leonard Cockayne: A most enthusiasticgardener’.

64 Simon Nathan, ‘Collections of letters written by or aboutJamesHector’.

67 Julian Kuzma, ‘Review: Peter Hayden and RodMorris,AnExtraordinary Land: Discoveries and Mysteries fromWildNewZealand’.

70 Ian Tyrrell, ‘Review: James Beattie, Empire andEnvironmental Anxiety: Health, Science, Art andConservationinSouthAsiaandAustralasia,1800‐1920’.


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Editor’sintroduction

PaulStar

November2013seesthelaunchofMakingaNewLand,editedbyEric Pawson and Tom Brooking and published by OtagoUniversityPress: anotableevent,particularly since this remainsthe only example of a book devoted exclusively toNewZealandenvironmentalhistoryinallitsaspects.Whilemarketedasanewedition of Environmental Histories of New Zealand, published adecadeagobyOxfordUniversityPress,Melbourne,athirdofthechapters inMakingaNewLandarealtogethernew,and the rest(except in two cases inwhich the authors havedied) havebeensubjecttocarefulrevision.

In both editions, in the chapter on New Zealand environmentallaw, NicolaWheen repeats the common understanding that ‘thegrowingpoliticisationof the environment…waskick‐startedbythe Manapouri controversy’. Nowhere in the book is therementionofthedebatesurroundinganotherpowerschemeofthesameperiod,intheWaikatoregion.Inthefirstarticleinthisissueof ENNZ, Jo Whittle meticulously analyses the lead‐up toconstruction of Huntly Thermal Power Station, convincinglyshowing (to again quote Nicola) that ‘The impact of Manapourishouldnotbeunderestimatedbutmustbeplacedincontext’.

InNewZealand’senvironmentalhistory,notonlysomeeventsbutalso some people have received less mention than is their due.Last year, when reviewing Neville Peat’s biography of LanceRichdale for ENNZ, I instanced five other individuals who had‘studied,spokenuporcaredfor’NewZealand’senvironment,butwhose biographies have yet to be written. Since then, someprogress has been made in each case, and the present issue ofENNZ includes three interim results: Bill Howie assesses thecontinuing significance of Kenneth Cumberland’s Landmarks;Andrew Gregg details the themes to be highlighted in hisbiography of Leonard Cockayne; and Simon Nathan describespreparatory work on the transcription of James Hector’scorrespondence.


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Inaddition,ImyselfamreturningtomaterialaboutThomasPotts,gathered over more years than I care to mention, and ColinMiskelly, Te Papa’s Curator of Terrestrial Vertebrates, continuesto follow ‘in the footstepsofEdgarStead’. Wheneverhehas thechance, Colin travels to the offshore islands visitedby this earlyCanterbury naturalist, re‐taking Stead’s photos from the samephoto‐point and noting ecological changes that have occurredsince Stead’s time. The fascinating results can be found atblog.tepapa.govt.nz

This issueofENNZalsocontainsthreereviews,oneofapopularwork and two of books of an academic nature. Ian Tyrrell’sconsiderationofavolumeontheworld’snationalparksranksasa‘reviewessay’, sincehis commentsprovidea valuable summaryof information on one of the fundamental ideas studied byenvironmental historians. Not enough work on New Zealand’senvironmental history is comparative. This essay only brieflymentionsNewZealand’snationalparks,butsurelysuggestshowmuch our study of them would gain from describing theirdevelopmentmorefirmlywithinaglobalcontext.

James Beattie, in Empire and Environmental Anxiety (which Ianalso reviews in this issue) seeks out the global context whendiscussing,amongothersubjects,thecourseofforestrypracticeinnineteenth‐centuryNewZealand.Similarly,wheneverafullstudyisattemptedof therelationshipsbetweenNewZealand’s ‘energyhistory’,environmentandenvironmentalism,let’shopethatitwillcompare(forinstance)notonlythedebatesaboutManapouriandHuntly within this country, but also the interchange of ideasbetween those opposing theManapouri hydro scheme and theircounterparts in Tasmania who, at much the same time,unsuccessfullyopposedthefloodingofLakePedder.


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Intothebackyard:HuntlyPowerStationandthehistoryofenvironmentalisminNewZealand

JoWhittle1

Introduction

The 1000 megawatt (MW) Huntly Thermal Power Station wasbuilt on the lowerWaikato River from 1973 to 1983. It is thelargest thermal power scheme in New Zealand and itsconstruction brought enormous changes to the small town ofHuntlyandthesurroundingrural landscape. Thepowerschemewas constructed in an area that few people considered to bescenic and its construction did not provoke a national‐scaleenvironmentalprotest.ThispartoftheWaikatoregion,however,wasaplacewheremanypeoplelivedandworkedandwheretheyfished, boated and swam. At Huntly a small number of groupsattempted to use the new language of environmentalism toarticulate theirownviewsof the impacts that thepower stationwould have on the local area and in particular on the WaikatoRiver. Their representations helpedmake tangible to thewidercommunity an invisible landscape of water and air pollution,therebyforcingsubtlechangesintheoperationofthecompletedpower station. They strongly asserted that the impacts onpeople’s lives of a big development schemewere relevantwhenconsidering environmental impacts, and used nascent formalenvironmental planning processes to articulate culturalconnectionswiththelandandtheriver.

The 1969 to 1972 campaign against raising the levels of LakesManapouri and Te Anau in Fiordland is commonly accepted asNewZealand’s firstnationalenvironmentalcampaign. Whilenotseeking to negate the importance of that campaign this articlechallenges its singularity in New Zealand’s environmental andenvironmentalist histories. The widespread protest againstdevelopment at Manapouri was predominantly a scenerypreservation campaign that was also shaped by an emerging 1 Dr. Jo Whittle works as a research officer at Southern Institute ofTechnology,Invercargill.ThisarticleisbasedonpartofherthesisElectricLandscapes: Electricity and Environment in New Zealand, 1902 to 1980,completedin2011.


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popular ecological and environmental consciousness. Occurringat almost the same time, controversy over the Huntly PowerScheme was conducted in terms of potential environmentalimpacts expressed within the framework of newly createdenvironmental planning procedures. Events at Huntly had aconsiderable influence on the development of environmentalpolicy and therefore merit inclusion in the history of theemergenceofenvironmentalisminNewZealand.

Electricitydevelopmentintheenvironmentalera

TheHuntly Thermal Power Station is highly visible to travellerson State Highway One between Auckland and Hamilton. Thepowerstationwasbuilt from1973to1983andwasdesignedtoburn both coal and gas. From the late 1960s, as commerciallyviable sites for further hydro‐electricity development werebecoming scarce, government power planners focused theirattentiononthermalgenerationasawaytomeetincreasingpeakelectricity demand.2 With a maximum capacity of 1000 MWHuntlyisthelargestpowerschemeinthecountry,andgeneratesmore electricity than all the hydro‐electric schemes on theWaikatoRiver combined.3 A large, angular edificewith two tallchimneys, the station is starkly conspicuous among greenpaddocks on thewestern bank of theWaikato River. Cross theriver,andtheimpactsofthepowerstationonthesmalltownshipof Huntly and on the neighbouring Waahi Marae become moreobvious. Itwasbuilt inanenvironment thatwasalreadyhighlymodified, among farmland and coal‐mining communities at a

2 John E. Martin (ed), People, Politics and Power Stations: Electric PowerGeneration inNewZealand1880‐1998,2ndedn,Wellington,1998,pp140‐41.LargeelectricitygeneratingschemesbuiltinNewZealandthroughthegreaterpartofthetwentiethcenturywereconstructedandoperatedbythecentral government. The government also built and operated thetransmission network or National Grid. Local distribution was theresponsibility of publicly owned electric power boards and municipalelectricitydepartments.

3HuntlyPowerStationremainsthelargestsinglegeneratingstationinNewZealand,providingupto20%ofthecountry’selectricity. Additionalunitscommissionedduringthe2000s increasedmaximumoutputof thestationto1,448MW. GenesisEnergy, ‘HuntlyPowerStation’,online, availableathttp://www.genesisenergy.co.nz(20January2012).


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point on the Waikato where the river already served multiplepurposes includingwater supply,water disposal and recreation.Concerns about the Huntly proposal were largely localised innature, of issue to shop‐keepers, coal miners, farmers and localMaori.4

Previous studies of the emergence of environmentalism in NewZealand have focused on the history of nature conservation,5 inwhich story the Save Manapouri Campaign is accorded iconicstatusasthefirstandmostinfluentialenvironmentalcampaigninNewZealand.6 From1969 to 1972Manapouriwas the focus ofNew Zealand’s most renowned environmental campaign, duringwhichasignificantcross‐sectionofsocietywasmovedtoprotest

4TheimpactsofthepowerstationontheHuntlyareaandinparticularonthe Maori community were researched during the 1970s and 1980s. Ofparticularnote,TomFookesof theUniversity ofWaikato School of SocialSciencespublishedaseriesofreportsandworkingpapersonthesocialandeconomicimpactsofthepowerschemeonHuntly. Seealso:A.R.Ngaparu,‘Adiscussionon theplanningof publicworks in relation toMaorimarae,usingWaahiMaraeHuntly as a case study’,ResearchEssay,University ofAuckland, 1978; Evelyn Stokes, Coal Mining Settlements of the HuntlyRegion,HuntlySocialandEconomic ImpactMonitoringProject,UniversityofWaikato,WorkingPaperNo.9,Hamilton,November1978;UniversityofWaikatoCentreforMaoriStudiesandResearch,HeAaronganaTainui:MoNgaaMahiWhakatuutuuWharehikoIRotooWaikato. TheDevelopmentofCoal‐Fired Power Stations in theWaikato:AMaori Perspective, Centre forMaori Studies andResearch,University ofWaikato,Hamilton1984; PeterHorsley, ‘Recentresourceuseconflicts inNewZealand:Maoriperceptionsand the evolving environmental ethic,’ in Peter Hay et al (eds),EnvironmentalPoliticsinAustraliaandNewZealand,Hobart,1989.5 Forexample:DavidYoung,Matahina:Power in theLand. TheStoryofaHydro Dam in a Dynamic Landscape, Wellington, 1998; Ross Galbreath,Working for Wildlife: A History of the New Zealand Wildlife Service,Wellington,1993;GeoffPark,NgaUruora[TheGrovesofLife]:EcologyandHistoryinaNewZealandLandscape,Wellington,1995.

6RogerWilson,FromManapouritoAramoana:TheBattleforNewZealand'sEnvironment, Auckland, 1982, p 10; Michael King,The PenguinHistory ofNewZealand,Auckland,2003,p441;DavidYoung,OurIslands,OurSelves:AHistory of Conservation in New Zealand, Dunedin, 2004, p 168; NicolaWheen, ‘AhistoryofNewZealandenvironmental law’, inEricPawsonandTom Brooking (eds),EnvironmentalHistories ofNew Zealand, Melbourne,2002,pp261‐74,p261.


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against the potential damage to the scenic beauty of LakesManapouri and TeAnau in Fiordland from government plans toraise lake levels as part of the hydro‐electric power scheme.Scholars have made large claims for the influence of theManapouricampaignonthedevelopmentofenvironmentalpolicyand resourcemanagement legislation.7 ‘The trends for the twodecadesafter1965maybesummedupinoneword:Manapouri’,writes David Young in his history of conservation.8 This articlewas inspired by an examination of the construction of a powerschemebegunatthetimethattheManapouriCampaignwasatitsheight but in a very different environment. It proposes thebroadening of the history of the development of a nationalenvironmental consciousness beyond a narrow focus oncontroversy associated with developments in naturalenvironments,andchallengesthedominantinfluenceoftheSaveManapouri Campaign on the history of environmentalism andenvironmental policy in New Zealand in the later part of thetwentiethcentury.

The Huntly thermal scheme raised issues reflective of theinternational environmental movement in the 1970s, includingthe consequences of air and water pollution for human andecological health, and cultural impacts of development. ThomasDunlapnotesthataninclusivemeaningofthepopularuseoftheterm ‘environment’ was characteristic of New Zealand andAustralia from the late 1960s onwards, in contrast to NorthAmericawherethewordtypicallywasinterpretedasreferringto‘naturalenvironment’.9HisclaimisborneoutatHuntlywherethedefinition of what was included in an assessment ofenvironmental issues was consistently broadened beyond thephysical environment to include social and cultural concerns.

7 In particular, seeWheen, pp 265‐66; King, p 441. Some historians aremore cautious. For example, see Galbreath’s analysis of the impacts andmeaning of the campaign (p 168); also Philippa Katherine Wells,‘Uncovering “Regimes of Truth”: Locating and Defining DiscoursesAssociated with Hydro‐Electric Development in New Zealand’ PhD,AucklandUniversityofTechnology,2004,p276.8Young,OurIslands,OurSelves,p168.9 Thomas R. Dunlap, Nature and the English Diaspora: Environment andHistoryintheUnitedStates,Canada,Australia,andNewZealand,Cambridge,UK,1999,p315.


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Thispaperalsohighlightsthepivotalimportanceofplaceaswellas time intheenvironmentalhistoryofelectricitydevelopments.It argues that distinctive manifestations of environmentalismoccurredinresponsetospecificdevelopmentproposalsinuniquelocations.

By the late 1960s proposed electricity schemes routinely facednewchallengesasa resultof theemergence inmainstreamNewZealandsocietyofanecologicalandenvironmentalconsciousness.A popularised understanding of ecological concepts andenvironmentalism offered those members of the public whocontested these developments new ways of interpreting majorlandscape change and of expressing values associated with theexisting landscape. Questions of scenery preservation, waterpollution and energy efficiency were all expressed as ecologicalandenvironmentalissues.

AnumberofinternationalwriterschroniclethepopularisationofecologicalconceptsinWesterncountriesinthe1960sand1970s,whereby a previously scientific term became part of a popularconceptualisation of the natural world.10 In its migration intopopular language the strictly scientific meaning merged withnormativevaluesaboutthewayhumansshouldrelatetoalllifeonearth, and therebydeveloped increasingpolitical authority.11 InNew Zealand scientific ecology, which principally developed inrelationtothecontrolofagriculturalpests,becamepopularisedintheformofapartially‐graspedconceptionofnaturalsystemsasacomplex,interconnectedwhole.12Ecologicalconceptsfirstbegan

10DonaldWorster,Nature'sEconomy:AHistoryofEcologicalIdeas,2ndedn,Cambridge,UK,1985(firstpublished1977);AnnaBramwell,EcologyintheTwentiethCentury:AHistory,NewHavenandLondon,1989;LibbyRobin,DefendingtheLittleDesert:TheRiseofEcologicalConsciousnessinAustralia,Victoria, Australia, 1998; Noël Sturgeon, Environmentalism in PopularCulture: Gender, Race, Sexuality, and the Politics of the Natural, Tucson,2009,p65.

11Worster, p 332; Bramwell, pp 4‐6; Samuel P.Hays,Beauty,Health,andPermanence :EnvironmentalPolitics in theUnited States,1955‐1985, NewYork,1987,pp27‐35.12Dunlap,pp249,64‐65;PaulStar,‘NewZealandenvironmentalhistory:Aquestionofattitudes’,EnvironmentandHistory,9,2003,pp463‐75,p467;Young,OurIslands,OurSelves,p168.


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to be popularly associated with landscape change in relation toelectricitygenerationschemesofthe1960s.13

From 1970 ecological ideas were incorporated into a newconception of ‘the environment’, and together these conceptsprovidedanincreasinglycompellingcontextfor interpretationofthe landscape change associated with large electricity projects.Thetermcouldbeappliedinavarietyofsituations,notjustwithrespect to pristine natural environments but also in the placeswheremostpeoplelivedouttheirdailylives.14Environmentalism‘widened the terms of debate’ over the value and impacts ofdevelopmenttoinclude‘notonlythewholenaturalworldbutalsothephysicalsurroundingsinwhichpeoplelived’.15 AsexpressedbyArnoldBerleant,environment‘isthenaturalprocessaspeoplelive it,however they live it. Environment isnatureexperienced,naturelived.’16

Historians have written extensively on the rise ofenvironmentalism as a global phenomenon of the 1960s and1970s.17 Young describes an ‘enormous and permanent shift inconsciousness’ in New Zealand in the early 1970s,18 and James

13Forexample, in relation to theTongariroPowerDevelopment, see:TheDailyPost(TDP),Rotorua,30July1964,inAucklandElectricPowerBoard(AEPB) Papers, Series 11, Item 28, Newspaper Cuttings, ARC Archives,Auckland; letter from President, Tongariro and Lake Taupo Anglers ClubInc,TurangitoT.P.Shand,MinisterofElectricity,Wellington,18September1964, inElectricorp,AANU7740,W3214/8, 6/0/10/4, part12,TechnicalInvestigationalSurveys‐WaikatoRiverBasin‐TongariroScheme,ArchivesNewZealand(ANZ),Wellington;EveningPost(EP),Wellington,7July1964,p 19; letter from Deputy Prime Minister, Wellington to S. Harrison,PalmerstonNorth,21July1964, inAANU7740,W3214/8,6/0/10/4,part10, Technical Investigational Surveys ‐ Waikato River Basin ‐ TongariroScheme,ANZ,Wellington. InrelationtoschemesintheWaitakiBasin,seeR.S.MacArthur,‘Summaryreview’,SoilandWater,2,4June1966,pp24,26.14RomHarré,JensBrockmeierandPeterMuhlhausler,Greenspeak,London,1998,pp185‐86,77.15Galbreath,p146.16ArnoldBerleant,TheAestheticsofEnvironment,Philadelphia,1992,p10.17 See for example David Pepper,TheRoots ofModernEnvironmentalism,London, 1984; Sturgeon; T. O'Riordon,Environmentalism, London, 1976;PhilMacnaghtenandJohnUrry,ContestedNatures,London,1998,p73.

18Young,OurIslands,OurSelves,p168.


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Belichplacesthedevelopmentofanenvironmentalconsciousnessin the context of major changes in societal attitudes in NewZealand from the late 1960s.19 In 1973, the year whenconstruction of the Huntly station began, conservation advocateLanceMcCaskillcomplainedaboutthenumberofpeopleclimbing‘on the environmental band‐waggon [sic]’ who could be heard‘talking glibly about conservation, pollution, ecology, and othergeneralisations’.20 That same year the editor of theOtagoDailyTimes informed his readers that ‘every human being and everysociety is totallydependenton theglobalenvironment for life’.21Concerns about scenery destruction, water pollution, noise anddust from construction or habitat losswere placed in a broadercontext through the global languageof environmentalismwhich,asLibbyRobinfoundinAustralia,provided‘abackgroundagainstwhichactivismmadesenseonadifferentlevel’.22

Firstimpressions:Jubilationandfear

Thepower station is locatednear to the township ofHuntly, 30kilometresnorthofHamilton. The township is situatedonbothbanksoftheWaikatoRiver,withthemainshoppingcentreontheeastern bank off Highway One. Once a busy centre for theWaikatocoal‐miningindustry,thepopulationofthetowndeclinedin the 1960s following the closure ofmany of themines and in1971, when the government was seeking a location for a largethermalgeneratingstation,itstoodatslightlyover5000.23Itwas

19JamesBelich,ParadiseReforged:AHistoryoftheNewZealandersfromthe1880stotheYear2000,Auckland,2001,pp515‐16,18‐19.

20 L.W. McCaskill, ‘Soil conservation and landscape’, Soil andWater, 9, 3,March1973,p1.21 OtagoDaily Times (ODT), Dunedin, 5 June 1973, in Electricorp, AANU7740, W5055/268, 38/11, part 3, Policy: Problems of Pollution of theEnvironment1972‐1975,ANZ,Wellington(hereafter:Electricorp,38/11pt3).22Robin,p42.23 Stokes; T.W. Fookes, Huntly Power Project: A Description, MonitoringSocial and Economic Impact: Huntly Case Study, University of Waikato,Final Report Series No.2, Hamilton, December 1981;New ZealandHerald(NZH), Auckland, 7 July 1977 in Electricorp, AANU 7740, W5159/101,21/90/5,part3,PowerStation‐Huntly‐NewspaperCuttings1976‐1977,ANZ,Wellington(hereafter:Electricorp,21/90/5pt3).


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consideredanappropriatelocationfortheschemebyvirtueofitsreadyaccesstoplentifulsuppliesofcoalandcoolingwater,anditsproximity to an efficient connection for transmission to theconsumption centres of the upper North Island, especiallyAuckland. The government’s decision was also influenced by abelief among officials that Huntly would be a reasonablyuncontroversialchoicegiventhatthecitizensofadecliningcoal‐mining townwould be ‘likely to find the power station and theassociated coalmining operation more acceptable than theinhabitantsofmostothercommunitiesintheNorthIsland.’24

In the early stages of scheme planning the government’sassumption of a ready acceptance of the scheme appearedconfirmed, as the first response of Huntly residentswas largelyfavourable.25Therewassaidtobe‘jubilation’inthetowninJuly1972 when the government announced that Huntly was thepreferredlocationforthebiggestpowerstationinNewZealand,26and there were high hopes that its construction and associatedcoal mining activities would bring increased employmentopportunitiestothetownandthewiderregion.27Duringthe

24 Comment by R.R. Harcourt, Division of Public Health, Department ofHealthtoChairman,OfficialsCommitteefortheEnvironment,Wellington,2November1972, inMinistry for theEnvironment,AAUM,W4043/69,ENV8/2,part1,HuntlyPowerStation1972‐1973,ANZ,Wellington(hereafter:MfE, 8/2 pt 1). A similar conception was recorded in ‘Notes taken atMeetingHeldinHuntlyBoroughCouncilChambers…’,12July1972,NZED,Hamilton,AppendixEinNZED,HuntlyPowerStation:EnvironmentalImpactStatement,UnpublishedReport,Wellington,October1972.25NZED,HuntlyPowerStation:EnvironmentalImpactStatement,p18.26WaikatoTimes(WT),Hamilton,2August1972,p4,inElectricorp,AANU7740,W5159/101, 21/90/5, part 1, Power Station ‐ Huntly ‐ NewspaperCuttings,ANZ,Wellington(hereafter:21/90/5pt1).27 ‘Statement of Huntly Borough Council Deputation’, 2 August 1972, inNZED, Huntly Power Station: Environmental Impact Statement, pp 51‐52.OtherHuntly interests also expressed firm support:AppendixE in ibid, p48; WT, 14 August 1973, quoted in T.W. Fookes, Public ParticipationInitiatives, Monitoring Social and Economic Impact: Huntly Case Study,UniversityofWaikato,FinalReportSeriesNo.5,Hamilton,December1981;TDP,15August1973,inElectricorp,38/11pt3.


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Figure1. AviewoftheHuntlyPowerStationin1979,seenfromthe suburban area of Huntly East. Source: T.W. Fookes,ExpectationsandRelatedFindings1973‐81,MonitoringSocialandEconomic Impact:HuntlyCaseStudy,UniversityofWaikato,FinalReportSeriesNo.4A,Hamilton,December1981,p4.

following year local support became tempered by uncertaintyabout possible negative impacts on the township and thesurrounding countryside. In August 1973 the editor of theWaikatoTimes,themajorregionaldaily,assessedtheattitudesofHuntly localsasbeinghopeful thatconstructionwouldstimulatebusiness inHuntly,burn itscoalandbe ‘tremendouslybeneficialfromaprosperitypointofview’,but,heasked,‘atwhatcost?’Henotedthemultiplyinglistofquestionsinhabitantshadabout‘sideeffects’ on soil, air andwater quality, and fears about the socialimpact on a relatively small community of the influx of a largenumber of construction workers.28 According to MichaelMinogue,MayorofHamiltonCity,thepeopleoftheWaikato‘wantthepowerstationtobeestablishedbutnotonanyterms,andatanyprice.’29

At the time that the Huntly scheme was announced consistentpressure forgreaterpublic involvement indecision‐makingoverManapouri and other electricity developments had made an

28WT,16August1973,p4,inElectricorp,21/90/5pt1.29WT,29March1973,p1,inibid.


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impression on the government, and officialswere aware that inconstructing a large scheme in a populated part of the country,relevant local and regional organisations and authorities wouldneed to be kept closely informed. In 1970 E.B. McKenzie, theGeneral Manager of the New Zealand Electricity Department(NZED)30,sentoutacirculartohisdistrictmanagersthatnoted‘atendency for members of the general public to take a muchgreater interest in technical decisions than in the past.’31 Aninternalcommitteewasthereforesetuptoworkoutaclearsetofgoals for the operation and management of thermal stations,including public relations measures aimed at reducing‘unfavourableimpactfactors’andminimisingcontroversy.32

Thiswasalearningprocessforallthoseinvolvedthatdevelopedovertheearlyyearsofplanningandconstruction.Engineersandofficials at Huntly went to considerable lengths to ensure thatresidentsandotherinterestedpartieswereinformedearlyaboutthepotential impactsof thescheme. In1972NZEDofficialsmetwith representatives from the Huntly Borough Council, theadjoiningRaglanCountyCouncil,andtheregionalWaikatoValleyAuthority (WVA), as well as with various communityrepresentatives and other local and regional interests includingthe Huntly Progressive Association and the Lower WaikatoConservation Authority.33 Officials attended public meetings inHuntlyduring1972and1973andprovidedinformationaboutthepowerschemetoasmanylocalpeopleaspossible.NZED

30 The New Zealand Electricity Department (NZED) was the governmentdepartmentresponsibleforthegenerationandsupplyofelectricityandfortheplanningandelectricaldesignofelectricityprojects.Martin,p329.31MemorandumfromMackenzie,GeneralManager,NZED,WellingtontoallNZEDDistrictsandSuperintendentsofElectricPowerStationsaroundNewZealand,28July1970,inElectricorp,38/11pt1.32 NZED, ‘Extract from interim report for circulation to thermal stationsuperintendents...’, 15 February 1974, in Electricorp, AANU 7740,W3223/2, 26/2/2/1/1, part 1, Thermal Power Stations 1970‐1973, ANZ,Wellington(hereafter:Electricorp26/2/2/1/1pt1).33 Appendix E in NZED, Huntly Power Station: Environmental ImpactStatement,pp38‐39.


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Figure2. Mapshowingthepowerstationsite.TheWaahiMaraeoccupies12hectaresof landdirectly southof thepowerstation.Thestatehighwaycanbeseenparallel to theWaikatoRiverandrailway line. To the north is the Rakaumanga settlement andschool (since relocated),while to thewestof thestationsitearethe lands of the Te Kauri community. Source: NZED,SupplementaryEnvironmentalImpactStatement,p3.


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engineers also regularly attended the Huntly Planning Forumwhichwas established in1974 in response to local pressure forgreater information about the scheme. The forumwas stronglysupportedbyMinistryofWorksandDevelopment(MWD)34staffasaninnovativemeansofimprovingcommunicationovermattersofconcerntoHuntlypeople,anditsmembershipincludedelectedrepresentatives from local and national government andspokespeople from Waahi Marae, local businesses and ruraladvocacygroupFederatedFarmers.35

Despite the attention given byNZED andMWD to keeping localpeopleinformed, informationabouttheprojectremainedlimitedandunsubstantiatedrumoursabounded.36 Intheabsenceofanyarchitecturaldesignsatthisearlystageitwasdifficultforofficialstoconveyarealisticimpressionofthesizeofthescheme,andtheMWD architectural team admitted that themassive scale of thebuildings was therefore difficult for locals to comprehend.37Questions posed to engineers at a public meeting in July 1972couldbeansweredonlyinthemostgeneralterms,whichcreatedunease among the local community. Askedwhether the stationwouldbenoisyanNZEDofficialrepliedthat ‘probablynoisewill

34 The Ministry ofWorks and Development (MWD) was the governmentdepartment responsible for investigation, civil engineering design andconstructionofelectricitygeneratingschemes.Martin,pp329‐330.35 Huntly Press, Huntly, 6 March 1974, in Electricorp, 26/2/2/1/1 pt 1;MWD, Huntly Power Project, Wellington, 1979, p 12; T.W. Fookes,GeneralisationsdrawnfromtheHuntlyMonitoringProject,MonitoringSocialand Economic Impact: Huntly Case Study, University of Waikato, FinalReportSeriesNo.6,Hamilton,December1981,p14.Forafulldescriptionof the membership, purpose and effectiveness of this group, see Fookes,PublicParticipationInitiatives,pp7‐11,19‐22.36Auckland Star (AS), Auckland, 9March 1973; NZH, 2 October 1973, inElectricorp, 21/90/5 pt 1; T.W. Fookes, Conclusions. Salient Conclusionsdrawn from the Proceeding Volumes in this Final Report Series, HuntlyMonitoring Project, University of Waikato, Final Report Paper No. 12,Hamilton,December1981.37 Notes by Peter Sheppard, Senior Architect, MoW, Wellington, 13 June1973andNovember1973,inPeterSheppard,‘FamilyofForms’,MinistryofWorks and Development, 1989; AS, 30 September 1971, p 8; 22 August1972,p3;NZED,HuntlyPowerStation:EnvironmentalImpactStatement,p4.


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notbetoobad.’38Informationonairpollutionwassimilarlyvagueand presented in an abstract, technical form that offered littlecertaintytoconcernedresidents.Theywereworriedthatthenewpower station would produce large amounts of ash and smoke,and theyreferred to thegrimexampleofMeremere,a coal‐firedpower station 32 kilometres downstream from the Huntly site.Constructed in 1956 to 1958, by 1970 the station representedoutdated technology and the grit and ash emitted from itschimneys often cast a brown haze over the surroundingfarmland.39 Engineersassured locals thatHuntlywouldproducenowherenearasmuchairpollutionasMeremere,buttheydidnotappeartounderstandhowtocommunicatetechnicalinformationinawaythatcouldallaytheapprehensionsofpeoplewhowouldbelivingnearthepowerstation.Oneofficialpredicted‘nohazardtohealth’but that therewouldbe ‘some increase inbackgrounddustiness around the town’, while another presented thisassuranceinmoreprecisetechnicalterms,butwithequallackofclarity, inhisexplanationthat ‘dustemissionatHuntlywillbe1‐1¼times[thatfrom]Meremere,butwillbediluted20times.’40

Similar uncertainty existed about the potential effects on theWaikato River of the scheme. The power stationwould extractriverwater for its once‐through cooling system, andwould thendischargethatwater,considerablywarmer,backintotheWaikato.When the Chief Engineer of theWVA raised concerns about theeffects of discharging warm water into the river, an NZEDspokespersonfailedtoallayconcernswithhisresponsethatthiswas a technical engineering problem which could be discussedlater.41 Engineers insisted that this process would have onlyminor environmental impacts; however thegovernmenthadnotcarriedoutanybiologicalresearchandlittlewasknownaboutthepossibleimpactsonriverfaunaandflora.

38AppendixEinibid,pp40‐43.39AS,26July1973,inElectricorp,AANU7740,W5162/2,21/71/5,part2,Meremere Power Station ‐ Newspaper Cuttings 1959‐1987, ANZ,Wellington; Martin, p 238; NZED, Huntly Power Station: EnvironmentalImpactStatement,p29;NZH,12August1973,inElectricorp,21/90/5pt1.40 Appendix E in NZED, Huntly Power Station: Environmental ImpactStatement,pp40‐43.41Ibid,pp43,49;Fookes,Conclusions,pp2‐4.


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The Huntly inhabitants with the most to lose were the 350residentsof theWaahiMaraeandtheassociatedcommunitiesofTeKauri andRakaumanga,whowere the nearest neighbours tothe power station (see Figure 2).42 They had great difficulty inasserting any influence on the way the scheme was designed.Theyacceptedtherationale for locatinga thermalpowerstationin the Waikato region but considered that the chosen site, lessthan 500 metres from their homes, was totally inappropriate.WaahiMarae,theprinciplemaraeofNgatiMahuta,wasthehomeoftheMaoriQueen,DameTeAta‐i‐Rangikaahu.43Duringschemeplanning Waahi people expressed anxiety over, among otherthings: noise from construction and from the operational powerstation, the possibility of dust from the coal used to fuel thestation, lossofprivacy,and lossof recreationalareasandaccesspoints along the riverbank.44 Theywere also greatly concernedaboutnegativeimpactsonthehealthoftheWaikatoRiver,centraltoTainui’shistoricalandspiritualwell‐being,andanintegralpartof theWaahimaraecomplex.45 Theypetitioned thegovernmentfor direct input into power station planning, arguing thatMaoricultural values should be acknowledged and protected as anintegralandyetseparatepartofthepublicinterest.46

GovernmentofficialsmadeagenuineattempttoengagewiththepeopleofWaahiasadistinctgroupwithintheHuntlycommunityand thegovernmentofferedcompensation in the formofmoneyand structural improvements to the marae.47 Officials still hadmuch to learn about how to consult effectively with Maori,however, and their assumption that advising on constructionproposals equated to meaningful consultation led to

42Ngaparu,p17.43 T.W. Fookes, Expectations and Related Findings 1973‐81, MonitoringSocial and Economic Impact: Huntly Case Study, University of Waikato,FinalReportSeriesNo.4A,Hamilton,December1981,p17.44 EP, 3 October 1973, in Electricorp, 21/90/5 pt 1; Power DevelopmentDivision, NZED, ‘Environmental Impact Statement: Huntly Power Station’,October1972,p6,inElectricorp,AANU7740,W5159/96,21/90/2part2,ANZ,Wellington(hereafter:Electricorp,21/90/2pt2).45CentreforMaoriStudiesandResearch;Ngaparu,p15;46EP,3October1973,inElectricorp,21/90/5pt1.47 Centre for Maori Studies and Research. AS, nd (c. March 1973), inElectricorp,21/90/5pt1.


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dissatisfaction.48 In1974whenRobertMahuta,TainuielderandWaahi spokesperson, accused government departments of areluctancetoconsult,NZEDmanagerW.J.Shanksreactedinangrybewilderment, exclaiming: ‘[w]e’ve been talking to them since1972’.49 Reflecting on the process some years later Tainuiexpressed resentment about the assumption by local andgovernment authorities that the concerns of Maori were nodifferent fromthoseofmembersof thegeneralpublic,aswellasthelackofattentionpaidtothespecialmeaningtotheiwioftheirlandandoftheWaikatoRiver.50

Hotwater: The debate over the discharge of coolingwaterintotheWaikatoRiver

WhileNZEDandMWDweregrapplingwith thequestionofhowbesttoconsultwithlocalcommunitiesatHuntly,thedepartmentswerealsocomingtotermswiththeneedtorepresenttheschemein terms of its environmental impact. The growing politicalprominence of environmental issues from 1970 resulted in theexpansion of government departments and agencies withenvironmental responsibilities. Scientists, media andenvironmental experts within local and central governmentexhortedengineerstoplanelectricitydevelopmentsinwaysthatshowed a greater sensitivity toward issues of pollution andecological destruction.51 New, formal environmental planning

48 T.W. Fookes, Social and Economic Impact of theHuntly Power Station:FirstYearProgressReport,HuntlySocialandEconomic ImpactMonitoringProject,SchoolofSocialSciences,UniversityofWaikato,WorkingPaperNo.2, Hamilton, March 1977; MWD, Huntly Power Project, p 10; Centre forMaori Studies andResearch;AS, 22March1973;WT,22March1973;15June 1973; 2 October 1973, in Fookes,Expectations andRelated Findings1973‐81,p4.49WT,7May1974,p26,inElectricorp,21/90/5pt1.50 Centre for Maori Studies and Research. Historical assessments of therelationship between the government and Tainui Waikato at Huntly canalsobefoundinFookes,GeneralisationsdrawnfromtheHuntlyMonitoringProject,p16;Fookes,Conclusions,p9;andHorsley,p131.51Forexample:R.H.Wilson,‘EnvironmentalplanninginNewZealand’,NewZealandEngineering,28,11,15November1973,pp330‐31;H.R.Williams,‘Openingaddress:Engineeringandecology‐Whatisatissue?’ProceedingsoftheNewZealandEcologicalSociety,19,1972;D.Scott, ‘Apossiblesetofecological guidelines for engineers’, Proceedings of the New Zealand


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procedures were gradually instituted from the late 1960s,motivatedasmuchbytheenvironmentalconcernsofthosewithingovernment as by pressure from outside of government.52 Thepotential impacts of the Huntly power station were debatedwithin this new framework and the scheme therefore becamewhat one engineer described as ‘a “guinea‐pig” for the newemphasisonenvironmentalprotection’.53

Huntlywasoneoftheearliestgovernmentprojectsaffectedbythelegislative framework of the Water and Soil Conservation Act(WSCA) 1967, under which government departments wererequired to apply to the National Water and Soil ConservationAuthority (NWASCA), chaired by the Minister ofWorks, for theright to use ‘natural water’ as part of any large development.54TheWSCAincludedinitspurposetherequirementtomakebetterprovisionfortheuseandqualityofnaturalwater,andtopromoteandcontrol themultipleusesofwater.55 TheActconstitutedanunwelcome constraint on NZED’s automatic right of access towater for the purposes of electricity generation, and on itsprimacy in determining the location of power schemes.56

Ecological Society, 19, 1972, p 7; Ian G. Crook, ‘Engineering andconservation in the Snowy Mountains, Australia’, Proceedings of theNewZealandEcologicalSociety,19,1972,pp16‐22.52MichaelRoche,LandandWater:WaterandSoilConservationandCentralGovernment in New Zealand 1941‐1988, Wellington, 1994, p 106; Ron G.Lister, ‘TheCluthaValley:Multipleuseandtheproblemsofchoice,’ inTheLandOurFuture:EssaysonLandUseandConservation inNewZealand inHonourofKennethCumberland,A.GrantAnderson(ed),Auckland,1980,p187.53A.V.Hatrick, ‘HuntlyPowerStation:Certainaspectsof civil engineeringdesign’,NewZealandEngineering,31,5,15May1976,p150.54C.R.Hannah,‘AdecadeofhydrologicaldatamanagementintheWaikato’,in Carol Cramp and Geof Ridall (eds), The Waters of the Waikato:ProceedingsofaSeminarheldatUniversityofWaikato,20‐22August1981,2,Hamilton, 1981, pp 401‐15, p 403; A.W. Gibson, ‘TheNationalWater andSoilConservationOrganisationinNewZealand’, inCraigDuncan(ed),TheWatersoftheWaikato,Hamilton,1971,pp37‐45,pp38‐40.55 Roche, p 105. For the background to theWSCA1967, aswell as a fullsummaryofthemembership,functionsandpowersofNWSCA,seeibid,pp98‐108.56Filenote,8November1971;briefingnotefromGeneralManager,NZEDto Minister of Electricity, Wellington, 18 November 1971, in Electricorp,


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NWASCAmadethedecisiononwhethertograntwaterrights,andindividualsandorganisationswhoweredirectlyaffectedhadtheright to challenge its decisions through the Town and CountryAppealBoard.57

Early in 1973 NZED submitted an application for the right toextract,useanddischargethewateroftheWaikatoRiverfortheHuntly Power Station. It requested the right to extract 34,200tonnesofwateranhour–upto27percentof theriver’s flowatHuntly – for cooling purposes, and to discharge thiswater backinto the river at approximately eight degrees centigrade aboveambientrivertemperature.58 InJune1973NWASCAgrantedthedepartment these rights, subject to conditions designed to limitnegative impacts on water quality in this intensively developedwaterresource.59Mediareportsonthewaterrightandassociatedconditions raisedpublic awarenessof the issues associatedwiththepowerscheme.UndertheWSCAaffectedpartieshadtherighttoappealthedecision,andthispresentedaformalopportunityforthem to influence the environmental impacts of the scheme.Therewere two appealsmade to theTown andCountryAppealBoard, of which the first, by the Environmental Defence Society(EDS),wasmotivated by concern for the ecological condition oftheriver.FormedinAucklandin1971,theEDSwasmodelledonthe Environmental Defence Fund in the United States wherelawyers and scientists and other expert witnesses volunteeredtheir time to put together cases against projects that ‘wouldgrossly harm the natural or social environment’.60 The EDS,‘dedicatedtothepreservation,restoration,andrationaluseoftheenvironment’, was a semi‐professional lobby group. Its

AANU 7740,W5184/44, 34/1, part 2,Water Control ‐ Policy 1970‐1973,ANZ,Wellington.57Roche,pp103‐06.58 Martin, p 250; Hatrick, p 149; NZED, Stage Environmental ImpactStatementforHuntlyThermalPowerStation,Wellington,June1976,p4.59AS,6 June1973;WT,29March1973,p1, inElectricorp,21/90/5pt1;National Water and Soil Conservation Organisation, Water Right No.221,MoW,Wellington,inElectricorp,21/90/2pt1;B.H.Pyle,‘TowardsabetterunderstandingoftheWaikatoRiver’,SoilandWater,11,1,September1974,pp15‐16.60 Alvin Smith and Gary Taylor (eds), Conservation in New Zealand: ACitizen'sGuidetotheLaw,Auckland,1985,np.


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membership was made up of experts in scientific debate,environmentallawandlobbying,whowerecollectivelydescribedin the media as ‘environmentalists’.61 Its appeal at Huntly wasmadeonthegroundsthatNWSCAshouldnothavegrantedNZEDthe water rights as the potential effects of heatedwater on theecology of the river were unknown, and it sought specificamendments to the conditions of the water rights in order toprotect riverbiota.62 At the appealhearings in September1973expertwitnessesfortheEDS–lawyers,biologistsandbotanists–challenged the technical evidence given by government expertsand undermined NZED assurances that the government hadsufficientevidencethatthedischargeofheatedwaterwouldhavenoadverseeffects.63

The emphasis on technicalmatters presented a challenge to theHuntlycommunitywhowerefollowingthedebate. AccordingtotheWaikatoTimes, local people at Huntlywere ‘acutely ecologyand Waikato River conscious’,64 but it considered that the lessscientifically‐minded struggled with the technical details aboutwater quality.65 Evidencepresentedby theEDSwas of a highlytechnicalnature,and issuesofmixingzones, thegrowthratesofblue‐green algae and dissolved oxygen levels66 created theimpression among non‐experts of a hidden landscape of

61EveningStar,Dunedin,30May1973, inElectricorp,21/90/5pt1;NZH,22 May 1975, in Electricorp, AANU 7740, W5159/101, 21/90/5, part 2,Power Stations ‐ Huntly Newspaper Cuttings, ANZ,Wellington (hereafterElectricorp,21/90/5pt2);Wilson,pp7‐8. Thesocietyhadalreadytakenother casesagainstWaikatoRiverpollutersandhadpreviouslybroughtasuccessfulprosecutionagainsttheHuntlyBoroughCouncilover itspermitfor the temporary discharge of raw sewage into the river (ODT, 27 April1974, in Electricorp, 21/90/5 pt 1; Young,Our Islands,Our Selves, p 198;A.H. Brown (ed), ‘EDS Newsletter’, 2, Environmental Defence Society Inc,Auckland,nd.(c.1972)inR.J.McLeanpersonalpapers,Invercargill).62 Appeal to the Town and Country Planning Appeal Board, 12 October1973,inElectricorp,21/90/2pt1.63 WT, 12 September 1973; WT, c. 3 October 1973; NZH, 12 September1973; WT, c. 8 September 1973, p 3; WT, 13 September 1973, p 26, inElectricorp,21/90/5pt1.64WT,30March1973,inibid.65WT,29June1973,inibid.66WT,12September1973;NZH,12September1973,inibid.


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discharges into the river that were unquantified but potentiallyharmful.

The second appeal against thewater rightswasmadebyTainuielder Robert Mahuta on behalf of Ngati Mahuta and the TainuihapuoftheHuntlyarea.Mahutahadgrownuponthemaraeandwas,inhiswords, ‘personallyacquainted’withthelandandwiththeWaikatoriveratHuntly.67HedeclaredthatgrantingthewaterrightswouldhavesocialandeconomicimpactsonWaahiMaoriasusersoftheriver,aslandownersandasthecustomaryprotectorsoftheWaikato.Helinkedhisuneaseabouttheculturalwellbeingofthecommunitytoconcernsthatthedischargeofheatedwaterinto the riverwould be detrimental to fish and plant life and towaterquality.68

TheWaahiappellantsexperienceddifficulties in translatingtheircultural connection with the river into the language of waterresource management. The appeal board dismissed most ofMahuta’s evidence as irrelevant on the basis that it stated‘generalities’ rather thandemonstratingspecificeffectsonwaterquality.Italsoruledthat,despitethescientificfocusofitsappeal,theEDSdidnotactuallyhavearightofappealasitwasunabletodemonstratethatitwasdirectlyaffectedwithinthenarrowtermsof the WSCA. Nevertheless the board was impressed by theweightofscientificevidencetheEDSpresented,andbyMahuta’sapprehension about how little was actually known about thebiologicalconditionsoftheWaikatoRiveratHuntlyandhowthepower station might affect the river. The combined appellanttestimonyservedtoraiseconsiderabledoubtoverassertionsthatthepowerschemewouldnotimpactonwaterquality.

67 Statement by Robert Te Kotahi Mahuta before the Town and CountryPlanningAppeal Board in theMatter ofWaterRightsNo. 220 and 221, 6July 1973, p 2, in Ministry of Justice, Tribunals Unit, AADM 7538,W2896/965,TCP272/73,R.T.Mahutaandothers‐NationalWaterandSoilConservationAuthority,1973,ANZ,Wellington.68 Appeal to The Town and Country Planning Appeal Board, Wellington,lodged by Thomas Wilson, Solicitor, Auckland, on behalf of appellantsChiefs,EldersandSpokesmenrepresentingsub‐tribesoftheWaikatotribes,June1973,inElectricorp,21/90/2pt1.


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Construction was already underway at Huntly by the time theappealswereheardandthereforetheappealboardwaslimitedtoimposingstricterconditionsthanthoseintherightsasoriginallygranted.69ItrequiredNZEDtocarryoutafullbiologicalsurveyofthe river prior to commissioning the power station andsubsequently to monitor the effects of the discharge of coolingwateragainstpre‐existingbiologicalconditions. Itruledthatthesurvey and the results of monitoring programmes were to bemade freely available to the public.70 The EDS and Mahutatherefore had a direct impact on the future effects of the powerschemeontheWaikatoRiver.TheHeraldconsideredtheboard’sdecisiontobea‘victory’fortheappellantsand,furthermore,thatitestablishedaprecedentwherebyNZEDwouldneedtocarryout‘environmental studies’ inadvanceofany futureapplications forwaterrights.71NZEDinitsturnmovedquicklytocommissiontheadditionalinformationrequiredundertherevisedconditionsand,indoingso,itsomewhatrestoredpublicfaithinthedepartment’sattitudetowardtheriver.72

ThefirstEnvironmentalImpactReport

In addition to thewater right application, Huntly Power Stationwas also the first power project – and one of the earliestgovernment projects – to be tested under new environmentalassessment procedures.73 When Cabinet approved constructionofHuntlyin1972itmadethisapprovalsubjecttoreceivingfromNZEDastatementontheenvironmentalimpactsofthescheme.74Thiswasanunprecedentedstipulationanditindicatesthelevelofenvironmental concerns at the highest political levels.75 The 69 Martin, p 250. EP, 27 September 1973, in Electricorp, 21/90/5 pt 1.Decision of Town and Country Planning Appeal Board, A571, September1973,inElectricorp,21/90/2pt1.70DecisionofTownandCountryPlanningAppealBoard,A571,September1973, in Electricorp, 21/90/2 pt 1. WT, 15 October 1973, in Electricorp21/90/5 pt 1; Fookes, Generalisations drawn from theHuntlyMonitoringProject,p14.71NZH,16October1973,p6,inElectricorp,21/90/5pt1.72Officialsenlisted theaidofgovernmentadvisorsandscientists,keen toestablish ‘meaningful studies’ (Memorandum from D.H. Jones, NZED toDirector‐General, DSIR, Wellington, 5 November 1973 and othermemorandafrom1973to1974inElectricorp,21/90/2pt1).Seealso:EP,16October1974;WT,12August1974,inElectricorp,21/90/5pt2.


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scopeandpurposeofenvironmentalimpactreportingwasstillintheearlystagesofpolicydevelopmentatthattime. Governmentministersenvisaged theEnvironmental ImpactReport (EIR)asaconfidential written statement by NZED that assured them thatanyenvironmental impactshadbeen identifiedandaddressed.76With planning for the scheme already well underway, anyenvironmental assessment couldhaveonly limited impacton itsdesign, but the Huntly EIR was nevertheless an important testcasefortheimpactassessmentprocess.Itprovedasteeplearningcurve for NZED which made a serious attempt to address theissuesof concern to thepublic; however, theEIRonHuntlywasbasedonminimalecologicalandhydrologicalinvestigation.77

In 1973 Cabinet accepted NZED’s report but requested thedepartment to submit a supplementary EIR once the requiredbiological and environmental studies had been completed.Meanwhile therewere calls for the current EIR to Cabinet to bepubliclyreleased.D.Williams,thedirectoroftheEDS,arguedthat‘theenvironmentalimpactofpublicworkssuchaspowerstationsis a matter of concern to all citizens and therefore ImpactStatements should be open to public scrutiny.’78 He was

73 Galbreath, p 160. For a background to the international adoption ofenvironmentalimpactreportingprocedures,seeO'Riordon,pp193‐99.Fora discussion of the adoption and purpose of environmental impactreporting in New Zealand, see Alvin Smith and Gary Taylor (eds),Conservation inNewZealand:ACitizen'sGuidetotheLaw,Auckland,1985,pp129‐35.74MemorandumfromMinisterfortheEnvironmenttoCabinet,31October1972,inMinistryfortheEnvironment8/2pt1;memorandumfromRobertG. Norman, Chairman, Officials Committee for the Environment, MoW toMinister for the Environment, Wellington, 7 May 1973, in Electricorp,21/90/2pt1.75Martin,p250.76 The language of environmental impact assessment was still beingdevelopedat thetimetheHuntlyEIRwasannounced. The firstreportbyNZED was known as an Environment Impact Statement but in order toavoidconfusion, Iuse ‘Environment ImpactReport’orEIR,whichbecametheofficiallyacceptedtermfrom1973.77NZED,HuntlyPowerStation:EnvironmentalImpactStatement,pp4‐5.78LetterfromDr.A.R.Williams,Director,EDS,AucklandtoT.M.McGuigan,MinisterofElectricity,Wellington,21May1973,inElectricorp,21/90/2pt1.


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supported by the editor of the Herald who called upon thegovernment to release the report so as to avoid giving rise to‘public suspicion’ about potential environmental impacts.79ThomasMcGuigan,MinisterofElectricity,resistedpublicationonthe basis that theword of Cabinetministers that environmentalimpacts would be dealt with should be sufficient for the publicand that the report was too technical anyway for the generalpublic to understand.80 By contrast his colleague Joe Walding,Minister for the Environment, urged Prime Minister Kirk topublish the report, a move he saw as being ‘crucial toGovernment’srelationswiththeenvironmentalmovement.’81

BowingtopublicpressureinJune1973thegovernmentreleasedtheEIRafterreworkingit into ‘languagemoresuitabletothe layman’.82Publicationopenedupthegovernmenttocriticismoftheinformationthatithadrelieduponinassessingtheenvironmentalimpacts of theHuntly scheme. Environmentalists and scientistsdenounced the report in themedia as ‘hastily‐prepared and farfrom all‐embracing’, and there were calls for the focus of theenvironmental assessment to be widened beyond the physicalriver environment to include social impacts.83 Of widerimplication, the government announced that all future EIRs ongovernment projects would be published and, in addition, theywouldbemadeavailable forpublicsubmissionswhichwouldbeconsidered before any decision was taken to proceed on largegovernment projects.84 Another significant change was therecognition among government engineers that environmental

79NZH,23May1973,inibid. Othernewspapersurgedthegovernmenttorelease the report, for example:TaranakiHerald , New Plymouth, 7 June1973,inElectricorp,38/11pt3;NZH,14May1973,inElectricorp,21/90/5pt1.80ThomasMcGuigan,MinisterofElectricity,quotedinWT,3May1973;also18May1973,inElectricorp,21/90/5pt1.81MemorandumfromJ.A.Walding,MinisterfortheEnvironmenttoPrimeMinister,Wellington,25May1973,inMfE,8/2pt1.82WT,30May1975,inElectricorp,21/90/5pt1.83TDP,15August1973,inElectricorp38/11pt3.Similarcommentsweremadein:WT,7June1973;NZH,8June1973,inElectricorp,21/90/5pt1.84 Directive from Secretary for the Cabinet, Prime Minister’s Office toMinister for the Environment, Wellington, 6 June 1973, in Electricorp,21/90/2pt1.


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studies should be carried out much earlier in planning for allfuture projects and before approval was given to beginconstruction.85TheHuntlyEIR,aswellasthewaterrightsappeal,considerably raised the bar for the range and quality ofenvironmental information that would in future be required tosatisfy an increasingly environmentally‐conscious society. ThuspolicychangesresultingfromtheHuntlydebatein1972and1973directly shaped the context within which future governmentprojectswereconstructed.

Thesecondwaterrightapplication

Increasing familiarity with the use of ecological andenvironmental concepts expanded the popular audience for thetechnical aspects of environmental studies. Local communitiesdistrusted evidencepresentedbyNZEDand they turned insteadto the expertise presented by independent scientists andenvironmentalgroups.In1975theeditoroftheDominionwarnedthe government that, unless it was seen to be showing strongleadershipinenvironmentalissues,itwouldfinditselfsupplanted‘in the public regard as the guardian of the environment’ by‘ecology groups’ to which ‘the public has begun increasingly tolookforguidance’.86ThisincreasedpressureonNZEDtoprovideearly information to the public on proposed projects and topresent evidence to support any statement about how itsactivities would impact on the environment.87 Withingovernment, too, there were a growing number of governmentagencies scrutinising the environmental impacts of electricitydevelopmentsincludingtheCommissionfortheEnvironment,theCleanAirCouncil(establishedundertheCleanAirAct1972)andthe Water and Soil Division of the MWD.88 NZED struggled tomeet the demands of environmental groups and governmentagenciesforsufficientscientificevidencetodemonstratehowany

85 Memorandum from P.W. Blakely, General Manager, NZED to Director‐General,DSIR,Wellington,3August1973,inElectricorp,38/11pt3.86TheDominion,Wellington,24February1975,inibid.87 Letter from Brian T. Coffey, Scientist (AquaticWeeds) Ruakura toW.J.Shanks, District Manager, NZED, Hamilton, 7 November 1975, inElectricorp,21/90/2pt2.88By1976thereweresome12governmentbodieswithaspecificinterestintheenvironment(WT,17February1976,inElectricorp,21/90/5pt3).


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environmentalimpactsofitsprojectswouldbedealtwith.Atthesame time it had to find a way to communicate complicatedengineering and environmental information to affected localsunfamiliarwith technical language butwhowere anxious aboutthe impacts of power projects on the quality of their homeenvironments.

Thesechallengeswereamplydemonstrated in1975whenNZEDappliedtoNWSCAforasecondwaterright,thistimetodischargewastewaterintotheriverthatcontainedtoxicchemicalsusedtoclean the boilers in the power stations. Its application wassupported by studies by scientists in the government’sDepartment of Scientific and Industrial Research (DSIR) whichdemonstrated that these chemicalswould be renderedharmlessonce they became diluted in the river.89 NWSCA accepted thisevidenceandgrantedtherights,butitsdecisionwasappealedbytworegionalwatercontrolauthorities(theWVAandtheAucklandRegionalAuthorityorARA),andagainbytheEDS,andbyMahuta,thistimeonbehalfoftheTainuiMaoriTrustBoard.90

TheWVA,ARA and theEDS challenged the recommendations oftheDSIR scientistswith contraryevidenceof theirown. RonaldBailey,whohadreplacedMcGuiganasMinisterofElectricity theprevious year, assured locals that chemicals in the boiler wastewould be harmless,91 but hewas contradicted by evidence fromEDS that the discharges would ‘materially detract from theconditionoftheRiver’.92 TheEDSandtheARAaccusedNZEDoffailing to make the toxic properties of some of the chemicals

89NZH,24July1975,inElectricorp,21/90/2pt2.90TheARAwasmotivatedtoappealbyaconcernabouttheimpactsoftheboilercleaningchemicalsonthequalityofwater.Itwasdeemedanaffectedpartyunder theWSCAonthebasisof its intentionto takedrinkingwaterfor Auckland from the Waikato River at some point in the future (TheEveningStandard,Wellington, 8October 1977, in Electricorp, 21/90/5pt3).FullinformationonthewaterrightsandappealprocessescanbefoundinElectricorp,21/90/5pt2andpt3.91GisborneHerald,25July1975,inElectricorp,21/90/5pt2.92D.A.R.Williams,EnvironmentalDefenceSociety Incorporated, ‘NoticeofAppeal Pursuant to Section 23 of the Water and Soil Conservation Act1967’,p3,inElectricorp,21/90/2pt2.


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clearly known,93 and the situationwasmademoremenacing byevidence from an independent chemist asserting that thedischargewouldbesopoisonousastokilltroutintheriver.94Theissuebecameabattlebetweenscientificexperts,whilewordslike‘toxicity’,‘poisonouschemicals’and‘toxiceffect’madepeoplewhowere dependent upon the river for their water supplyunderstandablyfearfulabouttheeffectsofthesepollutants.95Onelocal asked a DSIR scientist whether he himself would willinglydrinkwaterfromtheriveraftertheboilercleaningchemicalshadbeendischarged,andanothersoughtreassurancethatitwouldbesafe for her to water her vegetable garden with river waterfollowingsuchadischarge.96

ThesupplementaryEIR

In 1976 NZED published the second or supplementary EIR onHuntlyasrequiredbyCabinetin1972.97ThesupplementaryEIRhadbeenundertaken in a constructive spirit, as the departmentnow appreciated the value of the process as an opportunity toreassure the public, and it sought to include any information‘which would serve to emphasize how the project is beingdesigned and managed with a view to minimizing any adverseimpactonthepeopleintheareaaswellasonthelocalecology’.98The supplementary report demonstrated greater sophisticationby the NZED in commissioning appropriate environmentalresearch than had been the case with the 1972 report, and thedepartment had responded to calls to broaden the contents toinclude effects on the community as well as on the physicalconditionsoftheWaikatoRiver.

93ManawatuEveningStandard(MES),PalmerstonNorth,8October1977;WT,11October1977,inElectricorp,21/90/5pt3.94NZH,1August1975,inElectricorp,21/90/5pt2.95AS,17July1975,inibid;MES,8October1977;WT,11October1977,inElectricorp,21/90/5pt3.96WT,11October1977,inElectricorp,21/90/5pt3.97NZED,StageEnvironmentalImpactStatement;NZED,SupplementtoStageEnvironmental Impact Statement: Huntly Thermal Power Station,Wellington,June1976.98Memorandum fromD.H. Jones, Project LiaisonOfficer, NZED to ProjectEngineer,NZED,MoW,Huntly,13January1975,inElectricorp,21/90/2pt1.


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TherewasstillcriticismhoweverthatthesupplementaryEIRwastoo technical,99 andMahuta criticised the focus on ‘thephysicalenvironment’ and a corresponding lack of emphasis ‘on socialimpactssuchastheeffectonemploymentopportunities,housing,community life and recreational amenities.’ He could find noadequate picture of the importance of the Waikato Riverenvironment and Huntly area as home to local Maori, anddescribed the EIR as a collection of technical papers ‘fordiscussion and information of other technical experts’, theaccuracyofwhichhewasunabletojudge.100

Livingwiththepowerstation

The social impacts of the schemehadnotbeen identified in anysystematic way prior to development but they soon becameevident once construction began. The attitude of Huntlytownsfolk toward the scheme, largely positive at the time thepower scheme was announced, became increasingly ambivalentas they began to grasp the dominating presence of the powerstation.101 One of the biggest single construction jobs everundertakeninNewZealand,itemployed2000peopleatitspeak.It took more than two years just to drive the several thousandfoundation piles. The main building rose 20 storeys high andcoveredanareaofnearlythreehectares,102andby1975thetwinchimneys, 50 storeys high, were a Waikato landmark.103

99 Letter from J.C. Fitzpatrick, Hamilton to the Commissioner for theEnvironment, 30 August 1976, in Ministry for the Environment, AAUM,W4043/69,ENV8/2/A,part1,HuntlyPowerStation‐Submissions‐1976,ANZ,Wellington(hereafter:MfE,8/2/Apt1).100R.T.Mahuta,Director,CentreforMaoriStudiesandResearch,UniversityofWaikato, ‘HuntlyThermalPowerStation:CommentsonN.Z.ElectricityDepartmentStageTwoEnvironmentalImpactReportJune1976’,Hamilton,August1976,pp4,7inibid.101NZH,28May1974, inElectricorp,21/90/5pt1;BarryDenton,ProjectEngineer,NZED,Huntly,quotedinAS,31July1975,inElectricorp,21/90/5pt2.102MinistryofEnergyElectricityDivision,HuntlyPowerStation,Wellington,1982, np; Martin, pp 252‐53; notes by Peter Sheppard, Senior Architect,MoW,Wellington,November1973,inSheppard,np.103 Barry Denton, Project Engineer, NZED, Huntly, quoted in Transcript,6:00pm Evening Report, 2YA Radio, 19 December 1975, in Electricorp,21/90/5pt2.


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Residents had difficulty retaining a sense of control over theirhome landscape as township, marae and local farmland wereprogressively transformed into an electric landscape over aconstruction period of more than six years. Although differentsectorsof theHuntlycommunitywere impactedontoavariableextent, their lives were disrupted by heavy construction traffic,noiseanddust,andbylesstangibleimpactsonlocalservicesandsocialpatterns.104‘Ithasonlyjustfilteredintoourconsciousnessthatthisprojectissobigitisoutofourleague’,saidD.Carey,thelocalFederatedFarmersspokespersonin1977.105

ConstructionofthestationdominatedlifeinHuntlyand,inallthechaosof construction, localsblamed it forwhatwerepotentiallyquite unrelated problems.106 A parent attributed hearing lossamong pupils at a nearby school to engine noise from heavytrucks,andfarmersblamedtest‐drillingforcoaltofuelthepowerstation for a sudden drop in the level ofwater inwells on theirland, despite a lack of any evidence that the events wereconnected.107 Officials did their best to respond sensitively tosuch issues but found it was difficult to resolve such complexcommunity debates within the parameters of engineering anelectricityscheme.108

The Waahi community, living ‘at the giant’s feet’,109 had goodreason to fear that their marae would be ‘completely

104 Records of the Huntly Planning Forum provide ample examples ofmultitude local concerns,asdo thesocialmonitoringreportsproducesbyFookesandhisteamattheUniversityofWaikato. InformationfromtheseinnovativeprogrammescanbefoundinMWD;Fookes,PublicParticipationInitiativesandConclusions.105D.Carey,RotongaroFederatedFarmers,quotedinNZH,6April1977,inElectricorp,21/90/5pt3.106MWD,pp10‐11.107NZH,12April1977,inElectricorp,21/90/5pt3;WT,2October1973;3November1973,quotedinFookes,ExpectationsandRelatedFindings1973‐81.108R.T.Mahuta,Director,CentreforMaoriStudiesandResearch,UniversityofWaikato, ‘Huntly Thermal Power Station: Comments onN.Z. ElectricityDepartmentStageTwoEnvironmentalImpactReportJune1976’,Hamilton,August1976,p17;NZH,18November1975,inMfE,8/2/Apt1.109AS,27August1977,p18.


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overwhelmed’by thepowerproject.110 Fromthemeetinghousestepsthestation’schimneystoweredabovetheroofofthehouseoftheMaoriqueenlike‘giantpakehaphallusesrapingtheland’inMaipi’s graphic description.111 Some felt dissatisfied with theopportunitiesavailable toexpress theirparticularunderstandingof the landscape through formal planning procedures and theysoughtmoredirectmeansofexpression. AgroupcreatedanewhakadedicatedtoMaorirightsissues,andinparticular ‘thedeepMaori resentment towards theHuntly project’. Waahi residentsalsothreatenedtotakedirectactionsuchasblockingroadaccessto thepowerproject,which created tensionbetweenTainui andgovernmentofficials.112

Figure3.TheHuntlyPowerStationasviewedfromWaahiMarae.Source:Fookes,ExpectationsandRelatedFindings,p4.

InSeptember1977GeorgeGair,MinisterofElectricityandEnergyResources, confirmed that, as ‘destiny’ hadmade themarae andthe power station close neighbours, the governmentwould givefavourable consideration to claims by Ngati Mahuta for

110Transcript,TVNews,7:00pm,8October1974,inElectricorp,21/90/5pt2.111AS,27August1977,p18. OntheissueoftheeffectsofconstructionofthepowerschemeinbreakingupMaorikinshipgroups,particularlybytheclosure of the local Rakaumanga Primary School, see Centre for MaoriStudiesandResearch,p45.112 WT, 6 May 1974, in Electricorp, 21/90/5 pt 1; The Evening Star,Dunedin,11April1977;EP,12September1977,inElectricorp,21/90/5pt3. The vocal protest at Waahi Marae occurred at a time of increasinglyovertactivisminMaorisocietyinthe1960sand1970s.SeeBelich,p478.


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compensation for the impact of the project on their traditionalwayof life.113 Itwas agreed that compensationwouldbe in theform of amajor upgrade to themarae, alongwith newhousing,community, and recreation facilities.114 The Government alsoacceptedMahuta’s suggestion to redevelopWaahi land betweenthe power station and themarae to create a landscaped ‘bufferzone’betweenthetwo.115In1981,withthepowerstationalmostcomplete,Waahi celebrated the completion of the reconstructedmarae,‘amodelofmodernredevelopmentdesign’that,accordingtosome,hadactuallyraisedthemanaofTainui.116

The issues at Huntly were not those of scenic beauty andindigenousecologybutwaterandairpollution,noise, trafficandotherdisruptiontothehealthandsafetyoflocalcommunities;inother words, issues of the environment as ‘nature experienced,nature lived.’117 Debates between environmental groups, localsand the government shaped the way the Huntly power schemewas built and operated in various subtle ways. Concernsexpressed through two appeal processes resulted in strictconditions to protect water quality, and monitoring provisionsrevealed and controlled the previously unseen and fearedlandscape of water pollution and chemical discharges. Earlyunease about air pollution from the huge station gave addedimpetus to thedesirebyengineers to install effective airqualitycontroltechnology.118

The Huntly experience also provided a robust test for newenvironmental assessment procedures, and promptedconsiderable refinements in their implementation. The input of 113EP,12September1977,inElectricorp,21/90/5pt3.114EP,9October1978,np,inElectricorp,21/90/5pt4;Martin,p251.115MemorandumfromJ.C.Wilson,HeadOffice,MWD,WellingtontoProjectEngineer,HuntlyPowerProject,MWD,Huntly,7April1977,inElectricorp,21/90/2pt2.Mahutahadmadethesuggestionin‘HuntlyThermalPowerStation’,August1976,p8,inMfE,8/2/Apt1.116 Northern Advocate, Whangarei, 13 February 1981, in Electricorp,21/90/5pt4.117Berleant,p10.118EP,6March1975, inElectricorp,21/90/5pt2;G.H.RobinsonandR.G.Whillock,‘HuntlyPowerStation:Someaspectsofplantdesign’,NewZealandEngineering, 31,5,15May1976,p137;ElectricityDivision,HuntlyPowerStation,np.


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localauthorities,environmentalgroupsandspokespeoplefortheWaahiMarae demonstrated the ability for local people to shapetheirownconcernsinthelanguageofenvironmentalimpactsandtodefinethemeaningof‘theenvironment’inrelationtotheirownsituation. By participating in formal environmental planningprocedures theWaahi community had helped to promote someunderstandingamongengineersandthewiderpublicaboutMaoriconnectionswith their ancestral lands andwaters, an issue thatwould becomemoreprominent in environmental debates of thecomingdecades.119

Local authorities also received grants from the government ascompensationforthenegativeimpactsofconstruction,andthesemade it possible to carry out major improvements to civicfacilities, roadsand recreational facilities.120 As thenameof thetownbecamesubsumedintothatofthegiantelectricityschemeitwas accepted that the future of Huntly was inextricably linkedwith the power project.121 In the assessment of social scientistTomFookes, the fearsandexpectationsof thecommunity in theearlyyearsofconstructionhadcalmedasthe ‘idea’ofthepowerstationbecamevisibleintheformoflargebuildings,tallchimneysand transmission lines.122 When the stationwas completed andthe inconvenienceofconstructionactivitieshaddissipated,some

119Horsley,p131. MorrisTeWhitiLove, ‘DealingwiththeMaoriCulturaland Spiritual Imperatives in the 21st Century in Water Resources’, 12November 2003, pp 1‐3, online, available athttp://www.iiirm.org/publications/Articles%20Reports%20Papers/Cultural%20Resources%20Management/ATT00004.pdf(1October2010).120 NZH, 22 September 1977, in Electricorp, 21/90/5 pt 3; Fookes,Conclusions,p5;MES,8October1977, inElectricorp,21/90/5pt3. Afternegotiationswithlocalcouncillors,in1977thegovernmentgrantedHuntlyBoroughCouncil$1milliontowardsprovidingpublicamenities,andRaglanCountyCouncilreceived$590,000foramajorsportscomplex(T.W.Fookes,Answers to Peoples' Questions, Monitoring Social and Economic Impact:Huntly Case Study, University of Waikato, Final Report Series No.1,Hamilton,December1981,p31).121NZH,7July1977,inElectricorp,21/90/5pt3.122Fookes,HuntlyPowerProject:ADescription,p2.


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Huntlyresidentsnotonlybecameaccustomedtothenewfeatureintheirlandscapebutevenproudofit.123

Figure 4. Huntly Power Station today, as seen from the northbankoftheWaikatoRiver.Photograph:MrJ.P.Whittle,2013.

Conclusion

AtHuntly,themeaningof‘theenvironment’developedinrelationto the unique circumstances at that place to include thecomplexitiesandintangibilitiesofsocialimpactssuchasqualityoflife and community health. While debates on naturalenvironmentssuchasnationalparksspoketoanationalsenseofidentity, issuesof air andwaterpollutionoccurred in theplaceswherepeoplelivedandrevealed‘theenvironment’asalocalandevenadomesticdomain. Local communities andenvironmentalgroups brought matters of environment and ecology home, andincreasingly defined what could and should be considered asenvironmentalissues.Theirvoicesbothinfluencedthedesignandoperation of the Huntly power station, and helped shape thedevelopment of environmental policy and in particular thefoundationoftheenvironmentalimpactassessmentprocess.

123Fookes,AnswerstoPeoples'Questions,p53.


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From1972,whenthepowerschemewasannounced,untiltheendof the decade, local and regional interests attempted to assertsomecontrolovertheelectricityschemeemergingintheirmidst.ThehistoryofHuntlyalsorevealstheextenttowhichlocal,non‐expert voices contributed to extending the boundaries ofenvironmental concerns to includesocial issues. ItwasanearlyexampleofthewayinwhichMaoribegantovoicetheirconcernsin the language of environmental impacts, thus redefiningenvironmental issues to include cultural perspectives. Much ofthepublic input into schemeplanningwas channelled throughaseries of water rights application processes and new policyinitiativesforassessingtheenvironmentalimpactsofgovernmentprojects.Withintheseformalproceduresdecision‐makerstendedto give greater consideration to evidence about ecological andbiologicaleffects,andattimespeoplehaddifficultyindeterminingbetween contradictory assertions presented by rival experts.However some groups managed to express their own concernswithin these new frameworks and, in so doing, they helped tomakevisiblepotential threats fromwaterpollution to thehealthoftheriver.ForthesereasonsHuntlyhasatleastasmuchrightasManapouri to be considered New Zealand’s first electricitydevelopmentintheenvironmentalera.

REVIEWESSAY:

Bernhard Gissibl, Sabine Höhler and Patrick Kupper(editors), Civilizing Nature: National Parks in GlobalHistorical Perspective, Bergahn Books, New York andOxford, 2012. x+24 pp. ISBN 978‐0‐85745‐525‐3.$US95.00/£60.00.

IanTyrrell1

Civilizing Nature tackles an important theme in globalenvironmentalstudies,thespreadofthenationalparkasideaandpractice.Itstartsfromthepremiseoftheconstructedcharacterofthe ‘national park’ with its various motives to categorise andcreate newly territorialised spaces that were, in practiceexpressive of modernity and the ‘civilizing’ of nature through‘protection’. Witha remarkablywidegeographicalcoverage, thecase studies that follow document the national park’s globalspread and diversity. The collective research exhibited hereavoidssimplydiffusionistideas,associatedmostnotablywiththework of RoderickNash,2 and shows the appropriation of naturechanneledintoprotectedspaces,illustratinginturntheinterplayofimperial, internationalorganisationalandnationalforces. Thebookdisplaysthemalleabilityoftheconceptofnationalpark, itsadaptation to different circumstances, and its changing culturalnuances across time. The editors are aware of the problem ofdefinition,andsensiblyoverride the formalnomenclaturewherenecessary. They provide interesting data on the overlap ofcategories such as state park, national park, nature reserve,wildernessareaandnaturalmonument.

Therichnessofthecasestudiescannotbefullyillustratedinthisreview.RecurrentthemesaretheAmericanmodelanditsdiversecompetitors;theroleofempireasanagentofparkdiffusionand

1 IanTyrrell is anEmeritusProfessorofHistory at theUniversity ofNewSouth Wales, Sydney. He is the author of True Gardens of the Gods:Californian‐Australian Environmental Reform, 1860‐1930 (University ofCaliforniaPress,1999),amongmanyotherworks.HeiscurrentlywritinganewbookonconservationandempireinTheodoreRoosevelt’sAmerica.2RoderickNash,‘TheAmericaninventionofnationalparks’,AmericanQuarterly,22(Autumn,1970),pp726‐35.


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transformation of nature; the transnational actors andinternational agencies that emerged in the interstices of empirebut by the 1920s to the 1970s sought to transcend imperialorigins;andthevarioususesofthenationalparkideafornation‐buildingandnationalism.

KarenJonestacklesheadontheissueofAmericaninfluence.Sheshows that Yellowstone provided a model for national parkselsewhere,evenasshearguesthatitwastypicallymodifiedinitstransnational applications. The importance of this model isunderlinedinseveraloftheotheressayssuchasCarolinRoeder’sonTriglavNationalParkinSlovenia.Itisstillnecessary,however,toemphasisethatquiteapartfromtheadaptationofYellowstoneto different circumstances, there was no single U.S. pattern forEuropean and global emulation, at least before 1916 – that is, ifwe understand ‘model’ to be a coherent system of parkcategorisation or plan of management. American national parkadministration and conceptualisation prior to the establishmentof the National Park Service in that year indicates as much.Americanparkswerethemselvesbothheterogeneousinstructureand subject to external pressures and even removal from thehallowedlist.WhatYellowstonediddowastoprovideabroaderifvaguerinspiration,anditdidsobecauseitbecameelidedwithEuropean‐projected ideas of receding frontiers and endangeredwildlife, themes that Yellowstone and other American parksexemplified alongwith their ‘grandiloquentWestern scenery’ (p36). Advocating theAmericanexamplewasuseful forEuropeansupportersofsuchparks,asmorethanoneofthecontributorstothis volume indicate (see e.g., p 132). National parks couldbecomeidentifiedinEuropeanmindswiththemodernbecauseofthe common image of the United States as exemplifyingmodernity, and because of ‘nation’s’ presence as an organizingidea. As Etienne Benson sensibly notes in his study of animaltracking, scientific practice within national parks also requirescloser attention. While it is commonplace to consider a‘Yellowstonemodel’, he remindsus, ‘national parks have alwaysbeenmorethanaconceptorasetofprinciples.’ Theyhavealsoinvolved ‘collections of very concrete practices’ developed inparticularlocations(p174).


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The experience of empire became a source of conservationsentiment and aided in some cases the transmission of natureprotectionideastometropolitanEurope.ThisisclearinBernhardGissibl’s fascinating discussion of attempts to create naturereservesinGermanEastAfrica(nowTanzania)beforeWorldWarOne. He shows the salience for the German case of Romanticnotions aboutwild nature,with similar yearnings to get back intouchwith theprimitive to those that tosomedegreemotivatedAmerican national park creation in the same period. Mostinterestingly, he shows the impact of these ideas back home ineffortstofashion‘natural’spacesthatinvolvedtherepopulatingofchosen areaswithwild animals such as theEuropeanbison. Atthe turn of the twentieth century, some Germans were worriedabouttheextinctionofthatspecies,worriesmotivatedinpartbythe knowledge of the bison’s American relative and its perilouscondition. Gissibl’s account is particularly useful because of theargumentsometimesencounteredthatmetropolitanandcolonialpoliciesweredisconnectedinEurope’sempires.YetGissiblshowsthat feedback loops did operate. The establishment of a post‐World War Two idea of a park‐oriented approach to therestoration of wilderness as part of urban recreation, and itsblendingwithEuropeancultural landscape ideas, roundsouthisincisivetreatment.

Jeyamalar Kathirithamby‐Wells also deals with the role ofcolonialismandshowsintheprocesshowdifficultitistoseparatethe categories of ‘imperial’ and ‘national’ in influences on parkcreation. Regarding the development ofMalaysia’s largeTamanNegaraNationalPark,shedocumentsthechangingrelationshipofnationalism to this park first proclaimed in 1939 by Britishcolonialrulers.Thelattersawitasa‘symbolofunityandnationalpride’ in ‘a societydividedby raceand religion’ (pp90,91),butafter independence nationalists became less suspicious of theexercisesince they toosought to forgeworthynational symbols.Rising tourism and awareness among the emerging, urbanisedmiddle class of the importance of a ‘natural heritage’ hasunderpinnedtheseimpulses.

Empire itselfwas a complex thing, as the exampleof theBritishsettler colonies shows, where colonials also colonised theindigenousand the land inadouble relationship. TheAmerican


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case of national parks is most easily related to that socialformationofa ‘settlerempire’ inwhichnationalparkaspirationswereevidentquiteearly.MelissaHarperandRichardWhitetakeup this question of settler societies, and, in the process, throwlight not only on the formation of national identities in andthroughtheappropriationofnatureaspreservedspace,butalsothedevelopmentofsettlersocietiesthemselves.Theirexemplarycomparative historical analysis emphasises the nascent nationaldiversity present in the process of what might be called settlerstate formation,3 in which national parks played an importantcrystallizing role. They, too, conclude that there was no onemodel, and that Yellowstone provided little direct influence orinspirationintheAustraliancase.Intheircomparativevignettes,Harper andWhite also deal insightfullywith both Canadian andNew Zealand park creation. Given the focus in much of theexistingliteratureontheUnitedStates,theirchapterisasalutaryreminderthatthenationalparkideawasgainingfavourinthelatenineteenthandearlytwentiethcenturies,andthatsettlersocietiesmadepioneeringcontribution longbeforethereweremanysuchparksinEurope.Australia’sAudleyNationalParkwasthesecondso‐called national park in the world, but Australia was not anindependent nation, a point that underlines the somewhatarbitrarynatureoftheconcept.YetHarperandWhitearguethatthe independent self‐governing British colonies were alreadybeginning to see themselves asnations. Audley’sproximity to amajor urban location made it very different from the kinds oftouristandrecreationalendeavours thatwereoperational in thecase in Yellowstone or some other western American nationalparks. Perhaps as befitted a country bathed in over‐blownegalitarian rhetoric, the pioneer Australian park was a moredemocratic facility in a number of ways, not least in itsaccessibilitytothepopulacethroughpublictransport.

Thequestionofnationalparksandempireisfurthercomplicatedbecauseinsomecountriestheterminologydifferedsharplyfromthe American example, and considerable diversity of categoriesandpracticeappearedevenwithinsingleempires. Indiscussing

3FrederickE.Hoxie,‘RetrievingtheRedContinent:SettlercolonialismandthehistoryofAmericanIndiansintheU.S.,’EthnicandRacialStudies,31.6(September2008),pp1153‐1167.


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TheNetherlands,HenryvanderWindt calls thenationalpark ‘apowerful but flexible concept that inspired various groups’ (p220)evenasuntamedorwildnaturecouldnotbe found in thatcountryandspaceshadtobethoroughlycreatedthrough‘naturedevelopment’ in the post‐World War Two period (p 219). Butnature reserves created earlier in theDutch colonieswerequitedifferent. Van der Windt highlights discontinuities betweenmetropolitanandcolonialconservation,athemealsoillustratedinCaroline Ford’s work. In the French case, as Ford shows in ameticuloussurvey,Francehadareasreservedforscientificstudy,located in the colonial realm. Yet Algeria, a colony,was treateddifferently fromother French possessions andwas the only onewithaFrenchdepartmentalstructure. Algeria’sroleasauniqueFrenchsettlersocietywasviewed‘asanextensionofmetropolitanFrance’ (p 77) andmeant that it alone received a national parkdesignation in the era of French colonialism. This points to theimportance of prospective or de facto incorporation in a nation,and,perhaps,thoughshedoesnotstatethis,ofcitizenshipissues.Certainly the case of American national parks would haveprovided some confirmation of this thesis. These were createdonly where U.S. citizens could lobby; they did not spread todistant, unincorporated ‘insular possessions’ until the end ofcolonial rule, butmore easily did so to the insular ‘territory’ ofHawaii acquiredat the samemomentof formal empire in1898‐99,whereU.S.citizenscouldpullstrings.4

Inter‐imperialconnectionsmighthavebeenstressedmoreinthisvolume. In the course of her discussion on Malaysia,Kathirithamby‐Wellsnotesthealmostsimultaneousdevelopment,thoughindifferentinstitutionalcircumstances,ofprotectedareasin the neighboring Dutch East Indies (a theme nicelycomplementing van der Windt’s discussion of Dutch imperialconservation).Thiswasalsothetime,incidentally,thattheUnitedStates in the Philippines was similarly considering a parksprogram and the trans‐imperial exchanges suggested by thesecasesmightwellbefruitfullypursuedforthewholeofSouth‐EastAsia. Crossing empires also entailed temporal succession andattendant geo‐political and military change. Roeder’s study of

4NashCastro,TheLandofPele:AHistoricalSketchofHawaiiNationalParkHawaiiNaturalHistoryAssociation,Hilo,1953.


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Slovenia’sTriglavNationalParkintheJulianAlpsshowshowthemajor themes of empires, international networks and nation allcontributed to thepark’sgestation through to theassumptionofitsboundariesin1981–astheareawentthroughasuccessionofdifferentregimesfromimperial,tomonarchist,andthensocialist,andfinallytothepresent‐daySlovenianrepublic(withdisruptivewars in between), thus demonstrating a ‘political dimension ofnatureconservation’(p240).

Thoughnational parks could serve either imperial ornationalistpurposes, and sometimes the same park institutions could, overtime, serve both, they also benefited from the development offorms of internationalism beyond empire and nation. For thetransmission of national park and kindred concepts in an era ofincreasing internationalist activity, the roles of transnationalactorswereofparticular importance. Nationalpark idealswereadoptedandadaptedthroughkeyindividualsandtheinstitutionsthat they supported. Thesedidnot always servenation, thoughinfluenced by the pull of both nation and empire. With greatclarity Patrick Kupper supplies a convincing overview ofSwitzerland, an important country for European parkdevelopment. ItwasthroughtransnationalactorsthattheSwissinfluence operated. At the centre of Europe, Switzerland’ssituationasasiteof institutionalandsupranationalorganisationand its association with peace‐making and internationaldiplomacymayprovidecluestoitsinfluence.Sotoo,thelinguisticand cultural segmentation within the country. No wonder thattherewasnosinglenationalmodelabroadforSwitzerland,yettheSwiss National Park was itself to be influential in Europe.Kupper’s account of the German‐speaking Swiss naturalist, PaulSarasin, is a welcome English language exposition of Sarasin’simportance, while the influence of another participant andcolleague, theGermanHugoConwentz, isalsodocumented. Thelatter’s work on natural monuments was ‘surprisinglytransnational in character’, Kupper concludes (p 126). Throughpersonalnetworking,Conwentz’sideasspreadtoSwitzerland(pp126‐27), the Austro‐Hungarian Empire (pp 243‐44), Italy andSweden. (Conwentz’s ideas even reached the United States, amatternottakenupinthesestudies.) SarasinisequallyobscureinEnglish‐languageworkonconservation. Thepioneering1913International Conservation Conference in Bern, at which


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Conwentzalsospoke,oweditsdevelopmentinnosmallmeasureto Sarasin’s persistence and his ability to network withinzoological and other scientific groups on the threat of speciesextinction. Anna‐Katharina Wöbse likewise notes Sarasin’s‘avant‐garde global nature protection scheme’ (p 152). Yet the1913 conference in turn is almost unthinkable without thecirculation of information on a global basis from the ends ofEurope’sempiresandfromtheAmericas.Indeed,Sarasin’sviewswere partly formed from his earlier explorations in South EastAsia.

Notonlyistheworkofindividualtransnationalactorsillustratedinthisvolume,butalsotheactivitiesofsupranationalinstitutions:theLeagueofNationsand,after1945,theUnitedNations.Wöbseshows how various international organisations ‘translatedheterogeneous ideas into a universalist notion of heritage’ (p153),creatingacommonterminologyand‘corporateidentity’fortheparkideaonagloballevel.Therebysheidentifiesinstitutionsmediating between diverse national, especially American, parkconcepts and the global rise of a natural heritage agenda. Thisprocess began under the League, which put ‘the protection ofnatural beauty’ on its program from 1925 to 1928 through itsInternational Committee on Intellectual Cooperation (p 145).Tracing international networks beyond post‐WorldWar Two inthe attempts to globalise park ‘ambitions’ through UNESCO andtheInternationalUnionfortheConservationofNature,Wöbseiscareful to note that the process was dominated for decades bywesternersandasmalleliteofwhitemales.Internationalismwasnot completely free of the political, cultural and economicinheritanceofwesternpower.

Anotherunderlyingthemeistherelationsbetweenempire,nationandindigenouspeople.ScholarsofNewZealand’senvironmentalhistorywillfindHarperandWhite’scontributionhelpfulhere,butGissibl,BradMartin,Jones,andKathirithamby‐Wellsalsoprovideevidence in this volume. As iswell known, indigenous cultureshavebeenfrequentlydisregardedorevenerasedinnationalparkcreationprocesses.HoweverMartinshowsfortheCanadianInuitthat in some circumstances a national park could be ‘a tool forindigenousculturalsurvival’. TheNorthernYukon(nowIvvavik)NationalParkwas ‘usedasavehicle formakingclaimsupon the


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state’ (p 168). Arguably erasure was a much more difficultprocessinplacesotherthanwherewhitesettlercolonialsocietiesdominated demographically and environmentally. But evenwithin the settler societies, there are differences. Harper andWhitenotethedistinctiveinceptionofTongariroNationalParkin‘thewaytheindigenoussacredwasincorporatedintothenation’throughMaoriparamountchiefTeHeuheuTukino’sgiftoflandin1887.Thisoutcomedisplayed‘asenseofindigenousparticipationin the political process not apparent elsewhere’, though Harperand White make clear that power relations in settler societiesaffectedthisoutcome.DespiteMaoripresenceontheparkboard,theirinputseemstohavebeenlargelyfrozenintothemomentofhistorical origins, and the indigenous influence thereafter wassmall in practice. Nevertheless, this case (and Martin’s)underlines a diversity of racial and social arrangements fornational parks in societies now commonly labeled as part ofsettlercolonialism(p56).

Most interesting as a way of synthesising the themes of theconnection between indigenous occupation and supposedly‘natural’ and ‘wild’ spaces for national parks is Emily Wakild’sstudy of Mexico. No doubt the distinctive revolutionarycircumstancesfromthe1910stothe1930sinfluencedthisnation‐building exercise. Mexicanparks departed fromAmerican ones.Being located ‘somewhere between protection and rational use’,they entailed ‘respect for rural livelihoods’ (pp 203, 201). Thisaccount isworthy of further scholarly attention in post‐colonialsettings, and in breaking down boundaries between ideas ofsustainabilityandthenationalparkconcept.

Lacunae are rare in this volume. It is perhaps a shame thatSweden,withthefirstNationalParksystem,isnotcovered,butwealready have the earlier excellent work of Tom Mels on thissubject.5 Moreover, as Kupper states, the case also drew uponAmerican models and this might have limited its application invery different European circumstances. Several leads for futureresearch are revealed, however. Not only might inter‐imperialconnections have been stressed more, but also indigenous

5TomMels,WildLandscapes:TheCulturalNatureofSwedishNationalParksLundUniversityPress,Lund,1999.


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impacts, compared across empires. These are matters ofemphasis,however.

Key moments in national park creation might be hypothesisedfromthesestudies,beginningwiththeroleofEuropeanimperialglobalization, particularly from the 1890s to 1914, drawingattention to species extinctions and asserting colonial controlsoverbothnatural resourcesand indigenouspeoples’occupation.Then came the 1930swhen parks spread tomany places in thecolonialandothernon‐westernworld,perhapsundertheimpactofcolonialandothernationaliststirringsandrevolutions,perhapsduealsototheeffectsoftheGreatDepressioninshiftingprioritiesover development, or perhaps increasing scientific and evenproto‐ecological interests. Finally, a key decade was the 1970swhenthemachineryofcontemporary internationalconservationwasbeingassembled. The impactofglobalisation throughthesewaves of economic and international communications changecould provide ways of exploring further the globalisation ofnatureprotection.ItissignificantthatIndia’stigerandbiospherereservesestablished in the1970sand1980s,studiedbyMichaelLewis, came at a timewhen so‐called new globalisation spurreddebates over international conservation, and this was the sameperiod in which the proliferation of international andtransnational non‐government organisations became marked.However, ‘effectiveglobalgovernanceofprotectedareas’(p236)remainslackinginmanydevelopingcountries,notjustIndia,and‘nation’ still provides themost important regulatory arena. Thenotedauthorityonnationalparks, JaneCarruthers,usefullyaddsanepiloguedealingwiththetrajectoryandpresentpositionofthenationalparkconceptinthiseraofnewglobalisation.

A final question concerns the boundaries between the differenttypes of spatial protection. Though the editors understand theproblem of definition and address it in the introduction, itsimplications for comparisons of park diffusion can be complexindeed. In some respects the original Australian national parkwas quite similar to some of the state parks established in theeastern United States. The failure, for a long time, to declarenationalparks in theAmericanEastwas largelyaproductof theconcentrationoffederalgovernmentpubliclandsintheAmericanwest.TheAustralianpioneeringexamplereflectedinpartdesires


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forurban‘safetyvalves’throughsitesforpopularrecreation,justastheimpulseforstateparksinplacessuchastheAdirondacksofupstateNewYorkdid. Thuscomparisonscanbe fruitfullymadeacrossthedifferentcategoriesof‘park’.

With an intellectual coherence often missing in the revisedproceedings of conferences, CivilizingNature is a path‐breakingwork in its field of comparative national park history. Botheditorsandcontributorsmustbecommendedontheoutcome.Itis also a valuable contribution to environmental history morebroadly and a useful addition to the study of twentieth‐centuryglobalhistory.


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Landmarks:Cumberland’smagnumopus?

BillHowie1

ThisarticleaimstodetailtheinceptionandlegacyofgeographerKenneth Cumberland’smagnum opus, his 1981 television seriesLandmarks. The initial inspiration for my research came as aresult of the reactions exhibited by my students at St PetersCollegeinAucklandwhenIshowedthemclipsoftheseriesfromthe ‘NZ On Screen’ website. The definition of ‘environmentalhistory’ given on the Australia and New Zealand environmentalhistory website (http://environmentalhistory‐au‐nz.org) is ‘thetransformation of the natural world by human action and theconsequences for both nature and people’. This correlatesprecisely with the aim of the series. The scholarly detail andencapsulationofalife’sworkisincludedinaserieswhichsetthebenchmark for New Zealand geographic documentary making.This article will detail who Cumberland was, what Landmarkswas,andarguethatsimplylabellingthewholeseriesas‘nostalgic’,needlessly consigns valuable scholarly work, which providesexcellentmaterialrelatingtohowearlyEuropeansettlerscraftedNewZealand,tothearchives.WhowasKennethBraileyCumberland?

Cumberlandwasageographerandhisworking lifewasdevotedto this discipline. He set a challenge to himself and to latergeographers by suggesting that practising a discipline with twothousand years of history required a ‘rigorous discipline andsatisfyingphilosophy’ (Cumberland1956). KennethCumberlandwasbornin1913inBradford,EnglandandstudiedgeographyandtheGermanlanguageatNottinghamUniversitybeforeattainingafirstclasshonoursdegreeingeographyatLondonUniversity.HisresultingfluencyinGermanwasadistinctadvantageasoverfiftypercentofall geographic literatureprior to1939waswritten inGerman. He was strongly influenced by the work of RichardHartshorne,whoseTheNatureofGeography(1939)drewheavilyupon German geography, and this book became Cumberland’s

1 Bill Howie is currently in the second year of his PhD at AucklandUniversitywhereheisresearchingthecivicrolepublicintellectualsplayinstimulatingdebaterelatingtoacademicdisciplineswithinwidersociety.


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‘vade‐mecum’(Pawson2011). HeimmigratedtoNewZealandin1938 to become a geography lecturer at Canterbury Universityunder the watchful eye of George Jobberns. He moved toAucklandUniversityin1946asaseniorlecturerandtoestablishtheDepartmentofGeography,holdingthe foundationchair from1949untilhisretirementin1978. Hepossessedakeenappetiteforpassingonhisknowledgethroughworkwithteachertrainingandaweekly radiobroadcast for theNewZealandBroadcastingCorporation(NZBC)entitled‘Lookingatourselves’.

Cumberland was a lecturer, academic, farmer, local bodypolitician, geographical politician and public intellectual. Theterm ‘multiphrenia’ was used by Billig (1995) to describe thesplitting of the individual into amultiplicity of self investments,and this could appropriately be applied to Cumberland.Subsequent to his death aged 97 in April 2011 there has beenreflection upon his career and achievement. This has beendocumentedinarticlesbyPawson(2011),Roche(2012),asessionatthe2012NewZealandGeographicalSociety(NZGS)Conferencewhere this paper was originally presented, and in his memoirsMilestones andLandmarks. The purpose of this article is not toreplicate existingmaterial but to provide a background on howLandmarks encapsulated his life’s work. Cumberland himself,reflecting upon his forty years of geographical work in NewZealand,commentsintheclosingsegmentofthefirstprogrammethatithasbeen‘amostcongenialtaskI’veenjoyed,indeedIstillsavoureverymomentofit’(Cumberland1981).

WhatwasLandmarks?

Landmarks was a 10‐part documentary series first screened onTelevisionNewZealand(TVNZ)on23rdAugust1981,writtenandpresented by Kenneth Cumberland. The title of each episode isdetailedinTable1,below.Theseriesexamined‘humanintrusionon theNewZealand landscapeandhow ithasbeen transformedby the destructive and constructive urges of mankind’(Cumberland1981). Modelledon the1972BritishBroadcastingCorporation (BBC) series America, Landmarks was a rare NewZealand expression of public intellectualism through geographyand attracted the largest viewing audience ever achieved by alocaldocumentaryseries(Boyd‐Bell1985).GeorgeAndrewswas


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theinspirationbehindtheseriesandfilmingstartedinlate1978.Cumberland was not the original choice of presenter, but asAndrews(2009)notes, ‘Kenlookedbelievableandsoundedgood… We never looked back’. The series received a 1982 FeltexAwardfor‘BestTelevisionDocumentary’andCumberland(1990)notesthat‘MymajorsatisfactionrestsonthefactthatmorethanamillionNewZealandersregularlywatchedLandmarks’.

Cumberland’s book, Landmarks: How New Zealanders Remadetheir Landscape, which was developed in conjunction with theseries,waspublishedbyReader’sDigestandsold70,000copies.The title of each chapter is also detailed in Table 1, below. Theiconic nature of the series led Jeremy Wells to parodyCumberland’s presentation style and appearance in parts of theseries TheUnauthorisedHistory ofNew Zealand (Baker, BarinasandHill2005),whichintroducedLandmarkstoanewgeneration.

A teacher ‘kit set’, setting out detailed lesson plans and studentactivitiesforeachepisode,accompaniedtheinitialseriesandwasdistributedtoschools.Asetofpostersthatteacherscoulddisplayin classrooms was also provided (see Figure 1). The ideaconveyedwas thatweneedtoknowNewZealand fromthe landup,invitingtheobservertoimaginethemudbeingcleansedfromavirginlandscapetocreateacolonialfarm.Thisinvokesthe‘mudon your boots’ geography ofW.G. Hoskins (1955). In 1984 theDepartment of Education distributed a video of the series toschools across the country. The former Director General of theBBCLordReith(1924)observedthattheaimofbroadcastingisto‘inform,educateandentertain’.Landmarksachievedeachoftheseaims.

Representationsofnationhood

The concept of nationhood in relation to New Zealand isperpetually evolving. Landmarks was ‘a historical geography ofNew Zealand’ (Cumberland 1990) which cited prominentindividualsandsignificanteventsthatshapedearlyNewZealandEuropean nationhood. As time elapses, this situated knowledgebecomescontestableand,asBillig(1995)contends,‘Nationshave


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Table1:TelevisionEpisodesandBookChapterComparisonEpisode Title Episode

Description Book Chapter

1 ALandApart ThephysicalcharacteristicsofNewZealand

WhereNoHumanFootprinthadTrodden

2 TheFirstFootprints

OriginsoffirstpeopletoreachNewZealand

CastawaysinaColdNewWorld

3 ReadyfortheTaking

Earlyexploitationofresourcestaking

TheLootingofNature’sTreasures

4 ThePastoralists

HistoryofsheepfarmingonCanterburyPlains

KingsoftheTussockCountry

5 GoNorthYoungMan

DevelopmentofdairyfarminginWaikatoandTaranaki

TheLittleMangetshisChance

6 TheBitterandSweet

NorthIslandhillcountry

DefeatandVictoryintheHills

7 NatureFightsBack

Harmfuleffectsofspeciesintroduction

NatureExactsitsRevenge

8 TheMainTrunkLine

Developmentoftransportnetworks

ForgingtheLinksofaNation

9 TownsandtheirTimes

HistoryofNewZealandtowns

TownsfolkCalltheTune

10 TheJourneyAhead

The21st century TracingtheShapeofTomorrow


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to create their own histories’ and ‘national histories arecontinually being re‐written and the re‐writing reflects currentbalances of hegemony.’ The series addressed multiple themesfrom forest clearing and soil erosion tourban sewerage andhillcountry farming. These themes developed key geographicalimaginaries that it wove into notions of New Zealand nationalidentity(HowieandLewis2013).

The programme itself was the only extended and theorisedstatementofnationhoodandnature‐societyrelationsavailableatthetimeandinthisformat. Itgavemeaningtoandlinkedsocialhistories, landscapes, identities and economy. The seriesscreened during a periodwhenNew Zealandwas attempting toshake off its ‘cultural cringe’ and when a swathe of dramaproductions such as The Governor (1977) and Children of FireMountain (1979),whichhadNewZealand landscapeandhistoryastheirbackdrop,wasbeingbroadcast.

Landmarks placed geography in New Zealand homes andcirculated Cumberland’s geographical imaginaries widely. Theintroduction toeachepisodestated ‘apersonalview’ofKennethCumberlandandmanyoftheimaginariesprojectedwerevestigesof the political projects that Cumberlandhadwagedover a longcareerasanacademicandpublicgeographer.Someofthevisionsofgeographywereatoddswiththeacademictemperofthetime.

Landmarks:TheYouTubelegacyThe influential geographer David Harvey (1990) notes that ‘thestudy of historical geography … has a major role to play inunderstandinghowhumansocietieswork’. Landmarksdescribeshowasmallnumberof individualsalteredthe landscapeofNewZealand in a shorter time frame than anywhere else. This is acompellingnarrativebutasimplequestionremains:Whyarethemobile‐phone using, iPod carrying, internet savvy, Facebooktweetersinmyclassroomsoengagedbythisstoryteller,anolderbespectacledmandressedinajacketandwithanEnglishaccent?

Modern technology has allowed the series to be separated intovisualchunkswhichappealtothemoderndigitalconsumer,withno clip longer than 11 minutes. Cumberland’s training as alecturer and radio presenter means that the narrative that


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accompaniestheclipsisarticulate,accurateandsharp.ThereforetheartofstorytellingandtheseriesrelatingtoNewZealandmeanthat an individual’s ‘common curiosity’ (Cumberland 1945) isstimulated.

Table2:LandmarksclipsavailableontheTeArawebsite

Topic Episode Location Time

Geomorphology Episode1 WhiteIsland 1.09

SheepDriving Episode4 MukamukaRocks,Wellington 1.01

Establishingpastoralism

Episode4 PencarrowHeads 1.03

RaurimuSpiral Episode8 KingCountry 1.11

Wherecanclipsbefound?The complete series is not available onDVD. However, extractsfromtheseriesareavailableinthefollowingplaces:

1. ThecompleteseriesisavailableonvideofromtheNationalLibraryofNewZealand.

2. NZ On Screen provides episodes 1 and 8 broken into 10minuteclips,whichareavailableatwww.nzonscreen.com

3. Thenationalfilmarchives(www.filmarchive.org.nz).4. TeAra:TheEncyclopaediaofNewZealandshowsfourclips

(www.teara.govt.nz/settledlandscapes).SeeTable2.5. On‘YouTube’:DownloadedbyTeeVeeNZ.SeeTable3.

AkeyelementistheavailabilityofawellresearchedNewZealandnarrativethatprovidesaccurateinsightsintohowandwhysettlersocieties dramatically transformed their landscapes. While thenumberofviewsmaynotcorrespondwithanyoftheclipsgoing‘viral’,thereismorethansimplenostalgiaoperating.Ascholarlyaptitudeprevailsineveryaspectoftheseries:fromprecisedatesofthearrivalofsheepfromAustraliainNewZealandtotheuseofanoriginalcreamseparatorwhichhelpedtransformtheWaikatodairy industry. The series introduces individuals such as ChowChong, John MacKenzie, Rudolf Wigley, William Goodfellow andotherswhoeachhadamajorimpactuponthedevelopmentofthe


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NewZealandlandscapeyetenjoylittlecontemporaryprofile.Thereferencing of the photographs (see Figure 1) displays theattentiontodetaildisplayedinallareasoftheseries.

Table3:Landmarksclipsandnumberofviews.

Title Episode Time Viewsat30/11/12

Viewsat31/05/13

Viewsat30/09/13

NZMaoriKumaraRevolution

2 4.55 2,474 2,977 3,428

NZMoa 2 8.36 14,331 19,018 21,365

MoaHunters

2 4.31 3,179 3,803 4,178

FirstSealersinFiordland

3 5.07 1,178 1,304 1,376

TheWhalers

3 8.35 731 935 1,046

Auckland:PolynesianCapitalCity

2 3.39 270 318 359

HobsonandTreatyofWaitangi

3 7.49 5,019 6,070 6,463

Muskets,FlaxandBibles

3 5.25 1,703 2,275 2,567

TiwaiPoint,BluffNZ,Australia

3 2.02 637 706

Conclusion

Landmarks was and still is a well researched New Zealandnarrativethattellsusabouthowourlandcametolookasitdoestoday. George Santayana (1905) stated that ‘Thosewho cannotremember the past are condemned to repeat it’. While not


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suggestingthattheenvironmentalmanagementpracticedinearlycolonialtimesislikelytoberepeated,awarenessofhowdecisionstaken can rapidly lead to transformation of existing landscapesprovidesapoolofknowledgethatbenefitsallNewZealand.

Figure1:LandmarksEpisode6:Posterforschools


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Bibliography

Andrews, G. (2009). Landmarks: A Land Apart. NZ On Screen(accessed 4 August 2012). Available from URL:http://www.nzonscreen.com/title/a‐land‐apart‐1981/background

Archive New Zealand (2012). The New Zealand Film Archive(accessed 10 Oct 20) Available from URL:http://www.filmarchive.org.nz/the‐catalogue/

BakerL.,S.Braunias,G.Hill (2005).TheUnauthorisedHistoryofNew Zealand. NZ On Screen (accessed 1 September 2012).Available from URL: http://www.nzonscreen.com/title/the‐unauthorised‐history‐of‐new‐zealand‐2005

Billig,M.(1995).BanalNationalism.Sage,London.

Boyd‐Bell, R. (1985).NewZealandTelevision:TheFirst25 years.ReedMethvenPublishersLtd,Auckland.

Cumberland,K.B.(1945). ‘Foreword’,NewZealandGeographer1,pp1‐4.

Cumberland, K.B. (1956). ‘Why geography?’, New ZealandGeographer12,pp1‐11.

Cumberland,K..(1981).Landmarks:HowNewZealandersRemadetheirLandscape.ReadersDigestServicesPtyLimited,SurryHills,NewSouthWales.

Cumberland, K.B. (1990). LandmarksRevisited.WaikatoBranch,NewZealandGeographicalSociety,Hamilton

Cumberland, K.B. (2011).Milestones and Landmarks. W. J. DeedPrintingLimited,Waiuku.

Harvey, D. (1990). ‘Between space and time: Reflections on thegeographical imagination’,Annals of theAssociation of AmericanGeographers80.33,pp418‐34.

Hoskins, W. G. (1955). The Making of the English Landscape.HodderandStoughton,London.

Howie,W.(2012). ‘Landmarks:Geographical imaginariesandtheco‐constitution of nation and discipline’. Paper presented in theKennethCumberlandsession,NZGSConference2012.


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Howie, W., N. Lewis (2013). ‘Geographical imaginaries:Articulatingthevaluesofgeography’,underreview,NewZealandGeographer.

NZ On Screen (2012). NZ On Screen (accessed 15 June 2011).AvailablefromURL:http://www.nzonscreen.com/.

Pawson, E. (2007). ‘Landmarks: A personal view of the story ofNewZealand’,in'Filmseveryenvironmentalhistorianshouldsee',EnvironmentalHistory12.2,pp350‐51.

Pawson,E. (2011). ‘Creatingpublicspaces forgeography inNewZealand:TowardsanassessmentofthecontributionsofKennethCumberland’,NewZealandGeographer67.2,pp102‐15.

Reith, J. C .W. (1924). Broadcast over Britain. Hodder andStoughton,London.

Roche, M. (2012). ‘Geography as “education for life”: KennethCumberland in the New Zealand Geographer 1945‐2007’, NewZealandGeographerspecialedition.

Santayana,G.(1905).TheLifeofReason:Introduction,andReasoninCommonSense.CharlesScribnerandSons,NewYork.

Te Ara, The Encyclopaedia ofNew Zealand (accessed 18 August2011).AvailablefromURL:http://www.teara.govt.nz.

LeonardCockayne:Amostenthusiasticgardener

AndrewGregg1

Leonard Cockayne is known as New Zealand’s greatest botanistandfirstplantecologist.NotonlywasCockayneaninfluentialandforward‐thinking individualwhopromoted the appreciation andpreservation of our indigenous flora, he also became NewZealand’smostnationallyand internationallyrecognisedpioneerbotanist through his life’s work. First and foremost, though,Cockaynewas–asthecoverofoneofhisbooksdescribedhim–‘amost enthusiastic gardener’.2 Gardening was the activity thatstimulatedhis interest inbotanyasacareer,andthedecadeshespentobservingandexperimentingwithplantsathomeandinthefieldunderpinnedhisscientificauthorityandexpertise.

I first became aware of Leonard Cockayne as a kid growing upnearOtariPlantMuseuminWilton,Wellington. My familyand Iwouldoftenexplorethisopenairsanctuaryforwalksandgetlostinthebeautifulanddiversefloraondisplay.EachtimeIvisitedIfoundmyselfstandingatCockayne’sgrave,whereheandhiswifeMaude are buried, and wondering what had inspired theman’sfascination with, and dedication to the study and protection of,plants. I did not appreciate at the time that the answer to thatquestionlaybeforemyveryeyes.

Fast forward two decades and I found myself revisiting thisthought.ThistimeitwasresearchintotheevolutionofTongariroNational Park, as part of the Waitangi Tribunal claims process,whichsparkedmyinterest. Cockaynehadconductedabotanicalsurvey in 1908 that proved influential in ensuring that tens ofthousands of acres of land around the three iconic mountains,Tongariro,NgāuruhoeandRuapehu,werereservedforprotection.IwantedtoknowmoreaboutthisearlyNewZealandscientistand

1 Andrew Gregg is an historian working for Auckland War MemorialMuseumandthecurrentTreasurerofPHANZA.OriginallyfromWellington,Andrewhas aBachelor of Science and aMasters inHistory fromVictoriaUniversity. Beforemoving toAucklandat thebeginningof2013,AndrewwasemployedasaseniorhistorianattheWaitangiTribunal.2L.Cockayne,TheCultivationofNewZealandPlants,WhitcombeandTombsLimited,Wellington,1923.


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discoveredthatlittlehadbeenwrittenabouthim.Icouldseethatabiographywasjustified,soIdecidedtotakeonthechallenge.

MybiographyofLeonardCockayne isbasedaround threebroadthemes of his life and work. First, I am looking at Cockayne’sinvolvement in the transitionofNewZealandbotanical researchfrom the so‐called ‘stamp collecting’ phase through to ecologicalstudiesofNewZealand’snativeflora.LeonardCockaynewasoneofthefirstNewZealandbotaniststogobeyondsimplycollectingandcataloguingnativeplants. Theearliestbotanists toarrive inNewZealanddiscoveredalandwithauniqueflora,fuellingtheirdesire to explore and collect specimens. These early explorerswantedtoseeplantsintheirnativehabitats,findnewspeciesandsend specimens tomuseums and gardens in their homeland. Ingeneral,theysawnativeplantsasmerecuriosities,believingthatintimethe‘superior’plantsandanimalsoftheirhomelandswouldreplace the indigenous biota.3 Consequently, their ‘botanising’focusedoncollecting,namingandsendingspecimensforscientificperpetuity.

Cockayne,however, sought tounderstand relationshipsbetweenplantsand theirenvironment. Indoing so,hehelpedpioneeranew plant science – plant ecology. In Cockayne’s words, ‘plantecologyisconcernedwiththestudyofplantsaslivingorganisms,notinthelaboratoryunderartificialconditions,butinthefieldasthey grow naturally’.4 His substantive research began as ahorticulturalist,studyingplantsinhisimmensegardentoseehowthe form of a species changed in relation to differentenvironmentalconditions.Thismethodofstudyingplantsinsitu,rather than from herbarium specimens, was an innovativeapproach within the field of plant science. Moving beyond hisgarden laboratory,heappliedhisknowledge toobservingplantsacross the New Zealand landscape. Through his extensiveobservation and field work, Cockayne made the most thoroughexplorationofnativevegetationofallNewZealandbotanists.

3 Biota refers to all of the organisms, including animals, plants, fungi andmicro‐organisms,foundinagivenarea.4 R. Glenn, The Botanical Explorers of New Zealand, A.H. and A.W. Reed,Wellington,1950,p154.


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Thetransitiontothisnewsciencewas,attimes,alonelypursuit.Few scientists were based in New Zealand during the latenineteenthandearlytwentiethcenturiesandthosethatdidresideherewere isolated from colleagues in other countries. In 1913,Cockayne remarked that ‘[o]ne is apt to get a little lonelysometimeswith sovery few interested in the same study. Even[Thomas] Cheeseman and [Donald] Petrie are sowrapped up indeciding whether a certain plant be a species or no, that myperhaps wider pursuits are of little interest to them’.5 Toovercome this isolation, Cockayne corresponded regularly withbotanical colleagues overseas, many of whom were leading theway in plant ecology. Cockayne exchanged ideas through theseinternationalconnections,placinghimattheforefrontofthisnewscientificdisciplineinNewZealand.

ThesecondstrandtomybiographyisCockayne’scontributiontothe modern conservation movement. Cockayne recognised andpromoted the protection of New Zealand’s indigenous flora at atime when bush clearance, wetland drainage and timberacquisition were all changing the New Zealand landscape.Throughhiscommissionedbotanicalsurveys,Cockaynecollectedscientific justifications to impress on governments the need topreserve New Zealand’s flora in its natural habitat. In the latenineteenthandearlytwentiethcenturies,protectionofthenaturalworld was very much focused on scenery preservation for thepurpose of recreation and spiritual fulfilment. Cockayne arguedstrongly, however, that ‘the special features of any landscapedependuponthecombinationsofplantswhichformitsgarment’.6For him, it was the uniqueness of New Zealand’s flora thatjustifieditsprotection.

CockaynewasalsoaninfluentialvoiceinthedevelopmentofNewZealand’s earliest national parks and reserves. He saw nationalparks as ‘havens of refuge’ or ‘great open‐air museums’, whereplantcommunitiesshouldbeprotectedintheirnaturalstatewithminimal disturbance from introduced species and humanactivities. At a time of rapid environmental transformation, 5LetterfromL.CockaynetoW.B.Hemsley,5February1913.6 L. Cockayne, ‘On a botanical survey of the Tongariro National Park’,AppendicestotheJournalsoftheHouseofRepresentatives,1908,C‐II,p2.


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Cockayne was the scientific voice behind setting aside andprotectinguniqueecosystems. Asmentionedearlier,Cockayne’sinfluenceledtotheexpansionofTongariroNationalParktooveronehundredandthirty thousandacres. Whileheacknowledgedscenerypreservationrationales for landreservation,hebelievedreserves should go further and incorporate representative plantlife unique to an area. To him it was a matter of nationalimportance, and in that senseCockaynewasamanaheadof histime.Cockayne’s influence among the general public, withingovernmentandthescientificcommunityisthethirdbroadthemeof my biography. Cockayne was a skilful publicist writingextensively inbothnewspapersandpopularbooksto informthepublicofhisviews,educatingNewZealandersabout theneed topreservetheirnaturalworldinthewakeofsignificantchange.In1910,hewroteoneofhisbestknownbooks,NewZealandPlantsandtheirStory, to,asheput it, ‘stirupsomeinteresthere in thebotany of the country’.7 This and subsequent works wereinfluential in shifting attitudes toward our indigenous plant life.His advocacyovermanyyears also led to theestablishment anddevelopment of gardens, parks and reserves across the country,including Kapiti Island Nature Reserve, Kennedy Bush and mypersonalfavourite,theOtariNativePlantMuseum.

Despite Cockayne’s limited university training, he also made asubstantial contribution to scientific scholarship. He publishedmorethan280articlesonNewZealandbotanyandplantecologyathomeandabroad.MuchoftheworkpublishedonNewZealandflora before Cockayne’s time focused on plant classification, butCockayne significantly advanced botanical knowledge in thetwentieth century and became an authoritative voicewithin thescientific community. This work received recognition withnumerousawardsanddistinctions, themostsignificantbeinganhonorary PhD from the University of Munich in 1903, and hiselectionasaFellowoftheRoyalSocietyofLondonin1912. ThesameSocietyalsohonouredhimwiththeDarwinMedal in1928.SuchhonourshelpedCockayne togain the fundingheneeded to

7LetterfromL.CockaynetoJ.Hooker,26June1911.


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continue his botanical work, to which he remained committeduntiltheendofhislife.

Leonard Cockayne, a most enthusiastic gardener, dominated anexciting and pioneering period in New Zealand science. A keyfigureofNewZealand’s‘secondgeneration’ofbotanists,Cockaynespentdecadesstudyingtherelationshipbetweenplantsandtheirenvironment at his home and in the field. What he discoveredalong the way provided a springboard for his scholarlyachievements. But itwasCockayne’ssenseof the intrinsicvalueofourindigenousflora–developedthroughcloseassociationoverhislifetime–thatinflamedhispassionforconvincingothersoftheneedtoprotectit.


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CollectionsofletterswrittenbyoraboutJamesHectorSimonNathan1James Hector (1834‐1907)was the dominant personality in thelatenineteenthcenturyscientificcommunityinNewZealand. Asthefirstprofessionalscientisttobeemployedbythegovernment,hefoundedtheGeologicalSurvey(nowGNSScience),theColonialMuseum(nowTePapa)andtheNewZealand Institute(nowtheRoyal Society of New Zealand) as well as supervising weatherforecasting,thetimeservice,andtheColonialBotanicGarden.As part of a forthcoming biographical study of James Hector,several collections of letters have recently been transcribed –more than 800 letters, mainly from the Alexander TurnbullLibrary,TePapaarchives,theHockenLibrary,andthearchivesoftheRoyalBotanicGardensatKew.Thishasbeenundertakenbyasmall team including Rowan Burns, Esme Mildenhall, JudithNathan, SimonNathan and SaschaNolden. These transcriptionsarepotentiallyauseful tool forresearchers inavarietyof fields,so they have been published by the Geoscience Society of NewZealandaspartsofGSNZMiscellaneousPublication133.Theyareavailableas freedownloadablePDF files fromtheGSNZwebsite,www.gsnz.org.nz–ClickonPublications,thenMisc.Pub.Series.Sofarthefollowingsevenvolumeshavebeenpublished:

"My Dearest Georgie": Transcriptions of 22 letters fromJames Hector to his wife Georgiana written in 1890 byJudithNathanandSimonNathan.GeoscienceSocietyofNewZealandmiscellaneouspublication133A,35pp.

"My Dear Hooker": Transcriptions of letters from James

HectortoJosephDaltonHookerbetween1860&1898byRowanBurnsandSimonNathan.GeoscienceSocietyofNewZealandmiscellaneouspublication133B,208pp.

1Dr.SimonNathanisanEmeritusScientistwithGNSScience.Followingalongcareerasaprofessionalgeologist,henowpursueshis interest in thehistoryofscience.


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“MyDearDrHaast”:Transcriptionsofselectedlettersfrom

Robert Langley Holmes to Julius Haast between 1864‐65and 1868‐70 by Rowan Burns and Simon Nathan.Geoscience Society of New Zealand miscellaneouspublication133C,53pp.

The correspondence of Julius Haast and James Hector,

1862‐1887 by Sascha Nolden, Rowan Burns and SimonNathan. Geoscience Society of New Zealand miscellaneouspublication133D,315pp.

"AQuickRunHome":CorrespondencewhileJamesHector

was overseas in 1875‐1876 by Rowan Burns and SimonNathan. Geoscience Society of New Zealand miscellaneouspublication133E,144pp.

TranscriptionsofselectedlettersfromFrederickWollaston

Hutton to James Hector and Julius Haast by EsmeMildenhall, Rowan Burns and Simon Nathan. GeoscienceSocietyofNewZealandmiscellaneouspublication133F(2ndedition),175pp.

JamesHector inNorthland,1865‐66byRowanBurnsand

Simon Nathan. Geoscience Society of New Zealandmiscellaneouspublication133G,57pp.

As well as information on Hector’s scientific interests and hisrivalrywithHaastandHutton,thereisinformationonlifeineachofthefourmaincentres,politicalgossip,commentsonthe‘nativeproblem’,andtheworkingsofgovernment. Therearegloriouslygossipy letters fromR.L. Holmes (MP 133C) andWalterMantell(2ndpartofMP133E),Hector’s concernsabout industrialunrestin 1890 (MP 133A), andHutton’s complaints about problems intheflaxindustry(MP133F).HectorkeptJosephHookeruptodatewithdevelopmentsinNewZealand (MP 133A), including notes on earthquakes, volcaniceruptions and other hazards. Hooker often sent extracts fromHector’sletterstothenewlyestablishedscientificjournal,Nature.


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OneofHector’sconcernswastheextentofdeforestation,andthespeed with which native forests were being milled or burnt.Based on his experience in Canada he advocated plantingimported conifers, and used the Colonial Botanic Garden as anexperimentalnurserytotestoutwhichspeciesgrewbestinNewZealand.Several more collections of letters are in preparation, includingcorrespondence between Julius Haast and JosephHooker, and abibliographyofHector’spublications,includingahugenumberofreports in the Appendices to the Journal of the House ofRepresentatives. It ishopedthatthebiographywillbepublishedbylate2015,intimeforthe150thanniversaryofthefoundingoftheGeologicalSurveyandtheColonialMuseum.For more information, please contact Simon Nathan –[email protected]. We would appreciate feedback fromreaders, informationonmore letters thatmaycometo light,andtheinevitablecorrectionsthatwillbediscovered.We gratefully acknowledge the award of the VUW‐GNS summerscholarship that supported Rowan Burns, and funding from theBrianMasonScientificandTechnicalTrust.


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REVIEW:Peter Hayden and Rod Morris, An Extraordinary Land:Discoveries and Mysteries from Wild New Zealand,HarperCollins, Auckland, 2013. 200 pp. ISBN 978 1 869509637.JulianKuzmaRipley’sBelieve ItorNot! is a franchise featuring bizarre events,strange items and sensational records. An Extraordinary Land,withsectionheadingssuchas‘MysterySolved’, ‘WhoKnew?’and‘That’sWeird’,similarlyshedslightonNewZealand’sastonishingwildlifeanduniqueenvironments,examiningmanymysteriesandmyths. The book usefully consolidates a wide range of recentscientificresearch,environmentaldiscoveriesandconservationalinitiatives in a way that is both informative and accessible. AnExtraordinary Land will prove an eye‐opening journey ofdiscoveryforreaders,offeringsurprisingfactsaboutourdiversityofspecies,eventhoseconsideredfamiliartoNewZealanders.Forexample, our national bird, once denigrated as a flightlessevolutionaryanomaly,isinfactrevealedbyrecentresearchtobea superbly adapted ‘sensory superstar’ with one of the biggestbrainsofanybirdintheworld!New Zealanders tend to takemuch about their environment forgranted, but the authors remind us what a unique, intricatelydiverselandweinhabit.Isolationhas‘turnedNewZealandintoawild laboratorywhereevolutioncouldconductexperiments thatled to weird and wonderful outcomes’. Believe It or Not! factsincludethecryogenicabilityofthealpineweta,theroleoflizardsand native bats as pollinators, the remarkable ability of thepohutukawatospreadacrossthePacificandcolonisetheharshestofenvironments,andtheasyetnot fullyunderstoodmovementsof whitebait. Genetics is used to explain the suicidal defencemechanism of the bluff weta, the incredible evolutionaryprovenanceoftheextinctHaast’sgianteagleandthetolerance(orintolerance) of many species to extreme cold. Our little bluepenguins are divided into two species north and southofBanks


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Peninsula, and the northern penguins do not like living in coldplaces–whoknew?!

The section entitled ‘Mystery Solved’ examines reasons behindour wildlife’s strange behaviour or unusual lifestyles. ‘WhoKnew?’revealsstartlingfactsaboutsomespecies,withthehelpofthoseatthefrontlineofscienceandconservation.Theformer,bythe way, includes an acknowledgement of the discoveries andcontributionsofchildrentoournaturalhistoryrecord–scientificinquisitiveness is not solely the provenance of adults. ‘That’sWeird’ investigates the extremes of evolutionary diversity – analienworldofsuper‐sizedspecies,waddlingmiceandboxingbats.‘TotheRescue’dealswiththeworkofpreservingnativespeciesin


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the face of introduced predators, outlining many conservationprojectsandsuccessstories.The authors both share a background with the Natural HistoryUnit and theybring the same standardsofproductionquality tothis book. Peter Hayden’s text is conversationally engaging,conveying his enthusiasm and reflecting his considerablequalifications for the subject as a writer and producer ofdocumentaries. The text is superbly complemented by RodMorris’ photography. It is possible to become inured toubiquitousbooksofNewZealandnaturephotographybutMorris‐withhisdramaticandrevealinglyintimateportraitsofbirdlifeinparticular‐isanartistatthetopofthegame,showcasingacareerofover30years.Overall,thisisawell‐researchedjourneyofdelightanddiscovery–acharmingandinterestingeye‐openerofabooktobeenjoyedbyreadersofallages.


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REVIEW:

JamesBeattie,EmpireandEnvironmentalAnxiety:Health,Science, Art and Conservation in South Asia andAustralasia, 1800‐1920, Palgrave Macmillan, Basingstoke,Hants.,2011.xv+320pp. ISBN978‐0‐230‐55320‐0. £55.00hardback.

IanTyrrell1

JamesBeattie’sEmpireandEnvironmentalAnxietyisanambitiousbook. It surveys the changing perceptions of British colonials,mostly (white) settlers, government officials and scientists, butalso artists. Encountering colonial environments generatedanxious responses among these people that both reflectedenvironmental critiques of colonial impacts and spurred theexertionof imperial control throughmoreefficientmanipulationofresourcesandbureaucraticintervention.Beattie’sworkbuildsuponthethesisofRichardGroveregardingthecolonialoriginsofearlyconservationbut,alongsideadeclensionistnarrative,Beattiefindsadevelopmentalnarrativeofresourceuse.

Covering the whole of the nineteenth century and the earlytwentieth,butwithemphasisuponthelaternineteenth,thebookdrawstogethermaterialonIndia,AustraliaandNewZealandasaregionwith distinctive interactions and common experiences ofimperialism and environment as they shared in a ‘cross‐fertilisation of environmental anxieties’ (p 167). Beattie followsthe careers of individuals who moved across this Indo‐Pacificworldasofficials,settlersandimmigrants,suchasAlfredSharpe,thepainterwhosewatercoloursofNewZealand influencedparkaesthetics in a trans‐Tasman context. Beattie shows the cross‐colonial linkages, thenetworksof influencethatspreadanxietiesabout British colonial and settler impacts upon the land’sresources andecosystems,while at the same timehe recognisesthat local circumstances powerfully influenced the policyresponsesadopted.

1 IanTyrrell is anEmeritusProfessorofHistory at theUniversity ofNewSouthWales,Sydney.


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The book identifies environmental anxiety across a range ofdifferent topics, showinghowcolonialsworriedaboutunhealthyurbanconditions,theaestheticsofenvironmentalchange,climatevariation, deforestation and its hydrological consequences, andperceived desertification. Thus, for health reasons, AustralianeucalyptusspecieswereextensivelyplantedinIndiatodealwithmalaria. Beattie shows that healthfulness and environmentalaesthetics were closely associated in the mania for plantingspecies such as the blue gum (Eucalyptus globulus). Concernamongcolonialcriticsandenvironmentalreformersoverthelossof forests also revealed fears for the possible effects on climate.Awareness of sand drift influenced attempts at dune controlthroughafforestation, and theaestheticsof apark‐likevaluationofnatureencouragedenvironmental change,andsimultaneouslyspurred the setting aside of urban and non‐urban parks andreserves. In the process of outlining these concerns aboutdeforestationandreforestation,Beattiecontestsfaciledistinctionsbetweenearlynineteenth‐centurydislikeofindigenousplantsandlaternineteenth‐centuryappreciation.Inthisandotherrespects,colonial environmental views were ‘more complex than manyscholarsbelieve’(p74).

Beattie’s stimulating arguments raise important questions fordebate. One is terminology. Though ‘anxiety’ is his favouredformulation, the epithet of ‘alarmism’ is also discussed amongsettlerconcernsthatexploited ‘highlyalarmist language’(p212)and ‘hyperbole’ (p 210). Yet alarmism and anxiety havesomewhat different connotations. Perhaps they are part of acontinuum, but one can be anxious about environmental issueswithoutraisinganalarmoverimminentcollapse.Thedistinctionmightbedeveloped.

Anotherissueisteasingoutfromthetextexactlywhattheimpactof anxiety is. A general point made is that anxieties had acumulativeeffect inpromotinggreaterhuman intervention,withthe implication that greater intervention meant moreenvironmental regulation. One might conclude thatenvironmental anxiety, or even alarm, was useful in proddingpeople and governments into corrective action, but the overallattitudetotheuseofhyperbolicrhetoricingoadingactionisnotexplicit.Ifanxietiesarefanciful,thentimeandtimeagainthecry


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of ‘wolf’ will undermine the value of the intervention. Thisargumentcouldbeturnedintoacritiqueofenvironmentalisminthattime,andinours.

Beattie makes a vital point by reminding us that Europeans inthesecoloniesworriedoverenvironmentalchange longago,andtookaction. Healsosuggests that thoughalarmandanxietyarenotnew,inourageastarkchoiceof‘destructionorconservation’is present (p 216). This categorisation contrastswith themorereserveddiscussionof the impactsofanxietyover the longhaul,given how varied in content as opposed to language theseanxieties have been. The relationship between perception andrealityovertimeneedsamoreexplicitanalysishere.

A further question concerns the processes whereby anxiety isarticulated and spread. Beattie emphasises the role ofprofessionalsandtheirgrowinguseofenvironmentaldiscoursetoenhance their power. But exactly how does the work ofprofessionalsorothergroupseffectchange?Intheearlytwenty‐first century, alarm sits alongside what appears to be, amonginfluential people, imperviousness towards the dangers, and atemporarilyrecedingsenseofpublicdisquiet.Whatistheroleofpolitics in articulating and channelling alarm? This question isparticularlyapt,giventhatthecasestudiesofAustralianandNewZealand on the one hand and India on the other had differentgovernmental structures, as Beattie reminds us, though eachsharedinthenineteenthcenturyaBritishcolonialaffiliation.Theroleofmedia in thisprocessofdissemination ishintedat in thediscussionofsoilerosionandtheimpactofthelaterDustBowlintheUnitedStates. But, for thenineteenth century, onewonderswhetherthespreadofliteracyandcheapernewspapers,togetherwiththecirculationofprintmaterialsacrosstheempirethroughspeediercommunications, influencedthelevelofanxietyinwaysthatcouldnothaveoccurredearlier,orwouldnotseemunusuallater.

Beattie also documents the important role of religion in thepromotionofenvironmentalanxietyandreform,butmainlyasasanction for environmental improvement in the husbanding ofresources. Theactualroleofreligioninpromotinganxietyisnottaken up. It is examined as a way of critiquing an aesthetic of


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wastelandandneglect(pp80‐81,187‐88)butnotintermsofthecreationofapocalypticalanddeclensionistthinking.Werechurchcongregations and news media used to mobilise people forconservation (as happened in the United States)? What, if any,was the role of missionaries in providing comparative data onwhyandhowtheexperienceofsomecountriesstoodaswarningstoothersofafatetobeavoided?

The book raises a tantalising issue about Indo‐Pacificconservation (pp 33‐34, 163‐64): common environmentalcircumstancesseemtohaveexistedthroughtheElNino/SouthernOscillation, or ENSO and, to some extent, shared patterns ofdrought and flood can be exhibited. The New Zealand‐basedsurveyor F.S. Peppercorne’s experience drawing solutions toAustralian aridity from North India is suggestive of sharedperceptionsandpolicies. ButwereIndo‐Pacificregionalclimaticinfluences the subject of much wider nineteenth‐centurydiscussion, and were observations on flood and droughtregularitiesacrosstheregioninfluential,orwasthecommonalitymoreoneofinstitutionalandpersonalconnections?

Beattie’s work shows wide reading, and admirably emphasisescomplexity,butperhapssomuchso that thenuancespreventusfrom seeing a clear outline of the impact of anxiety and itsrelations to imperialism. While the latter is shown to beconcernedwith colonialdevelopment, it also represented settlerassertions of power over land and indigenous people.Conservation could be viewed as intrinsically an extension ofsettler demonstrations of a right to occupation – asmarking aneffectivestakeintheland.

There are many important observations in this sound andscholarly study. Its breadth of coverage and integration of theresearch is admirable, as is its innovative linking of Australia toboth New Zealand and India. One testimony to this book’simportance is the many questions it raises for future research.ThisworkwillalsoaddtothegrowingscholarshiponAustralian‐Asianrelationsfromanew,environmentalstandpoint.

ISSN: 1175 4222 ENNZ: Environment and Nature in New Zealand · ENNZ: Environment and Nature in New...

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